Developing and Assessing the Come Back to Mānoa Program: Why Seniors Leave and How to Help them Graduate

Abstract

The Come Back to Mānoa program, established in Summer 2014 by the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa and housed administratively in Outreach College, assists undergraduate seniors who stopped attending college to return and graduate. This poster provides an overview of the program’s development, including creating mission and vision statements and objectives; outreach efforts and participation data; and plans to implement an assessment survey of respondents. In addition to assessing outcomes, the survey evaluated why students left using broad categories from the UHM 2012 Leavers Survey and adding a few more reasons based on relevant literature. Most research on student attrition concentrates on first year and sophomore students, but very little literature focuses on senior attrition and how we might help those students persist to degree (Hunt et al., 2012). The information obtained from the survey is used to improve the Come Back to Mānoa program and contributes to the academic literature. Initial challenges and strategies are also presented.