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How to Proactively Manage Your Student Caseload

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How to Proactively Manage Your Student Caseload

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Seidman (2012) College Student Retention Formula and Next Steps

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Seidman (2012) College Student Retention Formula and Next Steps

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Earl (1987) Intrusive Advising of Freshmen in Academic Difficulty

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Earl (1987) Intrusive Advising of Freshmen in Academic Difficulty

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Hutt (2017) Breaking Down Barriers to Retaining Students

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Hutt (2017) Breaking Down Barriers to Retaining Students

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Early intervention encompasses the "systematic method of recording and communicating student behaviors that contribute to student attrition" and "effective intervention at the first indication of academic difficulty" (Tampke, 2013). Intervention initiatives can be:

Faculty initiated (Progress Reports and Ad Hoc Alerts)

Campus partner initiated (Scholarship Risk)

Advisor initiated (Ensuring Degree Applicable Credits, Fewer than 13 Credit Hours).

Regardless of where and how interventions originate, academic advisors are uniquely suited to provide intrusive and indivualized interventions to students in their caseloads and within their colleges and departments. The UAC's intervention efforts are based on relevant literature and national best practice.

UAC Advisor-Facilitated Interventions
Advisor-Facilitated Intervention: Red Flags at USC
Intervention Calendar

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Intervention Repository - Academic Advising | University of South Carolina

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Early intervention encompasses the “systematic method of recording and communicating student behaviors that contribute to student attrition” and “effective intervention at the first indication of academic difficulty” (Tampke, 2013). I…

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Simmons (2011) A National Study of Early Alert Models at Four-Year Institutions of Higher Education

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Simmons (2011) A National Study of Early Alert Models at Four-Year Institutions of Higher Education

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Waltenbury et al. (2019) Academic Probation: Evaluating the Impact of Academic Standing Notification Letters on Students

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Waltenbury et al. (2019) Academic Probation: Evaluating the Impact of Academic Standing Notification Letters on Students

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Bloom, Hutson, He, & Konkle (2013) Appreciative Education

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Bloom, Hutson, He, & Konkle (2013) Appreciative Education

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Nietzel (2019) The 15-To-Finish Campaign: Putting The 'Four-Year' Back In Four-Year Degrees

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Nietzel (2019) The 15-To-Finish Campaign: Putting The 'Four-Year' Back In Four-Year Degrees

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Higher education's completion agenda features several policies designed to increase the number of students who complete college and earn a degree. One of its boldest components is the "15-to-finish" campaign, the brainchild of Complete College America, a national alliance dedicated to improving college completion rates.

The 15-to-finish initiative encourages students to enroll in 15 credits per semester (or, including summer terms, 30 credits per year). It seeks to change the fact that the majority of college students do not register for at least 15 credits per semester, the minimum course load that would enable them to earn an associate of arts degree in two years or a baccalaureate degree in four years. This pattern is reinforced by the federal financial aid definition of a full-time student as one who enrolls for at least 12 credit hours per semester.

For undergraduates wanting to earn a B.A. in four years, the math of completing 12 credit hours per semester just doesn't add up. That approach stretches a four-year degree into five years of enrollment, tuition and greater living expenses. In addition to the extra costs of each additional semester, the odds of "life getting in the way" increase, interfering with - or even preventing - degree completion. Research has shown that students who enroll for at least 15 credits per semester earn higher GPAs and are more likely to persist in their enrollment than those taking fewer courses, and yet, whether it's a two-year or four-year school, the majority of students complete fewer than 30 credits per year.

In 2012, the University of Hawaii began an aggressive campaign to inform students about the importance of completing 15 credits per semester if they wanted to graduate in four years, thereby avoiding additional years of tuition and the foregone income from not having a full-time job. After just one year, the rate of incoming students at the flagship Manoa campus enrolling for 15 credits per semester jumped from 38% to 64%. Similar increases were achieved on other University of Hawaii campuses.

As evidence for the effectiveness of 15-to-finish accumulates, more than half the states have implemented some version of the campaign, involving hundreds of colleges. Some states, like Indiana, now hinge students' eligibility for state financial aid to their completing 30 credits per year.

Among some of the more encouraging findings:
Best Practices
Like most strategies aimed at improving college completion, 15-to-finish should not be introduced as a stand-alone policy. It is most likely to succeed when it is:

1. Embedded in a campus culture where degree completion is consistently emphasized.

2. Supported by well-informed faculty and staff advisors who counsel students about the advantages of 15-credit-hour loads.

3. Guided by clear curricular maps that chart which specific courses students need to take and when they need to take them to earn a degree on time.

4. Enabled by course scheduling that guarantees that required classes are offered when needed.

5. Aligned with incentives, like financial aid and banded tuition (charging students who take 15 or more credits the same tuition as students who enroll for 12), that encourage completing 30 credits per year.

One other best practice is the recognition that, desirable as it might be, 15-to-finish is just not possible for every student, who, because of family duties, financial limitations, work obligations or other realities are precluded from regularly taking that many credits. When 15-to-finish is not feasible for students, it is essential that colleges provide alternatives that keep these students on track to degree completion. Students who cannot take 15 credits per semester (which is often the case for working adults returning to college) cannot be ignored or neglected. They need schedules, financial aid and advising that are tailored to their unique circumstances, aimed at helping them earn a degree in the most timely manner possible.

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The 15-To-Finish Campaign: Putting The 'Four-Year' Back In Four-Year Degrees

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The 15-to-finish campaign encourages students to complete 15 credits per semester (30 credits per year), making it possible to earn an AA in two years or a BA in four. It's a smart policy, as long as students who cannot enroll at that intensity have other options to facilitate degree completion.

