Nearbies

Abstract

Community colleges enroll nearly half of the students enrolled in public undergraduate programs and a disproportionate number of first-generation, low-income, underprepared and minority students. The new national completion agenda has brought both visibility and pressure to these open-access institutions, which have completion rates of less than 25% for first-time full-time students and even lower rates for part-time students. While interventions to improve success tend to be focused on the first year, a surprisingly large number of students successfully complete more than 1 year of college credits yet leave without completing a credential or transferring. This study focuses on these “nearbies,” successful students close to completion who leave higher education. Results indicate students have varied reasons for departing, demonstrate behaviors at odds with their espoused value of earning a certificate or degree, and need support and encouragement throughout their time at the college. Personal relationships are particularly important in fostering a sense of connection.

Keywords

college completion student success stop out drop out educational goals educational attainment

Community colleges serve an essential access function, enrolling 47% of all public undergraduates and disproportionate numbers of students who work, raise families, and/or arrive academically underprepared for college-level courses (Snyder & Dillow, 2012). While the vast majority of entering community college freshmen say they intend to earn a certificate or degree, 6 years after entry, only 34% of first-time, full-time freshmen have achieved this goal—and fewer than 25% when part-time freshmen are included; nearly half (46%) disappear entirely from higher education without completing a certificate, degree, or transferring (Radford, Berkner, Wheeless, & Shepherd, 2010). Yet, National Student Clearinghouse data indicate that approximately 80% of first-time community college students complete 12 or more credits within 6 years of entry, and about 60% complete 30 or more (College Board, 2013). Relatively few studies focus on characteristics and experiences of students who successfully accumulate significant numbers of credit hours but who leave college before earning a credential or transferring.

This article focuses on this less-examined end of the community college pipeline. We seek insights into students’ lives and the value they place on education to understand why seemingly successful students fail to complete credentials and what colleges might do to reengage them in completing certificates, degrees, or transfer. Understanding students’ behavior and perceptions may help colleges to improve rates of attainment—especially when relatively small investments of college resources and effort may be required to encourage completion. Furthermore, the analysis has implications for the ways in which community colleges interact with their students, for maximizing return of investment of resources required to improve rates of completion and transfer, and for shifting student success initiatives from a concentration in the first year to continuous efforts throughout students’ lives in college.

Literature Review

Strong and consistent correlations have been reported between early departure behaviors and college students’ pre-college characteristics, levels of involvement, and commitment in classroom and extracurricular activities (Pascarella & Terenzini, 2005). Those particularly at risk for early departure include first-generation students, students from historically underrepresented racial/ethnic groups, and students from non-native English speaking or lower-income families (Cohen, Brawer, & Kisker, 2014). Also, students who delay in starting college for a year or more after high school graduation, who are enrolled part-time, who work full-time, or are financially responsible for dependents are at higher risk for attrition (Burns, 2010). While these correlations are well documented, student characteristics are largely beyond the control of the open admission college and thus offer little leverage for improving community college completion rates. The question remains, what can the college do to improve student success?

Tinto (1993) asserts that less than 25% of all students drop out because of academic failure while more than 75% of students who leave college do so because of difficulties related to a lack of fit between the skills and interests of students and “the organization of educational institutions, their formal structures, resources, and patterns of association” (p. 89). Theoretically, student success can be improved if the student adapts to the institution, if the institution adapts to the student, or both. In fact, Pascarella and Terenzini’s (2005) extensive review of the literature asserts that since “individual effort or engagement is the critical determinant of the impact of college, then it is important to focus on the ways in which an institution can shape its academic, interpersonal, and extracurricular offerings to encourage student engagement” (p. 602). However, Astin’s (1993) observation that shaping an institution’s offerings to foster engagement of a diverse student population is a challenging undertaking remains valid today, 20 years later:

Environmental assessment presents by far the most difficult and complex challenge in the field of assessment. It is also the most neglected topic. In its broadest sense, the environment encompasses everything that happens to a student during the course of an educational program that might conceivably influence the outcomes under consideration. This includes not only the programs, personnel, curricula, teaching practices, and facilities that we consider to be part of any educational program but also the social and institutional climate in which the program operates. (p. 81)

Many colleges have implemented practices intended to improve student success in the first year. These include mandatory student orientation, intrusive advising, placement testing in English and math, required enrollments in developmental courses, streamlining of developmental programs, college success courses, and other innovations with mixed results (Hoops, 2010; Morest, 2012). Implicit in these approaches are the assumptions that early interventions will improve rates of first-year retention and that students who successfully navigate their first year will have acquired enough academic skills and college knowledge to persist, to transfer, or complete a certificate or degree.

