Abstract
Given tight budget constraints and limited revenue, many institutions are looking for ways to serve undergraduate students more effectively with fewer resources. This study reports findings of an empirical study completed during the Spring of 2010. The focus of this study is the impact of an "Early Alert" pilot program at a small public state college and its potential to improve the academic performance and the 'pass rate' of ‘first year' students. Our “Early Alert” Pilot Program had two objectives: (1) identify ‘first year' students (not enrolled in learning support) that are ‘at-risk' academically, based their academic performance within the first month of a semester; and, (2) determine if the currently available academic support resources at our College were effective in improving the academic performance and 'pass rate' of these ‘at risk' students. Within our investigation we identified eight different sections of a College Algebra course. Students in three of those eight sections were designated the "treatment" group and the students in the remaining five sections served as our "control" group. The identified ‘at risk' students in the “treatment” group were individually encouraged to use various available academic support resources. Whereas the control group ‘at risk' students were not provided any special encouragement to use the available academic resources. Using a two-sample t-test and other procedures, we determined if the "at risk' students in our experimental group had a higher pass rate for the College Algebra course than those "at risk" students in our control group. Attendees will learn more about our findings and also learn how we designed and conducted our pilot study.
Location
Room 2908
Recommended Citation
Reese, T. David; Greene, Denise; and Lyon, Julie, "Do "Early Alert” Programs Work? (An Empirical Study of College Algebra Students)" (2012). SoTL Commons Conference. 2.
https://digitalcommons.georgiasouthern.edu/sotlcommons/SoTL/2012/2
Do "Early Alert” Programs Work? (An Empirical Study of College Algebra Students)
Room 2908
Given tight budget constraints and limited revenue, many institutions are looking for ways to serve undergraduate students more effectively with fewer resources. This study reports findings of an empirical study completed during the Spring of 2010. The focus of this study is the impact of an "Early Alert" pilot program at a small public state college and its potential to improve the academic performance and the 'pass rate' of ‘first year' students. Our “Early Alert” Pilot Program had two objectives: (1) identify ‘first year' students (not enrolled in learning support) that are ‘at-risk' academically, based their academic performance within the first month of a semester; and, (2) determine if the currently available academic support resources at our College were effective in improving the academic performance and 'pass rate' of these ‘at risk' students. Within our investigation we identified eight different sections of a College Algebra course. Students in three of those eight sections were designated the "treatment" group and the students in the remaining five sections served as our "control" group. The identified ‘at risk' students in the “treatment” group were individually encouraged to use various available academic support resources. Whereas the control group ‘at risk' students were not provided any special encouragement to use the available academic resources. Using a two-sample t-test and other procedures, we determined if the "at risk' students in our experimental group had a higher pass rate for the College Algebra course than those "at risk" students in our control group. Attendees will learn more about our findings and also learn how we designed and conducted our pilot study.