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Tampke (2013) Developing, Implementing, and Assessing and Early Alert System

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Tampke (2013) Developing, Implementing, and Assessing and Early Alert System

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Are your emails to students limiting your equity efforts?

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Are your emails to students limiting your equity efforts?

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Are your emails to students limiting your equity efforts? | EAB

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Small, intentional changes in the ways we communicate with minoritized students can help restore some of their trust in our institutions. Learn 5 common mistakes you may be making in your student emails—and how to correct them.

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DiClemente & Velasquez (2002) Motivational Interviewing and the Stages of Change

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DiClemente & Velasquez (2002) Motivational Interviewing and the Stages of Change

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Group 1 has always been the largest, about 85% of the freshman class in recent years. Group 2 and Group 3 are approximately the same size each year, but Group 2 has always been larger. Group 4 has always been the smallest group and has become non-existent with the use of scanners.

In 2015, two changes occurred at MSU that caused Pathfinders to change the criterion for an absence problem for a freshman. From 2015-2017 scanners were added to most classrooms holding 50 or more students. These scanners enabled attendance data to come to Pathfinders from large classes which in the past did not provide consistently accurate data. In addition, and during that same time period, the University switched from a mid-term grade report to a first progress report approximately 6 weeks into the semester and a second progress report about 12 weeks into the semester. Consequently, Pathfinders changed to using 6 or more total absences before the first progress report as an indicator of an attendance problem.

Since the implementation of Pathfinders, the academic performance has steadily increased. The table below displays these changes.

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Group 1 has always been the largest, about 85% of the freshman class in recent years. Group 2 and Group 3 are approximately the same size each year, but Group 2 has always been larger. Group 4 has always been the smallest group and has become non-existent with the use of scanners.

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Greenfield, et al. (2013) Developing and Sustaining Successful First-Year Programs - Early Alert Warning Systems

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Greenfield, et al. (2013) Developing and Sustaining Successful First-Year Programs - Early Alert Warning Systems

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Thaler and Sunstein (2009) Nudge chapter 1

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Thaler and Sunstein (2009) Nudge chapter 1

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Missed Connections (2021 Connected Conference Presentation)

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Missed Connections (2021 Connected Conference Presentation)

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Hanover (2014) Early Alert Systems in Higher Education

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Hanover (2014) Early Alert Systems in Higher Education

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Are your e-mails to students limiting your equity efforts?

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Are your e-mails to students limiting your equity efforts?

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Are your emails to students limiting your equity efforts? | EAB

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Small, intentional changes in the ways we communicate with minoritized students can help restore some of their trust in our institutions. Learn 5 common mistakes you may be making in your student emails—and how to correct them.

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Winfield (2018) The Art of Intervention: Partnering with Faculty for Early Academic Alert

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Winfield (2018) The Art of Intervention: Partnering with Faculty for Early Academic Alert

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James K. Winfield, University of South Carolina
With higher education reaching enrollment peaks of students from various backgrounds with diverse needs, a huge responsibility is upon colleges and universities. This increase in students warrants the necessity for more support. To meet this challenge, colleges and universities look to the development of early-alert mechanisms that identify students who are academically at-risk. Trending at many institutions, these programs have become institutional priorities to improve student retention. Processes typically involve an automated referral system that alerts faculty and staff to refer a student as signs of academic need occur. Institutions are investing thousands of dollars into launching and further developing efforts to monitor students and their behaviors, as they could exhibit signs of a need for intervention. These signs can include negative changes such as a decrease in class attendance; a lack of classroom participation; and, the most obvious indicator, poor grades.

It is imperative to note that regardless of the technological platform used to drive these retention initiatives, there is a human factor that proves vital in this process: the faculty who provide instruction to these students. Greenfield, Keup, and Gardner (2013) address the need to identify those "critical partners" upon implementing any early alert initiative, a list that typically includes advisors, counselors, peer mentors, tutors, and other academic success personnel. These are the common figures that one would expect to make up a panel of individuals to both develop and sustain these programs.

A National Survey for Student Engagement (NSSE) report cites that faculty should consider themselves as an "integral cord in an institution's safety net for students" (Cambridge, 2005, p. 2). The roles of faculty members and instructors are essential in providing effective and seamless interventions for academically at-risk students. Often it is the charge of an academic support unit to implement and sell an early-alert mechanism; the best way to foster that buy-in is to identify and engage faculty early who partner with services such as tutoring or supplemental instruction. These are the potential advocates who can mobilize and share these efforts for student success.

A 2013 report from The Higher Education Resource Institute (HERI) revealed the top three factors that contribute to student success and persistence in college are a sense of belonging, ease of academic adjustment, and faculty interaction (as cited in Pryor, 2013). Although all of these are interconnected, it is evident that faculty have a consistent role in fostering a sense of connectedness and support to the students whom they serve. As student services staff and advisors it is essential to share feedback with students to ensure that they know where they stand along with if they are meeting the expectations of the college classroom. Grounded in the idea of Reynolds (2009) helping strategies and providing effective feedback, there are three best practices offered that can guide approaches to making effective referrals through these systems: identify the student's needs early, make the student aware they are at-risk, and connect the student to relevant resources.

Here is the summation of these best practices and things to consider as faculty and instructors find the need to intervene with students:

Identify the Student's Needs Early. Joe Cuseo (2011) identified academic disengagement, absenteeism, and mid-semester grades as some of the tangible indicators to warrant intervention for a student. These factors, if found at the right time, have been proven to have a positive effect on student performance in the classroom. "If we have learned anything over the years in our attempts to improve student retention, it is that the earlier one attends to a problem or potential problem, the easier it is to deal with that problem and the less likely it is that it will manifest itself in the form of student withdrawal" (Tinto, 1993, p. 171). These signs should be identified early to host the proper form of intervention, specifically within the first few weeks of the academic semester as these are prime times to address a student's academic concerns.