The reality, however, is quite different. Between 40% and 50% of freshmen leave community college before their second year of attendance—a rate that has remained remarkably stable after decades of research focused on improving early persistence (ACT, 2012). Assessing or improving longer-term success of students is surprisingly difficult as progress must be measured against students’ varied educational objectives. Many may intend only to take a class or two, to take many classes but never earn a credential, or to transfer to a 4-year institution without earning an associate’s degree (Cohen & Brawer, 2014). Furthermore, students may change educational objectives more than once, attend sporadically (missing one or more academic terms before returning), enroll in different community colleges from term to term, or enroll in several colleges during the same term (Peter & Forrest Cataldi, 2005). Thus, when a community college student stops attending classes at a particular college, it is often difficult from an institutional perspective to ascertain whether the behavior represents failure or completion of the student’s educational objectives.

While the most common measures of student success remain completion of certificates and degrees, followed by transfer, alternate methods of categorizing student objectives and progress are now being promoted to supplement these traditional measures. Alternatives include completion of developmental and transition into gateway courses in English and mathematics, acquisition of 15 or 30 credits within a specific time frame, persistence from fall to spring and fall to fall, and successful completion of courses (e.g., Bahr, 2011; College Board, 2013; Jenkins & Cho, 2012).

In one such study, Topper (2009) used data from the Achieving the Dream initiative to identify students who earned at least 30 credits within the first 2 years of attendance before stopping out. She found that men were more likely to stop out (53% vs. 48% of women) as were students who entered college in their 20s (55% vs. 47% of those under age 20 and 52% over age 30). Fifty-five percent of students without a stated major or program of study left college within 5 years compared with 53% of those with a certificate or degree goal and 47% of those with a transfer goal. In a similar vein, Jenkins and Cho (2012) emphasized the importance of early commitment to a program of study, finding that over half of the students who chose a major in their first year of attendance earned a certificate or associate degree, transferred to a 4-year institution, or earned a bachelor’s degree within 5 years—about one third more than students who waited until their second year to choose a major.

Other research includes Lane, Michelau, and Palmer’s (2012) six-state study that defined “ready adults” as former students who had completed half or three-quarters the number of credit hours required to earn a degree before stopping out. This study suggested a number of general policies, strategies, and tools to mitigate barriers to former students with college credit seeking to complete degrees. Bausch et al. (2011) focused on identifying former New Jersey college students, 20 years of age or older who were in good academic standing and had completed half the credits needed for a degree within the last 10 years before leaving without a credential. Former students with significant numbers of credits earned report a variety of barriers including (a) competing priorities of work and family responsibilities that interfere with devoting the time or effort required to return to college, (b) financial pressures that make returning to college difficult especially if previous financial holds or student loan defaults are involved, (c) fear of failure exacerbated by unfamiliarity with computer and related technologies and a feeling of not belonging, (d) bureaucratic obstacles such as academic holds related to poor grades in classes that may have been abandoned when the student last left college, and/or (e) difficulty getting transcripts and work experience analyzed for academic credit or determining which program currently fits student needs and resources.

Johnson, Rochkind, Ott, and Dupont (2009) gathered telephone survey responses from a nationally representative sample of more than 600 former 2- and 4-year students (age 22-30) asking why they left college before completing a credential and then compared their responses with those of students who had attended similar institutions but successfully completed a credential. The study found that 60% of the community college respondents who had not graduated said they paid for college without help from their families, worked more than 20 hours a week while in school, and/or enrolled part-time, which in turn limited their financial aid and health care options. More than half said that a primary reason for leaving college was a need to work more, and approximately 30% reported that they had college loans to repay. Approximately 80% of noncompleters agreed that two changes would make college completion much more likely: offering more financial aid and health benefits to part-time students, and offering more evening and weekend classes to accommodate working while taking classes.

Recently, the Lumina Foundation funded Project Win–Win to identify students whose academic records already qualify them for an associate’s degree or place them no more than 9 to 12 credits short of a degree. Sixty-four associate’s granting institutions in nine states (Florida, Louisiana, Michigan, Missouri, New York, Ohio, Oregon, Virginia, and Wisconsin) have participated and identified approximately 130,000 former students with 60 or more credits, a grade point average (GPA) at or above the minimum required for graduation, no apparent degree, and a time lapse of at least 1 year since last enrolling. Transcripts of the 46,000 students who had neither earned a degree nor were enrolled elsewhere were audited, and 6,250 degree-eligible students and another 21,500 students within 12 credits of an associate degree were identified. Of the 21,500 students who were close to a degree, 2,800 could not be found, 4,600 needed to complete required math courses, and 600 have returned to college (Institute for Higher Education Policy [IHEP], n.d.).

