Retention and graduation rates for engineering disciplines are significantly lower than desired, and research literature offers many possible causes. Engineering learning communities provide the opportunity to study relationships among specific causes and to develop and evaluate activities designed to lessen their impact. This paper details an…

In this important resource, Dr. Fleming (a noted expert in the field of minority retention) draws on educational evaluations she has developed in the course of her distinguished career. This book analyzes the common factors and the role institutional characteristics play in minority student retention to show what really works in increasing…

A four-week summer program at Georgia State University prepares entering African-American students for college work through instruction in mathematics, reading, composition, study skills, word processing, tutoring, academic and career counseling, mentoring, and follow-up. The program has been well received and succeeded in enhancing retention.…

In an effort to improve minority recruitment and retention, the University of Arizona collaborated with Pima Community College to launch the Exploratory Transfer Institute (ETI), a summer program to encourage minority students who were not considering transfer to do so. The ETI was conceived, planned, and implemented through a relatively complex…

A five-week summer program for special acceptance students has been developed at St. Mary's University of San Antonio, Texas. Students accepted into the program must show high potential in the form of good high school grades or high test results. The special acceptance program has three components. The academic skills component is a three hour…

The 115 African-American and other nontraditional medical students attending a summer program in study skills and academic preparation to promote achievement and retention were compared with 82 nonattendees on demographic and academic measures. Little difference was found in the groups, except that attendees felt the program helped them adjust to…

The Pre-College Summer Institute (PCSI) program has been in effect at the University of Hartford, College of Basic Studies, since the summer of 1968. PCSI was a five-week, five-days-a-week program designed to evaluate and prepare marginally acceptable students for the college's entering freshman class. Initially, the program was designed to…

The Philadelphia Partnership is a Philadelphia School District (Pennsylvania) program, sponsored by the state higher education system and designed to increase the number of low-income and minority students in comprehensive, neighborhood magnet schools who attend college and graduate. A hundred sophomores are selected annually to participate in the…

The New York State Liberty Partnerships Program (LPP) provides students at risk of dropping out of school with services specifically designed to keep them in school through high school graduation, to encourage them to pursue higher education, and/or to secure meaningful employment. Section 1 describes the LPP school year program, giving brief…

The University of Minnesota, Morris campus, developed a bridge program called the Gateway Program to meet the special concerns of African American and American Indian incoming freshmen. The program initially prepares students for higher education through a 4-week summer program that includes an umbrella course in math, computer literacy, and…

Two surveys were conducted to identify the essential characteristics of minority engineering programs and to provide summaries of ongoing minority programs in a broad sampling of engineering schools. The first surveyed colleges with the largest minority enrollments, including the 6 traditionally Black schools and 45 predominantly white schools.…