Abstract

On 2000-2001 a report of the Consortium for Student Retention Data Exchange determined that retention and graduation rates in higher education institutions are consistently lower for underrepresented minorities. On 1997 a National Study of Student Support Services, conducted by the US Department of Education established that Support Services Program have a positive and statistically significant impact upon students grades, credits earned, and college retention. This paper analyzes three years of data from the College Academic Achievement Program at Michigan State University to determine its effectiveness in terms of student performance. For the purpose of this project, performance is measured in terms of the cumulative GPA achieved during the first semester of the freshman year.

Introduction
In 1971 the US Department of Education established the TRIO Programs to help underrepresented students achieve educational goals above the secondary level. The Federal TRIO Programs are educational opportunity outreach programs designed to motivate and support students from disadvantaged backgrounds. TRIO includes six outreach and support programs targeted to serve and assist low-income, first-generation college, and disabled students to progress through the academic pipeline from middle school to postbaccalaureate programs.

The six programs are:

• Upward Bound
• Talent Search
• Student Support Services
• Educational Opportunity Centers
• Ronald E. McNair Postbaccalaureate Achievement
• Training Program for Federal TRIO Programs

For the last 30 years one of the TRIO Programs that has received a significant impact in budget increase is the Student Support Services Program. The SSS has report an increase from $10 millions in 1971 to $245 millions for the fiscal year 2001, an increase of almost 2500% in thirty years. This program has a direct impact in almost 200 thousand students nationwide.
For the Fiscal Year 2001 TRIO disbursed $730 millions in the following programs:

Student Support Services
The DE Student Support Services Program (SSS) focuses on improving college retention and graduation rates of disadvantaged college students. It provides participants with a range of academic and non-academic supplemental services, that include tutoring, academic, career and personal counseling, remedial assistance, and cultural enrichment activities.

According to the National Study of Student Support Services (NSSSS) conducted by the DE in 1997 participants of the program receive one or more of the following services:

As it was found by the cited study and other research (Massy, 2001) Support Services Program have a positive and statistically significant impact upon students’ grades, credits earned, and college retention. At Michigan State University the SSS Program support the College Achievement Admissions Program, which goal is to bring access to quality education for underrepresented minority students.

The CAAP Program
Michigan State University offers underrepresented students a unique opportunity to study at the institution even if they don’t meet the standard admissions criteria. In order to be admitted those students are required to join the College Achievement Admissions Program (CAAP). CAAP students agree to receive academic support services from the Office of Supportive Services during one year. Every year MSU admits almost 400 students in CAAP. Because most of CAAP students are admitted under special circumstances the predicted or expected GPA for them is lower than the regular students.

Study Methodology
For the purpose of our analysis we took three years of data of CAAP students: 1999, 2000, and 2001. We considered the cumulative GPA achieved during the first semester of freshmen year and compared it with an already established projected GPA. We also analyzed the recalculated GPA for the 2001 students.

The predicted GPA is defined by the institution and its based on the performance of peer students during their first semester and also take into consideration the retention rate. The recalculated GPA is the GPA that the admissions counselors assigned after reviewing the students coursework from ninth to eleventh grade, but taking into consideration only academic courses (Math, Science, Social science, English and Foreign Language. The data for the P_GPA included 1104 students. For the R_GPA the data included 418 students.

Key findings
According to the Recalculated GPA for the incoming class of 2001 it was expected that 75% of the students would have fallen in academic probation after the first semester. The actual data shows that only 33% of the students felt in academic probation:

According to the Predicted GPA only one student out of 1104 (.09%) would have had a Cumulative GPA of 3.0 or above. The reality was that for the whole three years of data 19% os the students had a GPA of 3.0 or above after the first semester:

It was also found that while the highest predicted GPA for the years 1999, 2000, and 2001 was 2.8, 3.04 and 2.96, respectively, the highest cumulative GPA achieved for those years was 4.0, 3.92, and 3.0:

Highest Predicted GPA Vs.
Highest Cumulative GPA

Conclusions
As it was stated in the 2000-01 Report of the Consortium for Student Retention Data Exchange, retention and graduation rates are consistently lower for underrepresented minorities in US higher education institution. In the other hand, the 1997 National Study of Student Support Services found that Support Services Programs have a positive and statistically significant impact upon students grades, credit earned and college retention.

After reviewing the available data of the MSU CAAP students we can conclude that support services do have a positive impact in MSU students. If we need to apply a Performance Based Budgeting approach to the Support Services Office, approach that required to allocate resources according to achievement of goals, objectives and outcomes (Daniel, 2001; Shulloc, 2001; Layzell, 2000), there’s no doubt that the CAAP Program should be funded for the future years.

References

Consortium for Student Retention Data Exhange.(2000-01). The retention and graduation rates report. (In http://www.occe.ou.edu/csrde).

Johnson, Sandra. (1995). Reinventing the university: managing and financing institutions of higher education. New York: LLP Coopers & Lybrand.

Layzell T., Daniel. (2000). Linking performance to funding outcomes for public institutions of higher education: The USexperience. In ASHE readings in Finance in Higher Education. Pearson Custom Publishing.Boston: MA.

Massy, William. (2001). Reengineering resource allocation systems. In ASHE readings in Finance in Higher Education. Pearson Custom Publishing.Boston: MA.

Massy, William. (2001). Improvement strategies for administration and support services. In ASHE readings in Finance in Higher Education. Pearson Custom Publishing.Boston: MA.

US Department of Education.1997. National study of student support services. (In http://www.ed.gov/offices/OPE/HEP/trio/).

Shullock, Nancy and Mernoy E Harrison. (2001). Integrating planning, assessment, and resource allocation. In ASHE readings in Finance in Higher Education Pearson Custom Publishing.Boston: MA.