Many participating colleges in Project Win–Win report that locating and convincing former students to complete the few requirements for a certificate or degree was both more difficult and less successful than expected. Identifying former students close to completing a certificate, degree, or transfer is time-consuming, and the individualized academic advising often needed to help returning students to complete a credential can be even more time-consuming. For example, specialized attention may be needed to determine which former students are best served by a general studies degree program (translating as many of the credits they have already earned as possible into a college credential) and which would benefit more from help in converting prior learning and credits from multiple institutions into a college degree. Students interested in direct career preparation may benefit more from learning what stackable and employer recognized certifications are available or how coursework can prepare them for professional exams. While the Council for Adult and Experiential Learning (Council for Adult and Experiential Learning [CAEL], n.d.) maintains LearningCounts.org, a website to help students to build a portfolio of formal and informal learning for college review, many colleges found it was difficult to convince students to return to college to complete their credentials. For example, Virginia’s Tidewater Community College identified 651 prospects, awarded 34 degrees outright, and convinced only 15 more students to return to campus to complete requirements. In Lumina-funded efforts, typically 9% to 17% of former students return to campus (Erisman & Steele, 2012).

In sum, studies demonstrate a significant number of community college students acquire credits well in excess of those required for certificates and sometimes approaching requirements for associate degrees, yet they leave higher education without either completing certificates or degrees or transferring. These findings collide directly with the assumption that the freshman year is the appropriate focus for nearly all interventions intended to move students from entry to completion or transfer. To address the gap between assumption and reality and to ascertain how a community college can help students take the final steps to completion, we conducted a case study at one community college.

Method

The Office of Research at Suburban Community College conducted a multiphase study during 2012 to learn more about students referred to as “nearbies”—initially defined as those who completed a minimum of 45 credits with a 2.0 (“C”) GPA at the college and who left after the 2010-2011 year without earning a Suburban certificate or degree. These credits do not include developmental courses (for which the college does not award credits) nor credits transferred from other colleges.¹ Thus, the key to selecting students for this study was where they ended in 2012, not when they entered the college or whether they had prior college work upon entry.²

The first part of this study involved a descriptive examination of demographic and academic progress data from the student information system to identify nearbies; a total of 834 students met the nearby criteria. Additional data secured from the National Student Clearinghouse indicated that 463 of these students (56% of the sample) had transferred to another college or university after leaving Suburban after fall 2010 and before February 2012 (when the latest data were available at the time the study was conducted). These transfer students were eliminated from this analysis along with 12 more who had been involved in a spring 2012 survey of Career and Technical Education alumni. After these adjustments, the sample for this analysis consisted of 359 students (43% of the original 834 students) meeting this modified definition of nearbies: former students who completed a minimum of 45 credits with a 2.0 (“C”) GPA at the college and who left after the 2010-2011 year without taking part in a spring 2012 survey of Career and Technical Education alumni or earning a Suburban certificate or degree or transferring to another college or university.

The second part of this study invited these 359 nearbies to complete a nearbie survey offered online or by telephone. Seventeen responded directly online and another 60 responded to telephone interviewers, for a total of 77 responses, a response rate of 21.4%. The survey asked respondents their primary objective in attending the college, their plans to earn a degree or certificate when they first enrolled, whether they had earned a bachelor’s degree before they last attended the college, whether anyone talked with them about the importance of earning a credential, the importance of a number of factors in their decision to leave the college, whether they transferred, why they decided not to transfer, future educational plans, interest in learning what courses they needed to complete a credential at the college, what might encourage them to return, and their sense of connectedness. The survey also included a number of demographic items such as race/ethnicity, gender, and age. Most items were closed-ended but several open-ended items permitted respondents to answer in their own words and potentially to provide responses that would give unexpected reasons for departure or incentives to complete.

The third part of the study was an analysis of transcripts of 20 randomly selected nearbies to gain insights into whether they had completed the College’s general education curriculum and the overall pattern of courses they had taken. The fourth and final part of this multiphase study was a focus group with participants recruited by an outside market research firm from a list of 359 nearbies supplied by Surburban. Potential participants were offered an incentive of $50 in addition to dinner. The marketing agency reported that recruitment was proceeding more slowly than expected, hampered by a combination of missing or outdated telephone numbers, difficulty catching students in person, and a lack of response to telephone messages. Therefore, we supplemented the original list of potential focus group members with approximately 300 additional students who had last attended Suburban in 2011-2012. The final definition of “nearbie” for the focus group component of the research is, therefore, somewhat different from the definition used in the first two components. Former students invited for the focus group included former students who completed a minimum of 45 credits with a 2.0 (“C”) GPA at the college and who left after the 2010-2011 or 2011-2012 year without taking part in a spring 2012 survey of Career and Technical Education alumni or earning a certificate or degree or transferring to another college or university.

A total of 14 nearbies agreed to participate in the focus group, which was held on a weekday evening at an off-campus focus group facility near the Suburban campus. However, only 5 arrived at the scheduled time and place for the focus group. Accepted practice for a mini-focus group allows 5 or 6 participants (rather than the 8 to 10 common in a regular focus group), and we decided to conduct the mini-focus group. Participants included one woman who had last attended in spring 2010, three women who had last attended Suburban in spring 2011, and one male who had last attended in fall 2011. Findings from this group discussion include references to college choice processes, academic goals, college experiences, reasons for leaving before earning a degree, and recommendations for improving college support for future degree completion.

