STUDENT SUCCESS INITIATIVESIMPLEMENTED BY THE MATH TEAM

FALL 2004

THE OPPORTUNITY

Attrition rate 42.6%

– The Math Team created May 2004

– Pilot project to reduce attrition approved

Number Percent

Pass 1280 57.4%

Fail 700 31.4%

Drop/Withdraw 250 11.2%

Total 2230 100%

FIRST SEMESTER MATH RESULTS FALL 2003

42.6%

STUDENT SUCCESS STRATEGIES

• Brainstormed student success strategies

• Focus of strategies was to make an early connection between the student and the professor and to encourage students to take responsibility for their learning

DATA COLLECTION• Initiatives

– Test 1 Reflections– Phone/email contact– Drop-in Tutorials (Technology)– Business Mathematics Help in MLC– On-line quizzes (LYRYX Project)– Pre and Post Attitudinal Survey– Put “strongest” professors into first year

classes, where possible

DATA COLLECTION

• Measurements– Mohawk Mathematics Assessment Test

(MMAT) Score– Demographics– Course and Class size– Attendance– Professor– Time and Location of Tests

FACTORS THAT DID NOT IMPACT STUDENT SUCCESS

• Statistically Insignificant Results– Professor– Time of Test– Location of Test

FACTORS THAT DID NOT IMPACT STUDENT SUCCESS

• Contact of students who did not write Term Test 1– Phone contact– Email contact

• No student offered the opportunity to write the missed test did so.

• These students were gone!

FACTORS THAT DID NOT IMPACT STUDENT SUCCESS

• “Drop-In” Tutorials (Technology)– Scheduled– Poor attendance– Too costly

FACTORS THAT DID IMPACT STUDENT SUCCESS

• MLC Business Math Help– Scheduled – 11 hours– Musical Chairs– Too costly

• Recommendation

Require co-op students in MLC who can help with business mathematics (and statistics not only technology math).

FACTORS THAT DID IMPACT STUDENT SUCCESS

• “Test 1 Reflections”• Objectives:

– to have students acknowledge their grade – i.e. how are they doing at week 5

– to have students accept responsibility for their grade

– to restate all the possible sources of help available while there was still an opportunity to improve

Test 1 ReflectionsAs part of the Math Dept’s initiative to improve student retention, I am asking you to complete the following questionnaire no later than one day after receiving your test mark.

Instructions:Simply reply to this email (to me!)l and fill in the blanks (then hit “SEND” of course!).A completed response will result in one (1) mark added to your test mark.My course: _____________________My mark on Test:   _________ out of __________

Three parts to the “Test 1 Reflections”Part 1: Course and grade acknowledgement

Are you happy with this mark?    Yes ______      No _______If No, WHY do you think your mark was lower than expected?(You can choose more than one option):The test was marked too hard _______The material was not what I expected _________I studied the wrong material _________I did not study enough ____________I missed too many classes ____________I did not do the homework on a regular basis __________I did not seek help from the MLC/instructor when needed: ____________Other reasons: ____________________ (specify)

Part 2: Responsibility for Grade

If you were NOT happy with your mark WHAT do you plan to do about it: (again, you can pick more than one)

Attend classes on a regular basis:____________Do ALL of the homework as an absolute minimum: ____________Ask for help from the MLC/ professor when needed: ________________Get a tutor through the counselling office: ______________Other: _____________________ (specify)

Use this area for any other comments you wish to make:

Part 3: Help Available

“Test 1 Reflections”

• Participation ranged from 60 -100%

• Positive feedback from many students– Anecdotal– Took ownership – hard on themselves– Many students thanked the professors– Were grateful for the contact– Some had fun!

'K' - is for Karen, thy teacher her name'A' - is for Academic, her method, her game'R' - is for Reasonable, the marks that she gives'E' - is for Envy, for the good life she lives'N' - is for Name, as I've stated above... for Karen teaches math with a whole lot of love.

“Test 1 Reflections”

Lyryx Project

• Online learning program tied to the text

• Pilot funded by McGraw-Hill

• Weekly quizzes starting WEEK 1

• Quizzes were created by Craig Cooke, a Mohawk Math Professor

Lyryx Project

• Quizzes were worth 15% of final grade

• Early graded feedback

• Professor knew by end of Week 2 which students had started to fall behind

• These students were contacted in class or by email

Lyryx Project

• Same instructor ran two classes one with Lyryx and one under regular program

• Trial was successful

• During Winter semester, remedial on Lyryx is being tested with all Business classes.

RESEARCH QUESTION

Does attendance affect performance?

ATTENDANCE

FINA

L GRA

DE

100806040200

100

80

60

40

20

0

Fall 2004FINAL GRADE vs ATTENDANCE

Correlation between final grade and attendance was statistically significant . (r=0.467, p=0.000)

Attendance

Attendance

ATTENDANCE

FINA

L GRA

DE

100806040200

100

80

60

40

20

0

60

60

Fall 2004

FINAL GRADE vs ATTENDANCE

n=102

n=156

n=803

n=236

PassedLow Attendance

Independent Learners

PassedHigh Attendance

Passers

FailedLow Attendance

Failures

FailedHigh Attendance

Heart Breakers

Attendance

RESEARCH QUESTION

• Attendance matters (r=0.467, p=0.000)

Why do some students who attend still fail?

