\n<\/p>\n
Colleges have spent years building systems to flag students in academic trouble. But a new report from TimelyCare suggests many students at risk of stopping out aren\u2019t struggling in class\u2014they\u2019re performing fine but quietly disengaging in ways institutions often miss.<\/p>\n
The findings come from a national survey conducted in January of more than 1,000 undergraduate students enrolled at four-year institutions. The report found that 92\u00a0percent reported academic confidence, with a majority reporting a GPA of 3.0 or higher.<\/p>\n
However, when asked about persistence, 31\u00a0percent said they had considered transferring and 24\u00a0percent said they had considered stopping out\u2014highlighting a disconnect between academic performance and the overall college experience.<\/p>\n
Nicole Trevino, vice president for student success at TimelyCare, said academic stability is no longer a reliable proxy for student well-being.<\/p>\n
\u201cInstitutions do a good job of gathering metrics as it relates to academic progression and utilization\u2014whether that\u2019s utilization of campus counseling or utilization of services on campus\u2014but those are outcomes support,\u201d Trevino said. \u201cWhat\u2019s happening is institutions are not really listening to students, and that\u2019s where there\u2019s a disconnect.\u201d<\/p>\n
In particular, the report highlights that the most distinctive finding isn\u2019t about students in crisis; it\u2019s students who report they\u2019re \u201cdoing OK.\u201d These students represent 49\u00a0percent of respondents\u2014the largest group in the survey\u2014and carry the least visible retention risk.<\/p>\n
\u201cFrom an academic standpoint, they do look like they\u2019re doing OK, but what we know is that emotionally, there are some concerns that are emerging,\u201d Trevino said.<\/p>\n
The quiet middle:<\/strong> The report found that institutions have robust systems for identifying students when challenges arise. However, it notes that these measures are \u201creactive by design\u201d and often miss earlier signals of disengagement\u2014such as stress and burnout that has not yet become a crisis, a gradual loss of belonging, growing uncertainty about academic or career direction, and silent withdrawal from campus life.<\/p>\n Trevino said institutions often don\u2019t recognize these early signs in students who are \u201cdoing OK.\u201d She emphasized the importance of tracking students\u2019 belonging multiple times throughout their time in college.<\/p>\n \u201cStudents might start their freshman year on track, for instance, but if something changes, being able to detect that and intervene, creating pathways to support students, is important,\u201d Trevino said.<\/p>\n She added that burnout is often normalized rather than treated as a warning sign, causing students to adapt to unsustainable conditions long before they ask for help.<\/p>\n \u201cStudents need structured, content-based ways to check in earlier and really surface those nonacademic signals before they become disengaged,\u201d Trevino said.<\/p>\n Addressing listening problem:<\/strong> For Trevino, it\u2019s important for higher education leaders to rethink how they define students at risk and the way they gather and use such information.<\/p>\n \u201cBefore that drift happens, intervene on it before students decide to leave the institution or stop out of college altogether,\u201d Trevino said.<\/p>\n The best way forward is for higher education leaders to move beyond academic and utilization-based metrics and prioritize listening to student needs, she said, adding that many students would welcome a structured check-in. According to the survey, about 85\u00a0percent said they would respond positively to proactive outreach from their institution asking how they are doing.<\/p>\n \u201cThat\u2019s where the opportunity lives,\u201d Trevino said. \u201cThe opportunity to integrate all that good metric information they\u2019re capturing with a student voice\u2014and being able to act on those pieces combined\u2014gives a more holistic picture of what students are dealing with.\u201d<\/p>\n Get more content like this directly to your inbox. <\/em>Subscribe here.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Colleges have spent years building systems to flag students in academic trouble. But a new report from TimelyCare suggests many students at risk of stopping out aren\u2019t struggling in class\u2014they\u2019re performing fine but quietly disengaging in ways institutions often miss. The findings come from a national survey conducted in January of more than 1,000 undergraduate<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":46246,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[57],"tags":[736,678],"class_list":{"0":"post-46245","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-education","8":"tag-risk","9":"tag-students"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46245","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=46245"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46245\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/46246"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=46245"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=46245"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=46245"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}