Findings

In the first phase of this study, we identified 834 students who fit the initial definition of nearbie: former students who earned 45 or more credits with a “C” average or higher, had not enrolled at Suburban for a year, and had not completed a Suburban certificate or degree. The mean cumulative GPA for all 834 students was 2.85, and the mean number of Suburban credits earned was 62—more than enough to earn certificates, most associate degrees, or to transfer. Interestingly, 13% of these students had earned 75 or more credits, and 3% earned 100 or more credits. We concluded that completing coursework was not as much a problem for nearbies as completing the right coursework to earn a credential or to transfer.

Analyzing application data for these 834 students revealed that 49% had declared transfer goals, 37% declared career and technical education (CTE) goals, and 14% were undecided. However, the college does not require students to update their intended major and many do not. Students are permitted to take courses across the curricula except in limited-admission programs such as those in the health careers. Thus, official student files reflect intent at the time of entry and may be inconsistent with courses taken or the students’ more current program goals.

Using National Student Clearinghouse data, we found that more than half of this initial sample (n = 463) had transferred to another college or university—information that was not available in the college database. These transfer students attended 91 different institutions with the most popular destinations located in the local metropolitan area where students could conceivably continue their education without relocating. Students who transferred had higher Suburban GPAs (M = 2.98) than students who did not transfer (M = 2.73). There was no difference in numbers of credits earned between students who did or did not transfer. We removed these 463 transfer students from the analysis as well as 12 students found to be involved in a different College survey occurring at nearly the same time—leaving 359 nearbies in the population for the remainder of the study.

Survey Results

In the second phase of this study, the 359 nearbies in our population were invited to participate in a survey. Seventy-seven nearbies (21.4%) responded. Twenty-three of the respondents (30%) said they already had a bachelor’s degree before they last attended Suburban, though Suburban’s records did not show this. It may be that some attended Suburban before earning the bachelor’s degree, then returned to the College but never updated their information to reflect the degree. This suggests that the College may need to consider better ways to keep student achievement properly updated.

Refocusing our analysis on the remaining 54 survey respondents (who told us they did not have a bachelor’s degree), we found that only 16 (30%) remembered a faculty or staff member talking with them about the importance of completing a degree or certificate. Given the importance of faculty–student interaction (Community College Survey of Student Engagement [CCSSE], n.d.), Suburban may be able to improve student success by finding ways to better foster this sort of contact between students and their faculty (Cohen et al., 2014).

Respondents were offered a checklist of possible reasons to explain why they left Suburban without a degree or certificate, as well as an opportunity to indicate additional reasons through an open-ended response. The top two reasons alumni chose were that they did not see a value of staying at Suburban to earn the associate degree (17%) and that they were not doing well academically (15%). Overall, there were no patterns or consistency in reasons given, suggesting the factors prompting departure are many, variable, and therefore challenging for a college to address with a targeted and narrowly focused approach.

Of the 54 respondents who did not have a bachelor’s degree, 34 (70%) said they planned to continue their education; 26 (48%) planned to return to Suburban, whether to Suburban only or to Suburban and another college or university; 29 (54%) were interested in learning what courses they need to complete a Suburban degree or certificate; and another 4 (7%) may be interested. Most interesting, 37 (69%) said they would be very likely to return to Suburban if the college were to allow them to take the last six credits in an associate degree program without having to pay tuition or fees or receive financial aid. The college had considered offering this incentive to students and was interested in learning the likely receptivity to this initiative. At the present time, however, Suburban has not launched the incentive program given a concern about declining state funding.

This survey provided insights about nearbie perceptions and behavior, but did not identify targeted interventions the college might take to keep students enrolled through completion or to draw the nearbies back to the institution to complete their credentials. Perhaps a most important finding was that the nearbies were basically satisfied with Suburban, reinforcing the interpretation that survey results provided little concrete direction to the college.

Transcript Analysis

Given the significant amount of time required to analyze transcripts, for the third phase of this study we drew a random sample of 20 nearbie students to investigate in detail. We studied these transcripts to understand more about these students’ academic records at Suburban and how close they were to earning an associate degree. To begin, we identified all general education courses they had taken and determined whether they had met general education requirements for an associate degree. We restricted the general education courses to those certified by the Illinois Articulation Initiative (IAI). The IAI is a statewide agreement in which all public 2- and 4-year colleges and many private institutions participate, agreeing to accept courses included in a general education core curriculum even if the institution itself has different general education requirements for native students.

Not a single student in our sample had completed the general education core curriculum before leaving Suburban. Interestingly, there was no specific area within general education requirements that a majority of students had completed or not completed. In particular, the common lore at colleges—that students defer taking math or speech—was not supported by the evidence. Another common suggestion—that students complete their general education core and then transfer—was similarly unsupported by the evidence.