RESEARCH QUESTION

Are basic math skills on entry to the college a factor in determining student success?

Quadrant

Avera

ge (%

)

80

70

60

50

40

30

20

10

0

57.060.5

72.0

79.7

Fall 2004

Average Math Assessment Score vs Quadrant

Basic Math Skills…by quadrant

Quadrant

ASSES

SM

ENT

(%)

85

80

75

70

65

60

55

Interval Plot of ASSESSMENT vs Quadrant95% CI for the Mean

One-way ANOVA: ASSESSMENT versus QuadrantSource DF SS MS F PQuadrant 3 54369 18123 69.33 0.000Error 1148 300084 261Total 1151 354453

Attendance: Action Plan by QuadrantIndependent Learners

• currently successful• attendance policies should not penalize these students.

Passers• current system works

Failure• do not, in general, have the basic math skills required to be successful – counseling as Heart Breakers• attendance is not the root issue

Heart Breakers• counseling to consider pre-technology or G.A.S. to improve math skills.

RESEARCH QUESTION

How do we identify the lower quadrants early enough to impact student success?

ONE POSSIBLE IDENTIFIER• Term Test 1 results

Quadrant

Avera

ge %

Heart BreakersFailures

Independent LearnersPassers

80

70

60

50

40

30

20

10

0

47.147.5

77.678.5

Average Term Test 1 vs Quadrant

PROBLEMS

• Attendance patterns and term test 1 scores are not available until Week 5

Is this too late?

• If it is not too late, what do we do with these students?

Attendance: What can you do?

• Attendance matters (significant correlation); but care must be taken not to penalize students who are capable of independent learning

• Contact after term test 1 with the purpose to reinforce the student’s responsibility in the learning process and to restate all available sources of help within the college works.

RESEARCH QUESTION

How do the students feel about math…is there math anxiety?

Attitudinal Survey

• An exploratory survey for our department.• Survey of Attitudes Toward Mathematics – this is

a validated survey based on Survey of Attitude Towards Statistics (Schau, 2003)

• Measures (components): affect, cognitive, value and difficulty.

• Each component had several questions asked in both the positive and the negative to give a reliable score.

Attitude Components• Affect - positive and negative feelings

concerning math• Cognitive Competence - attitudes about

intellectual knowledge and skills when applied to math

• Value - attitudes about the usefulness, relevance, and worth of math in personal and professional life

• Difficulty - attitudes about the difficulty of math as a subject

Attitude Scoring

• Scored on a 6 point scale from strongly disagree to strongly agree.

• For “Difficulty” the scores were reversed for analysis so that on graphs anything positive about math shows as a high value and anything negative as a low value

Comparing Business and Technology StudentsAtt

itude S

core

DifficultyValueCognitiveAffect

6

5

4

3

2

1

FacultyBusinessTechnology

Attitude ComponentsPositive

Negative

Att

itude S

cale

DifficultyValueCognitiveAffect

6

5

4

3

2

1

Boxplot of Attitude ComponentsPretest

Positive

Negative

Attitude Scores for Business and Technology Combined

Attitude Survey Results• Affect: 75% have positive feelings about

math• Cognitive: 90% have positive attitudes

about their ability to do math• Value: 95% believe that math is useful in

both their personal and professional life• Difficulty: 70% of the students find math

difficult as a subject

Attitude Survey

• Exploratory data collection

What needs to be addressed?

Attitude Survey

• Math anxiety exists.

• In spite of positive attitudes in “affect”, “cognitive” and “value”, students still believe math is difficult.

• Next initiative will be to design an experiment to find a solution to this problem.

Att

itude S

core

DifficultyValueCognitiveAffect

6

5

4

3

2

1

TestPrePost

Attitude ComponentsPositive

Negative

Comparing Pre and Post Scores

FALL 2003* FALL 2004**

Number Percent Number Percent

Enrolled 2230 100% 1869 100%

Disappeared prior to test 1

250 11.2% 153 8.2%

Failed 700 31.4% 540 28.9%

Attrition (failed math)

950 42.6% 693 37.1%

Retention (passed math)

1280 57.4% 1176 62.9%

THE SUCCESS

103 STUDENTS SAVED

FALL 2005 – SPRING 2007

Where do we go from here?

LYRYX expanded to remedial(Winter Initiative – no data yet)

• Objective: to increase participation by having– remedial available from any location including home– faster turnaround of results– more relevance by tying remedial directly to text

used in course (all remedial questions are business related)

– same remedial format as the quiz procedures in the course

RESEARCH QUESTION

Does class size affect student success?

Class Size

• Design: Two double-section and ten single-section classes in Fall 2005; continue experiment over several semesters.

Business Math, MA101 (14 sections)

• Factors to be recorded: class size, professor, course, and program

Class Size

• Fall 2004: Due to registration problems class sizes were not adequately distinct. Experiment will now run over 4 semesters rather than 6.

RESEARCH PROBLEM

• A potential underlying effect on student success is the expectation that students attend regular classes while writing a concentrated number of tests (in some cases until 9:30 pm!!!)

• FORWARD TO CORPORATE STUDENT SUCCESS COMMITTEE AND PROGRAM DEPARTMENTS

THANKS TO