The University of Idaho has continued to increase its efforts to retain first-year students.
The cold enrollment climate in which UI is trying to operate — especially considering things like the discontinuation of the Western Undergraduate Exchange (WUE) — necessitates the need for these enrollment efforts. Through New Student Orientation, the Early Warning System for grades, Student Options Advising Retreat (SOAR), the Vandal Edge program and Making Achievement Possible (MAP)-Works, UI is doing its job making the transition to college as easy as possible with students.
But there is always room for improvement.
“I think it would be helpful if we had more mentoring programs, more programs where upper classmen are heavily involved with helping first-year students and first-year non-traditional students make that transition to campus life,” Dean of Students Bruce Pitman said. “I think that having older experienced students mentor new students would be very helpful.”
And Pitman is correct. UI could use more programs geared toward the development of relationships between experienced students and less experienced students.
According to a 2010 report released by ACT, peer mentoring was a highly rated practice — considered an effective way to retain incoming students — but also had one of the lowest inclusion rates across the country.
Peer mentoring is a way for new students to have someone who knows the ropes of UI life, and guide them through the difficult first year. It also helps students develop social groups without having to attend house parties, which are ripe with binge and underage drinking, according to a study published in the journal Recruitment & Retention in Higher Education.
Last year’s retention rates topped out at 76.5 percent, according to UI’s Institutional Research, indicating we still have a long way to go.
UI continues to make good efforts toward retaining new students, but we can never do too much to provide our newest Vandals with a system and safety net to support their journey — one that can be tumultuous at times.
–KM