Comparing Success for Transfers Students and First-Time Freshmen Using Data from Institutional Archives – Early Results

Fred W. Depiero; Dominic J. Dal Bello; Lizabeth L. Thompson; Stephen R. Beard

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Conference: 2023 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition
Location: Baltimore , Maryland
Publication Date: June 25, 2023
Start Date: June 25, 2023
End Date: June 28, 2023
Conference Session: Engineering and Engineering Technology Transfer and the Two-Year College Student Part 1
Tagged Division: Two-Year College Division (TYCD)
Page Count: 14
DOI: 10.18260/1-2--43363
Permanent URL: https://peer.asee.org/43363
Download Count: 305

Paper Authors

biography

Fred W. Depiero California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo

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Dr. Fred DePiero earned his BS and MS degrees in Electrical Engineering at Michigan State University. After which he worked at Oak Ridge National Lab in the areas of robotics and machine vision. He then earned his PhD, also in EE, from the University of Tennessee. In 1996 he moved to San Luis Obispo, CA and joined the faculty of Cal Poly in EE. After 10 years of service as an Associate Dean, Fred rejoined the faculty and has since moved into the Computer Engineering Department. His areas of interest have branched out to include web applications for teaching and learning, as well as new approaches to digital-to-analog converters with first and second order holds.

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Dominic J. Dal Bello Allan Hancock College orcid.org/0000-0001-8002-3226

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Dom Dal Bello is Professor of Engineering at Allan Hancock College (AHC), a California community college between UC Santa Barbara and Cal Poly San Luis Obispo. At AHC, he is Department Chair of Mathematical Sciences, Faculty Advisor of MESA (the Mathematics, Engineering, Science Achievement Program), and Principal/Co-Principal Investigator of several National Science Foundation projects (S-STEM, LSAMP, IUSE). In ASEE, he is chair of the Two-Year College Division, and Vice-Chair/Community Colleges of the Pacific Southwest Section. He received the Outstanding Teaching Award for the ASEE/PSW Section in 2022.

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Lizabeth L. Thompson California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo

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Lizabeth is a professor at Cal Poly, SLO in Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering. She has been teaching for 22 years and has continued to develop innovative pedagogy such as project based, flipped classroom and competency grading. Through the SUSTAIN

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Stephen R. Beard

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Abstract

This work-in-progress is part of an NSF grant focused on improving recruitment, persistence and graduation of students originating at two Hispanic-Serving California Community Colleges, and transferring to a highly selective, predominantly white, 4-year institution. This paper compares the success of transfer students versus first-time-first-year (FTFY) students at the 4-year institution using a novel, cross-institution data collaboration. Using this cross-institutional dataset, we are able to highlight metrics by which transfer students are relatively more successful than FTFY students.

For example, traditional measures such as time to degree do not fully reflect the success of transfer students. We have found that transfers perform as well or better than FTFY students when accounting for their time at community college and for their part-time enrollment status. In fact, transfer students who do transfer to this predominantly white, 4-year institution graduate at higher rates than FTFY students, although their time-to-degree is longer.

The metrics used in these studies were not available from the office of institutional research at our universities. To support this study we developed a cross-institutional dataset, and our own database system and secured multi-institutional agreements for this data-collaborative. We share our experiences with multi-institutional data-sharing, including privacy concerns.

Our goals for this effort are two-fold: 1) to evaluate the effectiveness of our admissions ranking system compared to their long-term success. And, 2) inform our 4-year institution during the process of a massive curriculum overhaul that is part of a quarter to semester conversion. As part of the semester conversion, the university is encouraging changes to promote transfer student success. Hence our efforts are timely for informing this process. Regarding the admissions ranking, we demonstrate that major-specific models predict persistence-to-graduation more accurately than college-wide models. Other investigations include the impact on progress associated with starting points in the curriculum, for the entering transfer students. We also examine curricular (prerequisite structures) and non-curricular (course offering capacities) barriers for timeline graduation of transfer students.

Citation
Format

Depiero, F. W., & Dal Bello, D. J., & Thompson, L. L., & Beard, S. R. (2023, June), Comparing Success for Transfers Students and First-Time Freshmen Using Data from Institutional Archives – Early Results Paper presented at 2023 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition, Baltimore , Maryland. 10.18260/1-2--43363

TY - CPAPER
AB - This work-in-progress is part of an NSF grant focused on improving recruitment, persistence and graduation of students originating at two Hispanic-Serving California Community Colleges, and transferring to a highly selective, predominantly white, 4-year institution. This paper compares the success of transfer students versus first-time-first-year (FTFY) students at the 4-year institution using a novel, cross-institution data collaboration. Using this cross-institutional dataset, we are able to highlight metrics by which transfer students are relatively more successful than FTFY students.

For example, traditional measures such as time to degree do not fully reflect the success of transfer students. We have found that transfers perform as well or better than FTFY students when accounting for their time at community college and for their part-time enrollment status. In fact, transfer students who do transfer to this predominantly white, 4-year institution graduate at higher rates than FTFY students, although their time-to-degree is longer.

The metrics used in these studies were not available from the office of institutional research at our universities. To support this study we developed a cross-institutional dataset, and our own database system and secured multi-institutional agreements for this data-collaborative. We share our experiences with multi-institutional data-sharing, including privacy concerns.

Our goals for this effort are two-fold: 1) to evaluate the effectiveness of our admissions ranking system compared to their long-term success. And, 2) inform our 4-year institution during the process of a massive curriculum overhaul that is part of a quarter to semester conversion. As part of the semester conversion, the university is encouraging changes to promote transfer student success. Hence our efforts are timely for informing this process. Regarding the admissions ranking, we demonstrate that major-specific models predict persistence-to-graduation more accurately than college-wide models. Other investigations include the impact on progress associated with starting points in the curriculum, for the entering transfer students. We also examine curricular (prerequisite structures) and non-curricular (course offering capacities) barriers for timeline graduation of transfer students.

AU - Fred W. Depiero
AU - Dominic J. Dal Bello
AU - Lizabeth L. Thompson
AU - Stephen R. Beard
CY - Baltimore , Maryland
DA - 2023/06/25
PB - ASEE Conferences
TI - Comparing Success for Transfers Students and First-Time Freshmen Using Data from Institutional Archives – Early Results
UR - https://peer.asee.org/43363
DO - 10.18260/1-2--43363
ER -