MGA admits a significant number of students who need remediation and are enrolled in learning support (LS) coursework. MGA saw a 107% increase in the number of LS students from fall’22 to fall’25. In fall’25, 847 students placed into learning support, accounting for 9.6% of enrollment.
To improve LS student success outcomes, several initiatives have been implemented that include course redesign, adding growth mindset activities, introducing early alert reporting and outreach, and peer mentoring, supplemental/embedded tutoring. The LS Coordinator, faculty who teach LS courses, the departmental Chairs, student success coaches, peer mentors, and the academic advisors collaborate to work towards this goal. Data-driven decision-making drives the planning and execution of these initiatives.
MGA observed successful outcomes with a pilot initiative in fall’24 in which success coaches were embedded into all the sections offered for Co-requisite-Quantitative Reasoning pairing for students placed into non-STEM LS math. These coaches also served as a bridge to math tutors and peer mentors for these students. With support from the math faculty, success coaches received weekly communication on students who were at-risk due to absenteeism, low grades or lack of engagement in class. Academic Success Coaches built individualized success plans for students through regularly scheduled meetings with the students. Discussions focused on student engagement, resilience, student performance in classes, motivation and mindset, resource availability for academic and non-academic support, and any other financial or personal concerns the student shared. Coaches also helped connect students with tutors and peer mentors as needed with regular check-ins. Tutors provided coaching in the subject. In some sections, tutors were embedded and attended classes with the students; they worked with them to review concepts, practice, and answer questions. They were also available after class for scheduled appointments to assist the students in-person or online. Tutors assisted students who were identified by faculty as having low or failing grades on assessments. Mentors provided guidance to the students, helped students to develop a sense of belonging to the institution by hosting a number of events, helped students develop an academic growth mindset by offering workshops, provided information on support resources available at the institution, and helped students to connect with their peers. Students who missed class or were not engaged in class were connected with mentors to encourage them to attend and to understand the value of progression through the curriculum and how it impacts their career goals.
In spring’25, students in the Co-requisite-Quantitative Reasoning pairing were also supported by embedded coaches. The initiative was also expanded to the Co-requisite-English Composition I pairing as a pilot project in spring’25. The plan for 2025-26 is to improve our processes for reporting and follow-up.
KPIs:
- Number of LS students passing gateway English and math courses
- % of LS students persisting from one semester to the next
Baseline measure (for each KPI):
- 51.5% of LS students successfully completed ENGL 1101 in fall’23 and 51.9% in spring’24.
- 58.8% of LS students successfully completed MATH 1001 in fall’23 and 58.9% in spring’24.
- 66.8% LS students persisted from fall’23 to spring’24; 46.9% persisted from spring’24 to fall’24
Data from fall’24 and spring 2025:
- 50.0% of LS students successfully completed ENGL 1101 in fall’24 and 51.0% in spring’25.
- 72.7% of LS students successfully completed MATH 1001 in fall’24 and 60.7% in spring’25.
- 72.2% persisted from fall’24 to spring’25; 47.6% persisted from spring’25 to fall’25.
Goal:
- 2% increase in the number of LS students passing the gateway English course at the end of fall’25
- 2% increase in the number of LS students passing gateway math courses at the end of fall’25
- 2% increase in the number of LS students persisting from fall to spring and spring to fall.
LS math: Fall’24
Overall success rates: The results of the pilot program in LS math highlighted a significant increase in the overall success rates of students taking Math 1001/0997 for fall 2024. The overall success rate of those students was a 73% pass rate, an increase of approximately 14% from the previous year. Also noteworthy was the decrease in the withdrawal rate during fall 2024, which was 6% versus 10% the previous fall 2023. Results also indicated that students taking the online sections of the course had a pass rate of 57.5% which was considerably lower than the pass rates for the in-person sections, 78.3%. The success rates for in-person sections showed an increase of 14% comparing fall’23 to fall’24. This data highlighted the challenge linked to student engagement in online courses.
Success rates for new students as compared to those repeating the course: Repeaters had lower pass rates (53.8%) as compared to those taking the course for the first time (69.2%) in fall’24. The observation was the same for the fall’23 data but the success rates were higher for both the categories in fall’24 as compared to fall’23: success rates for repeaters increased by 10% in fall ‘24 as compared to fall’23; success rates for new students increased by 4% in fall’24 as compared to fall’23. This data highlights the need to focus on students who are repeating the course and may need additional support from tutoring and coaching to perform successfully.
LS math: Spring’25
Overall success rates: The results from spring’25 showed an increase of 1.8% in the pass rates as compared to spring’24 data. Pass rates for the online sections was 11% lower as compared to that of the in-person sections (66.7%) again highlighting the challenge with engaging online students. The withdrawal rate showed a decline from 15.1% in spring’24 to 7.6% in spring’25 which was a step in a positive direction.
Success rates for new students as compared to those repeating the course: Students taking the course the first time had passing rates of 69.2% as compared to 34.5% for students repeating the course. This observation was parallel to that observed in the fall’24 data.
In analyzing data and success metrics from fall’24 and spring’25, it is important to note that the number of students repeating the course in spring’25 was double the number repeating the course last fall which might explain the overall reduced impact in the spring. However, the success rates for in-person section continued to remain strong in spring’25.
These insights will influence the strategy moving forward, with more support in terms of tutoring and coaching being offered to students repeating the course from the start of the semester. The challenge with online sections is ongoing and the success team is in conversation with the faculty to plan additional strategies to engage the students.
LS English, Spring’25: The success coaching pilot with LS English sections did not show any improvement in the overall pass rates for both in-person and online sections combined as compared to the previous spring. However, the in-person sections with embedded coaches showed an increase in success rates by 2.8% as compared to spring’24. The pass rates for students taking the course the first time were 13% higher than those of student repeating the course. This pattern parallels the observation with the math LS course. It is interesting to note that there was a 35% increase in the number of repeaters in spring’25 as compared to spring’24. The spring pilot faced some challenges with communication between the academic success coaches and faculty which have been addressed and resolved for fall’25.
Overall persistence and retention rates: Persistence rates for the LS student population from fall to spring showed an increase of 5.4% when comparing 2023 to 2024 fall semesters. Persistence from spring to fall increased by 0.7% when comparing 2024 to 2025 spring semesters.
One-year retention of students who began with learning support requirements increased by 1.7% comparing fall 2024-25 with fall 2023-24. This is an encouraging trend as the LS enrollment increased by over 46% from fall’23 to fall’25.
- To strengthen communication between the faculty and the success coaches on a weekly basis, MGA will explore web-based reporting for both English and math courses.
- Success rates between face-to-face and online classes vary. English and math will study the distribution of online vs in-person classes across the campuses to enable more effective offerings that align well with success outcomes.
- Math and English departments will discuss policies to improve success rates in online course offerings.
- The maximum enrollment for LS English sections will be capped at 20.
- A LS Coordinator will be hired for the English department to organize and support LS course offerings.
- Faculty teaching LS English will be organized into a community to support engagement and professional development.
- English department will refine the student success coaching model in Learning Support classes based on the success outcomes from spring’25.
Student engagement remains the biggest challenge