Make the Student Aware That They Are At-Risk. According to Reynolds (2009), to be effective, "helpers must present the referral in the spirit of respect and collaboration arranging the initial contact between student and referral either by telephone, [email], or in person" (p. 160). This approach is a crucial point in the academic referral process". The ability to disarm the student and convey a genuine sense of care can bridge the gap of trust and provide comfort between both faculty and student. In some cases, the intervention may become resolved solely based on the referrer or recommender showing care and concern for the student and the issue that they are trying to navigate. Reynolds even proceeds to outline the level of care and sensitivity that is required to inform students that they have been referred and cautions advisors to bear in mind that in these instances a student can likely convey an attitude or disposition of not wanting the help.

Connect Student to Relevant Resources. It is imperative that faculty members possess an awareness of institutional support opportunities that are in place to make the proper referral. Common practice for many institutions is that a student should become aware of campus support resources during admissions events and new student orientation, but most students only connect with these resources when there is a need for immediate assistance. In the event that the intervention is necessary, Reynolds (2009) goes on to say that helpers (faculty or staff) "must offer referrals with the same care as interpretations and confrontations, bearing in mind that the student may feel threatened by the suggestion that their dilemma requires expert or professional attention" (p. 160). Prepare for resistance from the student as they may be reluctant to accept the need for academic intervention.

Effective interventions for academically at-risk students are not possible without the buy-in and support of faculty members and academic departments. Early-alert programs are at their best when the pulse of student performance centers on faculty observations within the classroom. Such insights can strengthen the argument for the necessity of these programs along with showing that feedback and intervention can contribute to student success. Students are more likely to succeed in an environment where feedback about their performance is offered early and honestly, thus enabling all parties to adjust behaviors and approaches to enhance the likelihood of success. Additionally, providing training for faculty and instructors can ease comfort in identifying the signs of early-alert and bridge the gap between efforts to retain and support students.
References
James K. Winfield
Assistant Director for Faculty Development
University 101 Programs
University of South Carolina
winfield@sc.edu

Cambridge, B. L. (2005). Promoting student success: What new faculty need to know (NSSE DEEP Report, Occasional Paper No. 12). Retrieved from http://nsse.indiana.edu/institute/

Cueso, J. (2011). Early-alert (early-warning) programs: Definition, advantages, variations & illustrations. Retrieved from http://www.uwc.edu/sites/uwc.edu/files/imce-uploads/employees/academic-resources/esfy/_files/red_flags-behavioral_indicators_of_potential_student_attrition.pdf

Greenfield, G. M., Keup, J. R., & Gardner, J. N. (2013). Developing and sustaining successful first-year programs: a guide for practitioners. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

Pryor, J. (2013, May). Preparing students to thrive in the 21st century- HERI CIRP Data. Presented at the annual ideaPOP Conference, Columbia, SC.

Reynolds, A. (2009). Helping college students: Developing essential support skills for student affairs practice. San Francisco, CA: Josey-Bass.

Tinto, V. (1993). Leaving college: Rethinking the causes and cures of student attrition (2nd ed.). Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.

Cite this article using APA style as: Winfield, J.K. (2018, December). The art of intervention: Partnering with faculty for early academic alert. Academic Advising Today, 41(4). Retrieved from [insert url here]

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The Art of Intervention: Partnering with Faculty for Early Academic Alert

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Currently trending at many institutions, early-alert programs have become institutional priorities to improve student retention. It is imperative to note that regardless of the technological platform used to drive these retention initiatives, there is a human factor that proves vital in this process

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Estrada & Latino (2019) Early Alert Programs

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Estrada & Latino (2019) Early Alert Programs

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Dial & McKeown (2019) Beyond Faculty Referrals: Advisor Facilitated Early Intervention

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Dial & McKeown (2019) Beyond Faculty Referrals: Advisor Facilitated Early Intervention

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Seidman (2012) proposed a formula for student retention RET = E ID + (E + IN + C) IV (p. 272). He suggests that student retention may be achieved by the early identification of student needs plus early, intensive, and continuous intervention. Similarly, Tampke (2013) suggests that "effective intervention" occurs "at the first indication of academic difficulty" through a "systematic method of recording and communicating student behaviors that contribute to student attrition" (pp. 523-524). Consistent with previous literature (Barefoot, Griffin, & Koch, 2012; Habley, Bloom, & Robbins, 2012), the 2017 National Survey of the First-Year Experience (NSFYE) (Estrada & Latino, 2019) found early alert programming to be a prominently featured initiative at a majority (79.4%) of institutions.

Estrada and Latino (2019) report that effective intervention requires the identification of "behaviors that contribute to success" and the implementation of "a systematic method to intervene when students fall short of those behaviors" (p. 53). It is likely that when advisors and other staff think of early intervention, they picture systems in which faculty report student red flags to some intervening agent (Gordanier, Hauk, & Sankaran, 2019; Tampke, 2013; Winfield, 2018). In fact, respondents to the 2017 NSFYE indicated that faculty engage in early alert programs at 89.6% of institutions (Estrada & Latino, 2019). Two of the greatest barriers to implementing high-quality early intervention programs, however, are the challenges of generating faculty buy-in (Estrada & Latino, 2019) and determining a "reliable set of predictors" (Beck & Davidson, 2001, p. 710). Given these challenges, it should be noted that academic advisors can design and implement a host of student interventions relying only on data readily available in existing campus advising technologies. Advisors may be uniquely qualified to serve as intervention agents due to the relationships they form with students, often beginning at orientation.