Finally, the transcript analysis showed students take a diverse array of courses both within the general education curriculum and beyond it. Although this study did not include rigorous transcript audits, findings suggest students are acquiring credits across a range of areas and may become discouraged by accumulating credits that do not lead to a formal credential, though they did not express this concern directly in the survey.

Focus Group

Nearbies who participated in the focus group reported a variety of early academic goals, including accruing credits to transfer into a bachelor’s program, earning an associate’s degree without any intention to transfer and completing courses to master content without intentions of securing the related credentials. Some nearbies reported staying with their initial academic goals while other changed their fields of study (for example, from law enforcement to accounting) in response to interest in course content and work experience.

These nearbies navigated college with little regard to traditional attendance patterns. Some reported starting college on a full-time basis as a recent high school graduate in response to parental pressure or by following the example of their high school peers. Several described starting or dropping to part-time attendance or stopping out altogether to maintain a full-time work schedule, to take on additional family responsibilities, or to avoid “missing out” on social activities with peers. All said they would advise new students to finish college as soon as possible even if it seems difficult to do so because external responsibilities of work, family, and/or social life increase over time, making completion ever more difficult.

All nearbies expressed dissatisfaction with advising, citing long waits, and a lack of depth and quality of information. Formal advising was often experienced as too brief or generic to be of much benefit: “It’s a hassle to get counseling . . . and the 10 or 15 minutes that [academic advisers] spend with you—how are they going to help guide your path for your future?” Nearbies wanted the college to do a better job in determining which services and information are best provided when rather than flooding them with catalog-level information. Most said they benefited from (or wanted) more personalized guidance when they first arrived on campus, and most agreed that advising on Suburban’s smaller campus was more accessible and useful than on the main campus.

Nearbies reported that information about college practices and policies was often confusing, especially early in their college careers, and that they did not always understand implications of their course or program choices in a timely way. For example, one participant knew she was good at mathematics but scored just below the cutoff score on the college placement test. She followed the college recommendation to register for a developmental mathematics course, not understanding that this was a noncredit “practice” course. A friend showed her the place in the related college brochure indicating that her assessment score was very close to qualifying for a credit course. With her friend’s encouragement, this nearbie refreshed her math skills (“learned a few formulas”) and took the placement test again. This time she placed into a college-level course and avoided taking a noncredit course she did not truly need. Early engagement with college faculty, advisers, staff, or even more experienced peers bolstered nearbie confidence during the transition to college. As one student said, “One warm encounter could change the whole experience of the school.”

Although this study did not include rigorous transcript audits, focus group findings indicate that some students acquire credits across a range of areas but are later discouraged to find that some or all of these credits do not count toward a formal credential or toward transfer to a 4-year institution. For example, several focus group participants reported having enrolled in an array of “interesting” vocational courses early in their college careers, failing to notice that these courses tend to be specialized or applied in nature and therefore rarely count toward credentials in other vocational programs or for academic transfer. While the college makes necessary information available to students in many forms, nearbies reported feeling surprised and upset when they became aware that credits earned did not “count” toward a particular goal.

Many nearbies observed that they were stretched thinner as time went on, typically working part- or full-time while enrolled in classes. In addition, they described a greater sense of wariness about the college experience as their time in college lengthens—an aversion to investing time and energy in choices that they might later find do not count toward expected credentials or transfer. The sting of perceived “wasted time and money” experienced previously along with a sense that they could easily make similar mistakes again contribute to a weaker sense of enthusiasm for taking on the continuing challenges associated with completing college credentials. For example, when asked, “How would you feel if Suburban invited you to a campus event?” the almost unanimous nearbie response was “skeptical.” They looked askance at this offer, saying they would need details to confirm that the event was “not just a waste of time meant for a group of people in the same major” but focused on their specific and personal interests or needs.

On the other hand, focus group nearbies said they valued college degrees. They agreed that the current labor market was very difficult to break into without a college degree. Those who reported having worked their way up to a good job without earning a degree still thought a degree would be useful. For example, one nearbie had been terrified to find upon being laid off from a banking job that she had worked her way up to over 10 years that—outside her narrow area of expertise—she was competing with 18-year olds for fast food or retail jobs that paid too little to meet her living expenses. The group consensus was that while a degree did not guarantee a stable, high-paying job, it made “getting a foot in the door” for an interview more likely. Nearbies agreed that any degree conferred some advantage, regardless of whether the degree conferred specific job skills.

Interestingly, nearbies almost uniformly equated college success with earning a degree. Even after acknowledging they were successful students in the sense of having completed more than 45 credits, none said they felt entirely “successful” without completing a degree. The personal sense of achievement at completing a degree was valued as well as its perceived career value. Listening to others describe the personal significance of earning a degree, even a participant who started the session by saying that she had completed all the course requirements but did not want a degree (just the knowledge) remembered that her father had always wanted to finish high school and said she might now submit the required paperwork and fees for her degree as a sign of respect for his aspirations. Paradoxically, while nearbies said it was valuable to complete a credential, none expressed a sense of urgency in doing so.

