Enrollment Management Administrators’ Perceptions of Community College Student Retention Practices

The purpose of this study was three-fold: (a) to determine the retention practices most frequently used by community colleges to retain full-time, associate degree-seeking students from their first-to-second year of enrollment as perceived by enrollment management administrators; (b) to determine the level of importance placed on these practices as perceived by enrollment management administrators; and, (c) to determine if differences exist between those practices most frequently used and those considered to be the most important when the enrollment size and campus geographic setting of the institution are considered. An online survey, developed by the researcher, was distributed to a sample of 269 community colleges that hold membership in the American Association of Community Colleges. Responses were received from 135 (51%) of those surveyed. Descriptive statistics and ANOVA tests were used to address the six primary research questions, with significance noted at p\u3c.05. Through ANOVA testing and the resulting analysis of data, six primary findings were established pertaining to the use of retention practices by community colleges and the rating of their importance by enrollment management administrators. The findings include: (a) there are certain retention practices used more frequently than others by community colleges to retain fulltime, associate degree-seeking students from their first-to-second year of enrollment, (b)there are certain retention practices deemed to be ‘very important’ in retaining these students as perceived by enrollment management administrators, ( c) there are no significant differences in the retention practices most frequently used when enrollment size is considered, (d) there are no significant differences in the retention practices most frequently used when the campus geographic setting is considered, (e) there are no significant differences in the retention practices considered to be ‘very important’ or ‘somewhat important’ when enrollment size is considered, and (f) there is a statistically significant difference in the retention practices considered to be ‘very important’ or ‘somewhat important’ when campus geographic setting is considered