In their work on choice architecture, Thaler and Sunstein (2009) suggest that individuals make poor choices when "they are inexperienced, and poorly informed, and in which feedback is slow or infrequent." On the other hand, they make "good choices in contexts in which they have experience, good information, and prompt feedback" (p. 9). By reaching out intrusively to students who exhibit potentially problematic behaviors, advisors equip students with context and valuable information they may lack as novices in the collegiate setting. Advisors are distinctively positioned to gather information, uncover predictive behaviors, and identify students who are at heightened risk of not persisting. The following section examines some of these opportunities where advisors can gather data and leverage their relationships with their caseload to positively impact student success and persistence.
Minimum Credit Hours
Distinctively, advisors have the ability and positioning to examine students' credit hour enrollment in aggregate, where faculty and other stakeholders may only be looking at students through the lens of a particular course. By establishing a standard number of credit hours, generally 15, at which a student is most likely to balance the ability to succeed with timely completion of a program and graduation, advisors can intervene when students are dipping below this threshold early, and oftentimes catch a student that may otherwise have exhibited no other early risk factors (Szafran, 2002; Venit, 2017). For many students, financial concerns may also arise from lower credit hour enrollment, resulting in extended time to degree.

Enrolling in adequate credit hours may seem to be too simple of a factor on which to conduct an intervention, or even one that advisors may assume many students do not need. However, Whitcomb and Mathews (2014) have demonstrated that there is no statistically significant correlation between any one student demographic and understanding of degree requirements, and "encourage academic advisors not to attempt to predict students' understanding of degree requirements solely based on grade point average," among other factors. Utilizing their unique ability to see students' total enrollment, advisors can contact students, alerting them to the benefit of enrolling in at least 15 credit hours. It should be noted that students may have valid reasons for enrolling in less than 15 credit hours, including disability status, serving as primary caregivers for children or elderly parents, and financial obligations for self and family. This intervention also allows advisors to establish context in these cases and better serve students in future meetings.
University Mandated Compliance and Registration Holds
Advisors can also work in collaboration with key campus partners to assure student compliance in university-wide mandates, neglect of which may trigger academic consequences both directly and indirectly. An example of such a mandate is the completion of online prevention education courses on topics like substance abuse and sexual assault. Directly, failure to complete requirements by university established deadlines will, at many institutions, trigger a registration hold on a student's account, preventing them from future course registration actions until they have completed the related action item. If students cannot register, despite taking other required actions, then they cannot persist by default. Advisors can work with the campus partners responsible for these initiatives to intervene with students who are not in compliance, emphasizing the importance of the requirement from an academic standpoint and leveraging the advisor to student relationship to encourage compliance.

Indirectly, advisors that are involved in intervention to encourage compliance with prevention education are supporting student success and persistence due to the intended outcomes of the course. A case study conducted at Oregon State University by EverFi (2018) concludes by stating "students [who receive the course] are safer and satisfied-giving them a greater opportunity to succeed. Incidents of alcohol abuse and sexual assault can dramatically disrupt students' lives, but effective prevention education enables them to remain in school and enjoy every opportunity to succeed."
Non-Registered Students
Intervening with students who have not registered for the upcoming term in a timely manner-after they have been advised and the opening week or two of registration have passed-can be considered a light touch intervention with a big impact. Hutt (2017) describes the value of a simple, 34-word email that can be sent from advisors to non-registered students asking, "Is there anything I can do to help?" The original campaign, sent by Hutt, the Assistant Vice President for Academic Advising at Kennesaw State University, was sent to 4,000 students with 3.0 or higher grade point averages. This further enforces Whitcomb and Mathews' study that advisors cannot rely on perceived levels of student success to determine whether students will benefit from intervention. Over 35% of students responded to Hutt's outreach, many within a few days, to describe registration barriers that they were facing. Factors such as parking tickets, course availability, and lack of resource information - "I know where I want to go, but I don't know how to get there"-arose frequently in Hutt's (2017) responses. These are challenges that advisors can assist students in overcoming through intervention, thus encouraging their students to persist and succeed.
Effective Timelines for Intervention
A final component of impactful early intervention conducted by advisors is intentional timing. To construct an effective intervention timeline, it is necessary to think about meeting students where they are and providing the support and resources they need, when they need them. The role of the advisor, particularly in intervention, says McElwee (2013), is to "at each stage . . . respond to the students' characteristics and developmental stage, providing information, support, or encouragement as needed." An intentional framework will use academic dates and deadlines as a guide to avoid "too much, too soon." If an intervention about non-registration is sent before students have had the opportunity to get comfortable with the process and system of registration, it will likely not serve its intended outcomes. Likewise, an intervention to reach student below a minimum credit hour threshold sent after the timeframe during which students can add additional classes is ineffective and likely frustrating for the student.
Implications for Institutional Improvement
Early intervention programs, such as those detailed above, target intrusive outreach to students based on the display of potentially problematic behaviors beyond-the-classroom that may hinder their ability to progress within their degree programs. By monitoring all students and not just those that enter the university with an at-risk label, advisors and therefore the institution are able to reach more students at risk of departure. This is especially significant upon acknowledging that many at-risk students will go on to lead productive academic lives and complete the requirements of their degree program while some students admitted as high-achievers will face academic and personal struggles that may lead to their departure. High-touch, high-impact interventions, such as these carried out by academic advisors, as students' primary points of contact, further demonstrate the attention and care promised to students and their families in the admissions and orientation processes. They also may deliver increased benefit to first-generation and low-socioeconomic status students, leveling the playing field for novice learners who lack context. Most importantly, the interventions described herein do not require institutional buy-in/support. Individual advisors can implement these initiatives of their own accord for the benefit of the students in their caseload.