Nearbies perceived substantial variations in their educational experiences. Participants noted that quality of instruction and faculty expectations for student learning were not uniformly high. Several cited evening courses taught by older part-time faculty “who mostly liked to brag about their experience” rather than teach useful content. Furthermore, several nearbies reported that all online and some in-person classes raised significant and seemingly unnecessary technological barriers to course mastery and completion.

Your text book is online and you have to get the key from the book to access homework assignments and then figure out how to turn in assignments online. Sometimes there are four or five different online sources or quizzes to do for one assignment. Tests are on a different key . . . You have to be technologically strong [and] put in at least twice the time [compared to courses without online components] . . . by the time you get there, where you’re ready to do the work, you’re so frustrated! Professors can’t even tell you how to do it.

Nearbies agreed that mastering technological proficiency requirements—which varied widely from class to class—was often more difficult or frustrating than mastering the course content. They reported using “RateMyProfessors.com”—an informal collection of online student evaluations of faculty—to inform their choices of courses and instructors. Nearbies were interested in receiving a personalized list of courses required to finish a college degree—and expressed great interest in completing a Suburban credential if the College offered them the last six credits for free.

Several possible areas for increasing nearbie engagement and completion rates emerged from the focus group—including refreshing orientation content and tone to ease the transition to college, providing advising that anticipates their questions and highlights needed information quickly and consistently, and explaining placement test results including implications for time to degree. Nearbies also wanted earlier information about differences between vocational and liberal arts transfer paths and clearer understanding of how programs of study connect with real world career opportunities. They noted that poor cell phone reception at Suburban’s main campus made it difficult for them to keep up with external responsibilities of work and family while between classes. Arguably, lack of telephone connection is more of a challenge for experienced students compared with beginning students of traditional age as work and family responsibilities increase with time.

Perhaps the most compelling finding from the focus group is the disparity between nearbies’ assertions about the value of a college degree and their own behavior, which is characterized by an attitude of casualness about attending classes and returning to complete. These nearbies were all successful students as evidenced by their GPAs, yet they seemed to wander through college with minimal connection to the institution, uncertain goals, uneven information to inform their decisions, and significant extracurricular claims for time and attention (from work, family, and peers) that took priority over school.

Limitations

This study has several notable limitations. The first is that it focused on nearbies at a single institution and at a single point in time. Though sparse, the literature about students who complete a significant number of credits without earning a certificate or degree or transferring suggests this is a more common behavior pattern among community college students than has been commonly identified or examined (Adelman, 2013; College Board, 2013). Replicating the study at a variety of community colleges would lend further insights into the prevalence of this behavior and the reasons for it.

A second limitation is the missing or incomplete information about degrees earned prior to community college attendance. Like at most community colleges, Suburban asks applicants to list their college degrees, but does not require documentation or verify the information. Moreover, the swirling behavior of students, characterized by their stopping out, attending two or more institutions at the same time, and moving from 4-year to 2-year as well as 2-year to 2-year institutions, means that students may earn certificates or degrees from another institution after enrolling in the community college, but not reflect this when they come back to the community college either because they are not required to update information or because there are no consequences for not providing the information. This may especially be the case of students who do not apply for financial aid, which would require more documentation about attendance and degrees earned. More rigorous screening is needed to exclude students who already have degrees, data that are likely available for most traditionally aged students through the National Student Clearinghouse. However, because many community college students are older, this information may not be available through the Clearinghouse.

In general, this study was exploratory and descriptive. We did not submit data to rigorous analyses for validity and reliability as our research objective was to gain insights into the behaviors and perceptions of nearbies. For example, we did not seek to explore the relative influence of student characteristics such as age or gender on the factors they identified as influences on noncompletion. Furthermore, it should be noted that focus group research is not intended to be generalizable to a larger population, but instead to provide rich insights into patterns of behavior and perceptions as voiced by the participants.

Discussion

This study of nearbies focused on community college students who earned 45 credits, attained a “C” GPA, and left the college without earning a degree or certificate or transfer. Overall, we learned that students have many reasons for attending, leaving, transferring, completing, or stopping short of graduation. Their varied and complex reasons mean there is no simple or single strategy to improving completion but that several avenues may be more productive than others. However, recurrent themes that emerged from the study’s findings suggest that the college should provide more accessible, responsive, and clear advising and direction to students (especially concerning the time and financial aid eligibility that remedial education courses consume while not counting toward a degree or certificate) to help students forge better connections with people at the college and to clearly communicate the value and shortest path to earning a credential.

