Newsletter | Starfish Retention Solutions

Starfish Retention Solutions

Paul Smith's College Calculates a Four-and-a-half-fold Return on Investment Within 18 Months of Adopting Starfish®

Student Success Outcomes Improve as a Result of Real-Time, Cross-Campus Information Exchange

Paul Smith's College is a private institution enrolling approximately 1,000 students. The college has been working for a number of years to increase its retention rates. Frustratingly, retention rates for both the freshmen-to-sophomore and the sophomore-to-junior cohorts had stagnated with a five-year average of 62 percent. In 2009, the institution responded by launching a new student support program, powered by the Starfish system, that takes a more holistic approach to student success rather than concentrating on those students with classic at-risk characteristics at admission.

The college's efforts are paying off. Since the launch of the program, Paul Smith's has reported gains in year-to-year student retention, with the largest gains as a result of programs helping students persist from their sophomore to junior year; the 2010 cohort had a 12 percent increase in retention over the previous five-year average. Consequently, the college has seen retention-related increases in net student-derived revenue of more than $540,000.

"Student success is our top priority at Paul Smith's College. That said, as financial stewards, we have to know that the investments we make to help students succeed are going to pay off and help fund the institution's priorities," said John Burke, vice president for business and finance for Paul Smith's College. "With the deep adoption of the Starfish system and real-time sharing of information across campus, we have already seen a four-and-a-half-fold return on our investment in the technology and related program costs, including personnel. At the same time, the campus services that are empowered by the Starfish system are noticeably more efficient and better-prepared to help our students."

>>see how Starfish is helping keep more students at Paul Smith's College

Have You Considered Funding Your Student Success Programs with Federal Dollars?

Bristol Community College Taps Title III Funding to Accelerate Student Success Programs with Starfish

Located in Fall River, Mass., Bristol Community College enrolls nearly 10,000 students, the majority of whom enter the institution with academic deficits and other readiness concerns that put them at risk for not completing their goals.

To address the issues that were limiting student persistence, the institution developed a comprehensive plan designed to connect students to the tools, people and learning resources that foster success with the goal of improving student retention by 10 percent. To finance their ideas, they sought funding through Title III, a federally funded program that helps eligible institutions of higher education to become self-sufficient and expand their capacity to serve low-income students. In 2008, the institution received a five-year, $1.5 million dollar grant through the program. The grants are intended to fund innovation that can be sustained by the institution at the conclusion of the grant period.

Now in the third year of the grant, Bristol has licensed Starfish EARLY ALERT™ and Starfish CONNECT™ to further enable students to connect to the institution and the many support resources that are available. In addition, the software systems accelerate the institution's efforts to know which students need help, and then to track its efforts to provide the support.

"Bristol Community College has leveraged our Title III grant to support our students in new, more effective and efficient ways," said Ben Baumann, academic advising specialist for Bristol Community College. "Nearly every institution offers student support services. The sad reality across higher education is that those resources are often underutilized because students don't know where or how to access help. By incorporating Starfish into our program, we are now able to proactively engage students and drive them to help. We have had the support resources here - we just didn't always know which students to seek out. With Starfish, we do."

>>read about the Title III program at Bristol Community College

>>see funding programs available to support student success

Starfish Client Innovation Update

Institutions Drive Creative Use of Solutions

Every month, institutions within the Starfish client community come up with creative ways of using our solutions to more effectively connect students to the support resources available on their respective campuses. Here are some recent innovations that we are proud to share:

Baton Rouge Community College. The institution has imported the names of all faculty members into the Starfish Success Catalog. Now, regardless of whether a student has an existing relationship with a particular faculty member, it's easy for him/her to connect with any faculty member to discuss course options, explore career paths, or even schedule appointments.

Rocky Mountain College of Art + Design. The college has automatically uploaded photos of all its students from the student ID system into Starfish. Now advisors, tutors, and counselors know the names and faces of their students even before they set foot in their offices.

Troy University. The institution is now automatically flagging first-time students within Starfish based on data in the Datatel system. They are using the information to track the student cohort efficiently and ensure support resources are made available proactively.

Bowie State University. By automatically pulling data from the institution's PeopleSoft system into the Starfish system, advisors now have a robust set of information about each student right within the Starfish student folder, including the student's GPA, major, and academic standing, among other attributes.

>>read more about our client community

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