Piecing Together the Student Success Puzzle: Research, Propositions, and Recommendations : ASHE Higher Education Report

Creating the conditions that foster student success in college has never been more important. As many as four-fifths of high school graduates need some form of postsecondary education to be economically self-sufficient and manage the increasingly complex social, political, and cultural issues of the 21st century. But about 40 percent of those who start college fail to earn a degree within 6 or 8 years, an unacceptably low number. This report examines the complicated array of social, economic, cultural and educational factors related to student success in college, defined as academic achievement, engagement in educationally purposeful activities, satisfaction, acquisition of desired knowledge, skills and competencies, persistence, and attainment of educational objectives. Although the trajectory for academic success in college is established long before students matriculate, most institutions can do more than they are at present to shape how students prepared for college and they they engage in productive activities after they arrive. This is the 5th issue of the 32nd volume of the Jossey-Bass series ASHE Higher Education Report. Each monograph is the definitive analysis of a tough higher education problem, based on thorough research of pertinent literature and institutional experiences. Topics are identified by a national survey. Noted practitioners and scholars are then commissioned to write the reports, with experts providing critical reviews of each manuscript before publication.

George D. Kuh is Chancellor's Professor of Higher Education at Indiana University, Bloomington, where he directs the Center for Postsecondary Research, home to the National Survey of Student Engagement.

Jillian Kinzie is associate director of the NSSE Institute for Effective Educational Practice and the Indiana University Center for Postsecondary Research.

Brian K. Bridges is associate director for the Center for Advancement of Racial and Ethnic Equity at the American Council on Education.

John C. Hayek is associate vice president for planning and performance for the Kentucky Council on Postsecondary Education.