Mike Dial
Assistant Director of First-Year Advising
University Advising Center, Office of the Provost
University of South Carolina
mdial@mailbox.sc.edu

Paige McKeown
Coordinator of First-Year Advising and Academic Intervention
University Advising Center, Office of the Provost
University of South Carolina
paigem@sc.edu
References
Barefoot, B. O., Griffin, B. Q., & Koch, A. K. (2012). Enhancing student success and retention throughout undergraduate education: A national survey. The John N. Gardner Institute for Excellence in Undergraduate Education.

Beck, H. P., & Davidson, W. D. (2001). Establishing an early warning system: Predicting low grades in college students from survey of academic orientations scores. Research in Higher education, 42(6), 709-723.

Estrada, S., & Latino, J. (2019). Early alert programs. In D. Young (Ed.), 2017 National Survey on The First-Year Experience: Creating and coordinating structures to support student success (pp. 53-61). University of South Carolina, National Resource Center for The First-Year Experience & Students in Transition.

EverFi. (2018, March 9). Going online: Sexual assault and alcohol abuse prevention at Oregon State University. https://everfi.com/insights/case-studies/oregon-state-university/

Gordanier, J., Hauk, W., & Sankaran, C. (2019, October). Early intervention in college classes and improved student outcomes. Economics of Education Review, 72(1), 23-29.

Habley, W. R., Bloom, J. L., & Robbins, S. (2012). Increasing persistence: Research-based strategies for college student success. Jossey-Bass.

Hutt, C. (2017, November 24). Breaking down barriers to retaining students. The Chronicle of Higher Education. https://www.chronicle.com/article/Breaking-Down-Barriers-to/241814

McElwee, R. O. (2013, April). Teaching and advising first-year students. Observer, 26(4). Retrieved from https://www.psychologicalscience.org/observer/teaching-and-advising-first-year-students

Seidman, A. (2012). Taking action: A retention formula and model for student success. In A. Seidman (Ed.), College student retention formula for student success (pp. 267-284). Rowman & Littlefield Publishers.

Szafran, R. F. (2002). The effect of academic load on success for new college students: Is lighter better? NACADA Journal, 22(2), 26-38. https://nacadajournal.org/doi/pdf/10.12930/0271-9517-22.2.26

Tampke, D. R. (2013). Developing, implementing, and assessing an early alert system. Journal of College Student Retention: Research, Theory & Practice, 14(4), 523-532. https://doi.org/10.2190/CS.14.4.e

Thaler, R. H., & Sunstein, C. R. (2009). Nudge: Improving decisions about health, wealth, and happiness. New York, NY: Penguin.

Venit, E. (2017, August 21). Why even C students should consider taking 15 credits their first semester. https://eab.com/insights/blogs/student-success/why-even-c-students-should-consider-taking-15-credits-their-first-semester/

Whitcomb, H., & Mathews, S. (2014, December). Exploring the relationship between student understanding of degree requirements and academic performance. Academic Advising Today, 37(4). https://www.nacada.ksu.edu/Resources/Academic-Advising-Today/View-Articles/Exploring-the-Relationship-between-Student-Understanding-of-Degree-Requirements-and-Academic-Performance.aspx

Winfield, J. (2018, December). The art of intervention: Partnering with faculty for early academic alert. Academic Advising Today, 41(4). https://nacada.ksu.edu/Resources/Academic-Advising-Today/View-Articles/The-Art-of-Intervention-Partnering-with-Faculty-for-Early-Academic-Alert.aspx

Cite this article using APA style as: Dial, M., & McKeown, P. (2019, December). Beyond faculty referrals: Advisory facilitated early intervention. Academic Advising Today, 42(4). [insert url here]

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Beyond Faculty Referrals: Advisor Facilitated Early Intervention

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Two of the greatest barriers to implementing high-quality early intervention programs are the challenges of generating faculty buy-in and determining a reliable set of predictors. Advisors may be uniquely qualified to serve as intervention agents due to the relationships they form with students, oft

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Dial & McKeown (2020) Academic Early Alert and Intervention: Why Academic Advisors Are Best Suited to Intervene with At-Risk Students

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Dial & McKeown (2020) Academic Early Alert and Intervention: Why Academic Advisors Are Best Suited to Intervene with At-Risk Students

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Early intervention programs, also referred to as early alert or early warning programs, are in use at a majority of two- and four-year campuses as means of improving retention and institutional persistence rates. According to Cuseo (n.d.), early intervention programs are "formal, proactive, feedback system through which students and student-support agents are alerted to early red flags" (p. 1). Karp (2014) cautions though that sending up a red flag in and of itself is not a student retention panacea. If that warning indicator causes an institutional helping agent to engage in outreach and intervention with the student, that may lead to greater student success outcomes.

On campus, student retention is everyone's responsibility, and over the last decade, early alert initiatives have become incredibly buzzworthy. The explosion of interest in and facilitation of early alert initiatives is likely due in no small part to the profusion of consulting services and tech firms purporting to offer the next big solution for student retention. As such, disparate campus units have engaged in the early intervention space. Recent scholarship suggests that at about 90% of responding institutions, faculty and advisors are consistently engaged in early intervention (Barefoot et al., 2012; Estrada & Latino, 2019). Figure 1 below showcases that other institutional personnel engage in this work at lower rates nationwide.

