Undergraduate Recruitment and Retention Efforts

This page is a summary of the responses to these survey questions:

• Is undergraduate student recruitment/retention an issue for your department?
• Is graduate student recruitment/retention an issue for your department?
• Please describe departmental efforts in this area.

Common themes across institution type:

• Retention was not a major issue.
• Recruitment was an issue across institution type.

Some institution specific issues:

• Two-year institutions tended to emphasize employment opportunities in recruitment.
• Four-year institutions tended to better coordinate efforts with institutional recruitment offices.
• Master's institutions commonly cited the importance of relationships with K12 and community colleges.
• Doctoral institutions tended to more often hire staff to help with recruitment.

Common themes for recruiting efforts included:

• Effective teaching of intro courses, with active recruitment of majors.
• Early introduction to field experiences.
• Working with the institutional recruitment offices.
• 'Training' academic advisors about the geosciences.
• Support for the undergraduate environment, including study space and student lounges.
• Lots of contact, involving faculty, with recruited students.
• Revising curricula to have societal relevance.
• Building relationships with K12 and community colleges.
• Support for student geology clubs.
• Raising scholarship money for undergraduates.
• Effective departmental websites and publications.

Some less common efforts that seem relevant/promising:

• Using junior and senior students to assist in visiting high schools for recruitment.
• Using federal funding (e.g., NSF GeoScope and OEDG) to recruit minority students and work with K12 teachers.
• Releasing faculty time to focus on recruitment.
• Adding honors sections to intro/general education courses to attract best students.
• Offering 'hot topic' first year courses (e.g., Sumatra, Katrina) to attract students.
• Raising alumni funds to send undergraduates to GSA.
• Rewarding faculty successfully recruit new majors.

Representative quotes:

• "We give recruitment talks in every introductory class semester"
• "Ever-closer work with community college partners in transfer student recruitment"
• "If it (recruitment) isn't an issue at all times, it becomes your problem"
• "(We) provide departmental resources (student lounge / new computer lab) and support student organizations in the department."