Joe Cuseo
- Research
indicates that at least one-half of all students who drop out of college will
do so during their freshman year (Consortium
for Student Retention Data Exchange, 1999). According to Lee Noel
(1985), “The critical time in establishing the kind of one-to-one contacts
between students and their teachers and advisers that contribute to student
success and satisfaction occur during the first few weeks of the freshman year”
(p. 20). Support for this observation is provided by the National Institute of
Education’s (1984) landmark report on the quality of undergraduate education in
John
Gardner suggests that front-loaded support for first-year students during their
early weeks on campus works like the marketing concept of “second sale,”
whereby the college helps students overcome “buyers
remorse” and make a long-term commitment to remain at the institution (Gardner,
1986, p. 267). High-quality advising during the first-semester of college may
be one way to promote long-term student commitment and retention. The
importance of quality first-year advisement for the retention of
African-American students, in particular, is empirically supported by research
indicating that the frequency of personal contacts between black freshmen and
their academic advisors is the variable that is most strongly associated with
retention through the critical freshman year; furthermore, the frequency of
student-advisor contact is significantly higher if the first contact occurs early
in the freshman year (Trippi & Gheatham, 1989).