Figure 1
Types of Professional Staff Engaged in Early Intervention

Note. Data from the JNGI 2012 Enhancing Student Success and Retention throughout Undergraduate Education: A National Survey Report (Barefoot et al., 2012) and the 2017 National Survey of the First-Year Experience (NSFYE) (Estrada & Latino, 2019)

There are many reasons that academic advisors are tapped for this role at most institutions. In Dial and McKeown (2019), several interventions are recommended that advisors can facilitate beyond faculty referrals or traditional early alert initiatives. Herein, in addition to these additional interventions, we as authors offer several reasons why academic advisors are best suited to respond to early alert notifications with at-risk students.
Preexisting Relationships
Where academic advising is appropriately resourced, including funding, staffing, and appropriate student information systems, beginning at new student orientation, advisors form 1:1 relationships with their advisees. It can reasonably be assumed that students are more likely to respond to emails, calls, and text messages from an individual on campus with whom they have a relationship than they would be to respond to outreach in the form of cold calls from a central retention office. Additionally, advisors get to know their advisees as whole persons and can co-design strategic and student-specific plans of action.
Tiered Intervention
Advisors are also optimally suited for the work of intervention due to the caseload-centric nature of the role. Advisors may be the only full-time professional staff members on campus to whom students have a formal, assigned relationship, rather than serving as one-off or walk-in practitioners. Because a team of advisors are doing the work of intervention, rather than a central coordinator (or even two or three), the idea of whether or not advisors have the capacity to include early intervention in their work shifts from "one person doing the work" to "one person doing the work for a finite, defined group," and others doing the same work on their own populations across the institution. Often, a major challenge to early alert is follow-up-critical so not only can staff gauge additional student need, but also be able to assess whether an intervention was effective. Advisors managing a caseload with a finite number of at-risk students can follow up with individual referring faculty in a way that a central office cannot.

When advisor caseloads are appropriately sized, 300:1 according to national best practice, advisors can stratify these groups early on using campus technologies and 1:1 appointments. Advisors are well-positioned to excel in caseload management in their day-to-day work-they know who they are responsible for and can therefore structure tiered interventions effectively, ensuring that all students get what they need when they need it.

Tiered intervention via academic advisors is adapted from the Response to Intervention (RTI) model, common in K-12 education for both behavioral and academic purposes (The IRIS Center, 2008). This model uses a pyramid visual to separate three categories of students in need of support: the base, often colored green, represents about 80% of a given student population, who will be successful when provided with universal supports that are preventative and proactive.

Advisors are uniquely positioned specifically to support this population due to students being in their assigned caseload. The second tier, usually represented in yellow, comprises an additional 15% of the student group and would be students who are classically at-risk and will be benefitted by monitoring and targeted intervention. Finally, the top tier, represented in red and making up about 5% of a population, would be those students who are actively struggling and will benefit from reactive, individual intervention. The aforementioned 300:1 caseload size allows advisors to give ample time to students (approximately four hours per year per student) and using the RTI tiers advisors can allocate this time effectively. Not every student in a caseload will need the four hours per academic year, and the time left over from those students is reinvested into time supporting students who need more than four hours.
Positioning Within Academic Units
The issues on which advisors are best able to intervene are naturally tied into their work-supporting the student with curricular advice and as a central source for guidance on decision making that will impact degree completion and time to degree. Often there are underlying causes that contribute to poor academic performance, such as mental and physical health concerns, serving as a primary caregiver to children or elders, or lack of access to basic needs. However, classroom factors, such as attendance issues and poor grades, are prone to appear as the red flags that alert professionals to these distal causes. When advisors are the central conduits of early alert and intervention, they are better primed than nearly any other higher education professionals to act quickly and effectively on the most visible academic red flags. Because advisors are, by the nature of their roles, embedded in the academic units and curricula where they advise, they are positioned to act as a one-stop shop for students' needs when the issues that arise manifest as academic.

As academic challenges can be visible evidence of underlying challenges and can also have far ranging effects on degree progression, it is vital for students that advisors are engaged in this work and are not an afterthought or a referral agent only if a responding office thinks they may need to be. Where the matter of a student's success or failure in courses may naturally necessitate course specific services, success in the course is inextricable from progress towards degree. Therefore, if a student needs support that involves a change to the degree plan because of this, the advisor is already involved, because they initiated the outreach. Because advisors are housed in their academic units and not a central retention-focused space, advisors can present assistance to the student that is focused on their curriculum and path to degree. Where faculty members are the purveyors of their subject matter, advisors are the purveyors of the curricula as a unit-so where faculty are the expert guides in their material, advisors are experts in guiding students through curricular complexity, and therefore intervening when there are adjacent factors of the college experience that disrupt the student's path through the curriculum. Marc Lowenstein says,

An excellent advisor does the same for the student's entire curriculum that the excellent teacher does for one course (Lowenstein, 2000). The entire curriculum refers both to the student's major and to the courses taken to meet general education requirements . . . whereas the individual course is the domain of the professor, the overall curriculum is most often the domain of the academic advisor, and the excellent advisor coaches the student through the process of learning the curriculum. (2009)
Implications for Practice
Early alert initiatives are relatively new to higher education in comparison to pillars such as, first-year seminars, orientation, and academic advising itself. When facilitated well and by staff who can have the quickest and largest scale impact for at-risk students, early warning programs have the potential to benefit both students and institutions. Academic advisors responding to early alerts benefit students by connecting them to resources; ensuring they are in majors and courses that align with their strengths, values, and goals; and showcasing an institutional ethic of care for students and their success. Institutions stand to benefit financially from the tuition dollars saved as a result of advisor outreach and intervention preventing dropout and dismissal. Student success and retention are of course everyone's responsibility; however, when academic advising is good, a special relationship forms between students and their assigned advisors. According to King and Kerr (2005), "academic advising is perhaps the most important way that first-year students interact with a representative of the institution" (p. 320). Due to the relational nature of their role, expertise in their curricula, university resources, and campus policies and procedures, and the finite number of students in their assigned caseloads, academic advisors are the most apt campus representatives to perform outreach and intervention following faculty referral.

