Eliminate Administrative and Financial Barriers to Success

While most academic leaders think of advising, academics, or student affairs when thinking about student success, the administrative infrastructure of a campus has an equally key role to play. Read this Roadmap to learn how the right policies, processes, and financial supports form the foundation for a broader student success strategy.

Nearly every academic policy, no matter how minor, can have an impact on student success. But most policies emerge from shared governance committees without careful analysis of their effects on student persistence or equity. 

Overly strict registration hold policies, for example, can needlessly discourage students from reenrolling, while overly lenient course repeat policies might lead some students to repeat the same course without making progress toward their degrees. Just revising bursar holds alone led to an 8% increase in retention at one university. 

Create a policy audit committee (or charge an existing policy committee) to review existing policies all at once, consider their cumulative impact on student success, and revise policies that create unintentional roadblocks to graduation. 

Most universities only allow students to register for one term of courses at a time. Extending the registration period to a full year of courses helps students plan ahead, both to avoid external conflicts like work and family responsibilities and also to think longer-term about their commitment to the university.

It also helps universities intervene earlier when critical courses are planned at the same time, when they need to open a new section to accommodate more students, or when they need to find a new instructor. EAB researchers spoke to two universities that made the move to multi-term registration and learned the top lessons to shift registration timelines without frustrating faculty or students.

Degree maps improve students’ ability to self-advise, acting as a proxy for in-person advising when resources are scarce. Without this guidance, many students will delay taking gateway and general education…