The finding that 16% of nearbies had earned 75 or more credits at Suburban, yet still had not completed a certificate or degree, was troubling, particularly as a number of these students will also have taken developmental courses that are not reflected in their earned credits. Students are potentially using up financial aid on courses that exceed those required for any credential at the community college, not even considering the aid used for developmental courses, and they are incurring opportunity costs from staying in the community college and not moving to the bachelor’s degree or graduating.

Recent studies (e.g., Jenkins & Cho, 2012; Zeidenberg, 2012) indicate that students who enter a program within their first year of college are much more likely to complete it compared with students who remain undeclared, earning substantial numbers of credits that may not apply toward a specific credential or transfer. Knowing that the longer students are enrolled, the less likely they are to complete a credential suggests that the college should be more prescriptive, encouraging students to choose and complete programs quickly (Burns, 2010). On the other hand, students may have valid reasons for earning noncredential credits such as changing interests or meeting a variety of work or personal needs—and the history and philosophy underpinning community college access make it difficult for these institutions to move to a more “efficient” prescriptive approach with students. However, as data continue to demonstrate that offering students an open array of options rather than providing strict guidance or mandates impedes progress and attainment, colleges are adapting. For example Completion by Design schools in Ohio and North Carolina are moving to limit program electives or create “default” electives that students are strongly encouraged to select, this despite faculty concerns that their favorite courses may no longer draw enrollments because they fall outside the rigorously defined programs of study that lead to credentials.

These themes often surface as students express the need to complete a college credential quickly. However, certificates—which typically require only between 18 and 30 credits to complete—seem to attract relatively little interest. Like any college credential, a certificate requires students to complete the right number of credits in the right distribution. The students in this study had accumulated more than enough credits to earn a certificate before they left Suburban but they are not completing the right credits to earn a certificate (or a degree). It is unclear whether students (a) know that certificates exist, (b) know certificates exist but misunderstand what academic or economic value they might hold, (c) know that certificates exist and their academic or economic potential but not what specific types of classes count toward a certificate, and/or (d) know that certificates exist and understand their potential value as well as the classes required but do not want to earn one (Carnevale, Rose, & Hanson, 2012; Jenkins & Cho, 2012, Radford et al., 2010).

Interestingly, students who choose well may benefit from the content knowledge gained even when a certificate is not completed. Beginning bookkeepers, for example, often find an entry-level job after completing two semesters of accounting classes and then work their way up to better positions in small and medium-sized companies with on-the-job training. Employers of computer support specialists often hold professional certifications in high esteem—which require competencies that can be gained from taking a series of core college classes and professional certifications but do not require a college certificate or degree. If data were available to show students that graduates with degrees or certificates have higher pass rates on professional licensure exams or higher wages than students without credentials, colleges might be able to insprie students to complete their certificates and degrees. Advising undecided students to make early informed decisions to secure a certificate, either as a valuable first step toward securing employment or in preparation for completing applied associate’s and bachelor’s degrees, could help students stay “on track” while raising institutional completion rates.

Currently, state policies in Illinois enable students to transfer from community colleges to public universities without completing the associate degree, and private institutions also accept students without the associate degree. Though a few community college−university agreements exist that favor students with associate degrees (e.g., by giving them preference for obtaining advising from universities and registering early), these incentives appear to attract few students.

Furthermore, except in health career fields that require the associate degree for students to be eligible to take licensure exams, formal community college degrees and certificates are rarely if ever listed as job requirements or preferences. If employers were to require or give significant preference to applicants with a credential, whether a certificate or an associate degree, students would be likely to perceive a value to completion that simply does not exist at this time, at least in the geographic area where Suburban is located. However, the reality is that neither employer nor transfer institution requirements currently send powerful messages to students about the value of completing formal credentials, and community colleges are hard-pressed to convince students of the importance of completion when they seem able to accomplish their employment or transfer goals without a credential.

This nearbie study provides concrete evidence that students who successfully navigate their first year at the community college are not assured of completion. Community college students balance a host of competing obligations—work, family, school—and their behaviors suggest many are vulnerable to being distracted from college perhaps even more when they are close to completion. As community colleges strive to increase the number of certificates and degrees earned by their students, and to assist students to efficiently and effectively move to completion, it is evident that community college supports must be sustained throughout a student’s time at the college. The traditional focus on entering students and first-year persistence must be expanded to include all students, wherever they are in their programs.

Footnotes

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The authors declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The authors received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Notes

Author Biographies

Dr. Trudy Bers is an educational consultant with The Bers Group. She was previously the Executive Director of Research, Curriculum and Planning at Oakton Community College in Des Plaines, Illinois, and has held offices in a number of higher education professional associations, including the presidency of the Association for Institutional Research. In 2014 Dr. Bers was honored as a recipient of the Arthur Cohen and Florence Brawer Distinguished Service Award from the Council for the Study of Community Colleges.

Dr. Pam Schuetz is an instructor in the Northwestern University School of Education and Social Policy where she teaches foundational courses on community colleges and education policy. Her research interests include dynamics of community college student engagement and formative assessment of college environments that promote successful student transitions into, through and out of community colleges.