Mike Dial
Assistant Director of First-Year Advising
University Advising Center, Office of the Provost
University of South Carolina
mdial@mailbox.sc.edu

Paige McKeown
Coordinator of First-Year Advising and Academic Intervention
University Advising Center, Office of the Provost
University of South Carolina
paigem@sc.edu
References
Barefoot, B. O., Griffin, B. Q., & Koch, A. K. (2012). Enhancing student success and retention throughout undergraduate education: A national survey. John N. Gardner Institute for Excellence in Undergraduate Education. https://static1.squarespace.com/static/59b0c486d2b857fc86d09aee/t/59bad33412abd988ad84d697/1505415990531/JNGInational_survey_web.pdf

Cuseo, J. (n.d.). Red flags: Behavioral indicators of potential student intervention. https://docplayer.net/17519395-Red-flags-behavioral-indicators-of-potential-student-attrition.html

Dial, M., & McKeown, P. (2019, December). Beyond faculty referrals: Advisory facilitated early intervention. Academic Advising Today, 42(4). https://nacada.ksu.edu/Resources/Academic-Advising-Today/View-Articles/Beyond-Faculty-Referrals-Advisor-Facilitated-Early-Intervention.aspx

Estrada, S., & Latino, J. (2019). Early-alert programs. In D. Young (Ed.), 2017 national survey on the first-year experience: Creating and coordinating structures to support student success (pp. 53-61). University of South Carolina, National Resource Center for The First-Year Experience & Students in Transition.

The IRIS Center. (2008). RTI (part 5): A closer look at tier 3. https://iris.peabody.vanderbilt.edu/module/rti05-tier3/

Karp, M. (2014, January 13). Tech alone won't cut it. Insider Higher Ed. https://www.insidehighered.com/views/2014/01/13/essay-looks-how-early-warning-systems-can-better-boost-retention

King, M. C., & Kerr, T. J. (2005). Academic advising. In M. L. Upcraft, J. N. Gardner, & B. O. Barefoot, Challenging and Suppporting the First-Year Student (p. 320). San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

Lowenstein, M. (2009). If advising is teaching, what do advisors teach? NACADA Journal, 29(1), 123-131. https://doi.org/10.12930/0271-9517-29.1.123

Cite this article using APA style as: Dial, M., & McKeown, P. (2020, December). Academic early alert and intervention: Why academic advisors are best suited to intervene at at-risk students. Academic Advising Today, 43(4). [insert url here]

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Academic Early Alert and Intervention: Why Academic Advisors Are Best Suited to Intervene with At-Risk Students

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Early intervention programs, also referred to as early alert or early warning programs, are in use at a majority of two- and four-year campuses as means of improving retention and institutional persistence rates. According to Cuseo (n.d.), early intervention programs are "formal, proactive, feedback system through which students and student-support agents are alerted to early red flags" (p.

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Communication is an important aspect of the advisor-advisee relationship, and this interplay helps both parties establish mutual trust, understand one another's perspectives, and provide clarity on goal achievement, to name a few. With the sheer number of duties that academic advisors face, it is a challenge to consistently preserve fundamental elements of communication. This is exacerbated by academic advisors becoming increasingly overburdened by their workload, emotional exhaustion, and a lack of institutional support (Gregerson et al., 2022). Mass outreaches have the benefit of reaching many students at once, and academic advisors conduct these types of outreaches for a myriad of reasons, including but not limited to prompting them to register, informing them of an opportunity, reminding them to submit an important document, and encouraging perseverance during midterms. However, they also have the disadvantage of eliminating personalized communication components, which diminishes the likelihood of students following through. Research on the art and science of large-scale outreach is blooming, and advisors can hone their communications to maximize effectiveness.

When advisors send outreaches, they are attempting to influence students toward a particular choice, way of thinking, or other behavior. In the literature, the term nudge has taken precedence and refers to altering the environment so that senses favor a certain outcome (Saghai, 2013). Nudges come in many forms, including but not limited to emails, text messages, verbal cues, slogans, and gestures, and usually serve the purpose of either informing, encouraging, or preventing. Regardless, there is an identified purpose with little effort for the recipient. Most advisors are well-versed in sending outreaches to students, but they do not always achieve the desired results. Suhaimi and Hussin (2017) analyzed the findings of several significant research papers and found that students are drowning in information, particularly when technology, academic requirements, and personal commitments are considered. Coupled with the incessant communication they receive daily, it is no wonder that students do not follow through, respond, etc.

Behavioral and physiological elements are at play, especially when considering what is most fundamental. Famous behavioral scientist B. F. Skinner (1974) asserted that human beings interact with the environment to generate consequences that in turn affect their behaviors. Through learning via past experiences, individuals could be less likely to respond to stimuli. Thus, outreaches can lose their effectiveness due to students being conditioned to respond based on past consequences. Regarding the latter, Lewis (2015) concurred that people are bombarded with information in today's world, and our brains struggle with filtering out information. Specifically, two structures in our brains (i.e., the thalamus and cerebral cortex) work together to select environmental information that is a priority, but the system is susceptible to inundation, resulting in over saturation. This can be especially true for students when responding to an email or carrying out a task that does not take priority over competing demands in the environment. While advisors cannot directly manipulate the physiology of their students or make drastic changes to their interactions with the environment, nudges can be structured in such a way as to yield more favorable results.

