Retention and Student Success
NMU wants to help students succeed, find value in their college education, and meet their personal higher education goals. Improving retention among all groups is key to overcoming declining numbers of high school graduates entering college.
Following the Strategic Plan, the Enrollment Plan organizes retention and student success efforts around advising, a sense of belonging, and student well-being. This plan provides details on how NMU is engaged in helping students feel like they belong and assisting them in overcoming financial, socioeconomic, and academic barriers.
As pandemic recovery continues, it is expected that undergraduate retention rates will soon return to pre-pandemic rates. With new, intensive efforts on retention, it is expected that retention rates will increase to new levels.
National standards exist for measuring retention for first-time, full-time freshmen. Quantitative goal setting for retention of other groups (graduate, online, non-traditional, etc.) has been problematic since standards are not well established.
First-time, full-time new freshman first-to-third semester return rates are 2018 cohort: 75.4%, 2019 cohort: 76.3%, 2020 cohort: 72.5%, 2021 cohort: 73.2%. Future enrollment planning should determine the most effective method for enumerating all retention efforts.
Strategic plan retention and student success goals, tactics, and associated metrics are listed in the table below.
Strategic Plan Retention Goal 1: Engage in proactive, holistic advising leveraging student success technology and student-centered analytics
| Unit/Area | Tactic | Metric | Goal |
| Undergraduate | Develop a student success framework 1.0 university-wide | Framework | Initial framework established by Fall 2023 |
| Undergraduate | Continue adoption and refinement efforts of the Educational Success Platform (ESP) to better support student success efforts | Interactions (alerts, cases, progress surveys) |
Increase quantity and quality of interactions Establish baseline in Fall 2022 |
| Undergraduate | Engage in proactive, holistic advising leveraging student success technology and student-centered analytics |
Metrics to be determined Unit assessment plan being developed 2022-23 |
Unit plan completed by Fall 2023 |
| Graduate | Develop consistent program director position descriptions outlining advising duties | Percent of departments | 100% of departments with graduate programs |
| Graduate | Develop methods to measure student outcomes (time to completion, graduation rate, job placement, GPA, belonging) | Task completion | Methods developed by Summer 2023 |
| Global Campus | Establish a retention metric for NMU's distance education students to better understand distance education retention needs | Retention metric established | Yes/No |
| Global Campus | Increase the Global Campus student use of ESP for student support needs | ESP usage | Global Campus students logging in to ESP |
| Global Campus | Expand the usage of online tutoring services to Global Campus students for academic support | Online tutoring usage | Global Campus students utilizing tutoring services |
| International | Increase study abroad participants by creating efficiencies in the study abroad application and tracking system | Study abroad participants | Increase from baseline 25 in Fall 2022 to 50 in Fall 2023 |
| College/Department Level | Increase the count of departments that have bylaws that recognize retention efforts as service in order to increase faculty involvement |
Percent of departments which have bylaws that recognize retention efforts Faculty participation |
Positive change |
| College/Department Level | Perform outreach to non-registrants | Percent of departments doing outreach | Positive change |
| College/Department Level | Increase early reporting of low performing students in ESP for 000/100/200 level classes | Percent of sections reporting | Positive change |
| Marketing and Communications | Implement a messaging strategy to current students about utilizing advising and affiliated support systems to increase use of such services | Strategy implemented | Done (yes/no) 22-23 academic year |
Strategic Plan Retention Goal 2: Increase student sense of belonging and engagement
|
Unit/Area |
Tactics |
Metric |
Goal |
|
Undergraduate |
Increase participation in student organizations and programs |
Count user activities and events Count of Pick One points |
Positive change Baseline 2022-23 |
|
Undergraduate |
Improve student connections with peers, faculty/staff, and alumni |
Count of students who participate in structured mentoring programs (faculty, staff, alumni, or peer mentors) Quality of mentoring |
Positive change Baseline 2022-23 |
|
Undergraduate |
Improve connection between students' academic program and co-curricular activities and their career goals (major exploration, experiential learning, internships, career exploration, etc) |
Count of departments that offer experiential learning opportunities at 100/200 level Count of for-credit internships Attendance at career fairs/ events |
Positive change Baseline 2022-23 |
|
Graduate |
Facilitate focus groups to explore new ways to engage students in the Graduate Student Association |
Focus group yes or no |
recommendations generated |
|
Graduate |
Expand faculty mentor and advisor participation in CGS&R workshops, & events |
Faculty advisors and mentors participation |
All mentors and advisors participate in at least 1 event including: -Orientation -WoW -3MT -Celebration |
|
Global Campus |
Increased the student usage of the GC Student Union in EduCat to connect distance students to each other and the institution |
GC Student Union access |
GC students utilizing the GCSU weekly |
|
Global Campus |
Establish online student organization to engage distance education students |
GC student orgs |
One GC student organization |
|
Global Campus |
Host Global Campus regional receptions and visits to connect distance education students to NMU |
Events |
2 regional events per year |
|
International |
Develop a pre-arrival international online orientation to foster a sense of belonging |
Online orientation created |
Done (yes/no) |
|
International |
Increase international student participation in the All Nations Club to foster a sense of belonging |
Students actively involved in the All Nations Club |
Positive Change |
|
International |
Create events celebrating international students and global cultures to foster a sense of belonging |
Events |
Increase from 6 in Fall 2022 |
|
College/department level |
Formalize intentional mentoring with the goal of improving engagement |
Number of departments with formalized mentoring plans Quality of mentoring relationships |
Positive increase Improve mentoring relationships |
|
Marketing and Communications |
Increase peer-to-peer engagement through digital and social media telling more student stories across platforms to support retention initiatives |
Count of posts Channel metrics |
Increase from current 10% of content to 20% of content during the 22-23 academic year |
Strategic Plan Retention Goal 3: Strengthen support for mental health and physical well-being
|
Unit/Area |
Tactics |
Metric |
Goal |
|
All units |
De-stigmatize help-seeking to increase the likelihood that students will seek help through NMU |
NSSE survey |
Improve from baseline W21 NSSE questions |
|
All units |
Provide tools to faculty and staff for responding to signs of student distress |
Count of participation in training |
Increase |
|
All units |
Promote available NMU resources and services to match the mental health needs of students with available resources |
Waiting list NSSE Survey |
Improved awareness Reduction of waiting list Reduction of unmet need |
|
All units |
Add case management services to increase our service capacity to meet the wellbeing needs of our campus community |
Correct routing of students Patients meet personal well-being goals |
Improvement |
|
Graduate |
Liaise with Special Advisor for Campus Mental Health & Wellness to inform student support programming and services |
Health and wellness services information published for graduate students |
Task completion by Fall 2022 |
|
Global Campus |
Establish national health promotion partnerships where distance students can get a discount or have use of exercise facilities to promote wellness |
Number of partnerships |
One partner in each of Global Campus's top enrollment states |
|
College/department level |
Formalize intentional mentoring with the goal of improving engagement |
Number of departments with formalized mentoring plans Quality of mentoring relationships |
Positive increase Improve mentoring relationships |
|
Marketing and Communications |
Create a mental health and wellness messaging campaign across campus for increased awareness of new and improved services |
Campaign created not yet identified awareness metric |
Done (yes/no) Increase awareness |