References

ACT. (2012). 2012 Retention/completion summary tables. Retrieved from http://www.act.org/research/policymakers/pdf/12retain_trends.pdf

Adelman

(2013). Searching for our lost associate’s degrees: Project Win-Win at the finish line. Washington, DC: Institute for Higher Education Policy.

Astin

A. W.

(1993). Assessment for excellence: The philosophy and practice of assessment and evaluation in higher education. Phoenix, AZ: Oryx.

Bahr

P. R.

(2011, Winter). A typology of students’ use of the community college. In Hu

(Eds.), Using typological approaches to understand college student experiences and outcomes (New Directions for Institutional Research, Vol. 81, pp. 33-48). San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

Bausch

Cavanaugh

Corre

Drescher

Godofsky

Houston

. . . Walker

(2011). The assessment of the disengaged adults returning to college program: An evaluation of DARC I and DARC II institutions. Retrieved from http://www.state.nj.us/highereducation/grants/Disengaged.htm

Burns

(2010). At issue: Community college student success variables: A review of the literature. The Community College Enterprise, 16(2), 33-61.

Carnevale

A. P.

Rose

S. J.

Hanson

A. R.

(2012). Certificates: Gateway to gainful employment and college degrees. Washington, DC: Georgetown University Center on Education and the Workforce. Retrieved from http://cew.georgetown.edu/certificates/

Cohen

A. M.

Brawer

F. B.

Kisker

C. B.

(2014). The American community college (6th ed.). San Francisco, CA: Wiley.

College Board. (2013). The completion arch: Measuring community college student success, six-year credit completion. Retrieved from http://completionarch.collegeboard.org/progress/college/threshold-number-of-credits-in-specified-time/six-year-credit-completion-us

10.

Community College Survey of Student Engagement. (n.d.). Faculty-student interaction. Retrieved from http://www.ccsse.org/survey/bench_sfi.cfm

11.

Council for Adult and Experiential Learning. (n.d.). Learning counts.org: College credit for what you already know®. Available from http://www.learningcounts.org/

12.

Erisman

Steele

(2012). From contact to completion: Supporting returning adult students in obtaining a college credential. HigherEd Insight. Retrieved from http://adultcollegecompletion.org/sites/files/documents/higherEdInsightBrief.pdf

13.

Hoops

(2010). Educational attainment strategies for working adults and nontraditional students: Applying new models in postsecondary education (Project Report). Washington, DC: FutureWorks. Retrieved from http://www.futureworks-web.com/pdfs/Educational%20Attainment%20Strategies%20Report%20-%20April%202010.pdf

14.

Institute for Higher Education Policy. (n.d.). Project Win-Win. Retrieved from http://www.ihep.org/projectwin-win.cfm

15.

Jenkins

Cho

(2012, January). Get with the program: Accelerating community college students’ entry into and completion of programs of study (CCRC Working Paper No. 25). New York, NY: Columbia University, Teachers College, Community College Research Center.

16.

Johnson

Rochkind

Ott

A. N.

DuPont

(2009). With their whole lives ahead of them: Myths and realities about why so many students fail to finish college. San Francisco, CA: Public Agenda. Retrieved from http://www.publicagenda.org/files/theirwholelivesaheadofthem.pdf

17.

Lane

Michelau

D. K.

Palmer

(2012). Going the distance in adult college completion: Lessons from the non-traditional no more project. Retrieved from http://knowledgecenter.completionbydesign.org/sites/default/files/403%20Lane%202012.pdf

18.

Morest

(2012). Community college student success: From boardrooms to classrooms (ACE Series on Community Colleges). Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield.

19.

Pascarella

E. T.

Terenzini

P. T.

(2005). How college affects students. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

20.

Peter

Forrest Cataldi

(2005). The road less traveled? Students who enroll in multiple institutions (NCES 2005-157). Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, U.S. Government Printing Office.

21.

Radford

A. W.

Berkner

Wheeless

S. C.

Shepherd

(2010). Persistence and attainment of 2003–04 beginning postsecondary students: After 6 years (NCES 2011-151). Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics.

22.

Snyder

T. D.

Dillow

S. A.

(2012). Digest of education statistics 2011 (NCES 2012-001). Washington, DC: National Center for Education Statistics, Institute of Education Sciences, U.S. Department of Education.

23.

Tinto

(1993). Leaving college: Rethinking the causes and cures of student attrition. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago.

24.

Topper

(2009, November-December). “Late Stop-Outs Part 2” Data Notes: Keeping informed about achieving the dream data, Vol. 4, No. 6.

25.

Zeidenberg

(2012, April). Learning or “spinning their wheels”? Understanding excess credits earned by community college associate degree completers (CCRC Working Paper No. 44). New York, NY: Columbia University, Teachers College, Community College Research Center.