With well over 50,000 bachelor's degree-seeking students, Texas A&M University has one of the largest undergraduate student populations in the country. The Office for Student Success (OSS) tracked enrollees throughout the registration season and sent nudges to students who missed their registration to remind them of upcoming opportunities to select classes. During the fall 2021 registration cycle, five colleges/departments allowed OSS to send outreaches on their behalf, and this was compared to four areas that wanted to send their own. Registrants were tracked throughout the spring and into the summer, resulting in a 4.94% difference in favor of those areas that permitted OSS to assist. The efforts were replicated during the spring 2022 registration campaign, and the results were as impressive (i.e., a 5.41% increase) for those assisted. It should be noted that the two groups naturally shuffled between the first round and the replication, which further supports the results. While the results are not indicative of causation, OSS believes that effective nudges played a role in encouraging students to register.

This begs the question, what constitutes an effective nudge? Burdick and Peeler (2021) suggest that nudges are supposed to gently encourage recipients, contain a human element, be thoughtful and particular, have suitable language, and incorporate elements of teamwork. These suggestions are even more important considering the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic. Specifically, effective nudging can increase the perception of feeling supported and facilitate connectedness. There is a definite subconscious component aimed at getting students' attention at pivotal moments throughout the semester and giving them an open, yet optional channel of communication that can facilitate effectiveness (Burdick & Peeler, 2021). OSS concurred with these assumptions and proposed the following elements for effective nudges: awareness of purpose, striving for compactness, limiting action items, avoiding new obstacles, and timeliness.

Awareness of Purpose. Before creating a nudge, advisors should define and build outreach around their central purpose. Typically, nudges are meant to either inform, encourage, or prevent something. If a well-defined purpose is not carried out accurately, the anticipated results run the risk of not yielding the actual outcomes. For example, if an advisor designed a nudge to encourage an action such as registering for courses but did not include a website link to do so, the outreach might only inform students instead of motivating them to complete an action.

Compactness. When designing the nudge, it is important to retain salient points but also not come across as long-winded. If compactness is not enforced, students could get lost in the communication and feel unsure about what they are supposed to do (e.g., become informed, complete an action, etc.). As a result, the desired outcome risks not being attained. It is recommended that advisors think about how to get their points across in the smallest number of words possible.

Limit Action Items. For nudges that strive to encourage an action item, it is recommended to stick to one item at a time. For instance, if the purpose of an outreach is to encourage students to sign-up for a new tutoring program, additional action items (e.g., filling out an academic survey, reminding them to see someone about advising-related holds, etc.) should be avoided. Advisors can master this step by practicing reading nudges and eliminating anything that can be construed as an additional action item.

Avoid New Obstacles. The fourth element involves not adding obstacles to the mix. For example, if the purpose of a nudge is to inform students about the scholastic deficiency process but also includes potential penalties (e.g., probation, suspension, etc.) as consequences, the designer of this nudge intentionally included an obstacle that could hinder students' ability to understand its purpose and cause undue anxiety. It is imperative to pinpoint potential obstacles and remove them.

Timeliness. Lastly, the timing of nudges should be considered, especially when time is of the essence. For example, if an advisor plans to send a nudge to remind students to complete and submit their anticipated registration schedules, it will make little sense to send it immediately prior to the deadline. In this instance, sending the nudge weeks in advance would be appropriate to allow students time to complete and submit it. On the other hand, nudges that are sent too early run the risk of being ineffective due to too much time passing between the nudge itself and the anticipated action. An example would be nudging students to inform them of academic standards pertaining to midterms in let's say week eight of the semester. If instead the nudge was sent during week five, when they are taking other exams, the nudge would most likely not be effective, and this could also induce confusion and possible pandemonium.

In conclusion, communication is a vital piece of the advisor-advisee relationship, and there are occasions when it is appropriate to influence students toward a particular choice, way of thinking, or other behavior. Even though behavioral and psychological elements are at play, nudges are powerful tools that, if designed correctly, can motivate students via encouraging, informing, or preventing. Adhering to a specified purpose, aiming for compactness, reducing action items, steering clear of new obstacles, and seizing the best opportunities for implementation can maximize the effectiveness of nudges.

Aaron J. Petuch
Academic Advisor
Office for Student Success
Texas A&M University
apetuch@tamu.edu
References
Burdick, J. M., & Peeler, E. (2021). The value of effective nudging during COVID. Inside Higher Ed. https://www.insidehighered.com/views/2021/02/23/how-strong-nudge-campaign-can-improve-student-outcomes-during-covid-opinion

Gregerson, K., Sutton, L., & Miller, O. (2022, March). From self-care to systemic change: The evolution of advisor well-being in NACADA. Academic Advising Today, 45(1). https://nacada.ksu.edu/Resources/Academic-Advising-Today/View-Articles/From-Self-Care-to-Systemic-Change-The-Evolution-of-Advisor-Well-Being-in-NACADA.aspx

Lewis, J. G. (2015). This is how the brain filters out unimportant details. Psychology Today. https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/brain-babble/201502/is-how-the-brain-filters-out-unimportant-details

Saghai, Y. (2013). Salvaging the concept of nudge. Journal of Medical Ethics, 39(2), 487-493. https://doi.org/10.1136/medethics-2012-100727

Skinner, B. F. (1974). About behaviorism. Alfred A. Knopf.

Suhaimi, F. A. B., & Hussin, N. B. (2017). The influence of information overload on students' academic performance. International Journal of Academic Research in Business and Social Sciences, 7(8), 760-766. https://doi.org/10.6007/IJARBSS/v7-i8/3292

Cite this article using APA style as: Petuch, A.J. (2022, September). The poser of nudges: Five elements to facilitate outreach. Academic Advising Today, 45(3). [insert url here]

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The Power of Nudges: Five Elements to Facilitate Outreach

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Communication is an important aspect of the advisor-advisee relationship, and this interplay helps both parties establish mutual trust, understand one another's perspectives, and provide clarity on goal achievement, to name a few. With the sheer number of duties that academic advisors face, it is a challenge to consistently preserve fundamental elements of communication.