Fresh look at the first semester in a NorwegianUniversity1
Fresh look at the first semester in a NorwegianUniversity
By Harald Åge Sæthre, Project Manager in the Section of Student and Academic Affairs, Faculty of Mathematics and Natural Sciences, University of Bergen, Norway.
Abstract: In a traditional EuropeanUniversity it has been accepted that more than 40% of the students give up in the first year of study. Today in Norway there is a change towards competition about students, and successful students result in increased governmental grants. Due to this universities have become more aware of the retention problem. During the last three years social networks, active learning and skills training have been implemented into the first semester for science students at the University of Bergen. This has led to higher retention, better recruitment and better results.
Goals for project "We care!"
The Faculty of Mathematics and Natural Sciences established in 1999 the project "We care!" focussing these goals:
Better retention
More retention among women
Better results in calculus
Better recruitment
Problems
Drop in number of applicants
After a period with high number of applicants the number dropped, especially in science.
Low retention
Traditionally more students drop out of the studies than the number that succeed. The illustration shows how many of the new students during autumn 1997 continued to register in later semesters. We found the largest drop the first year with a 40-50% decrease. This dropout could partly be explained by some students using our faculty to prepare for other prestigious studies, i.e. medicine. However, when asking new students, only 15% answered that they had such plans, while 75% actually planned for a master in science. So when 328 registered as new students in 1997, 246 should end up with a master. As you can see from the illustration we lost a lot more. Some of the loss was compensated by recruiting students from colleges but we still had problems recruiting enough students for a master degree in most of our fields. A higher number of women than men dropped out. In 1997 the women represented 44% of the new students, after the 8th semester this group only included 30% women.
Governmental grants and attitude among teachers
Earlier the universities got their money without any connection to students success.
The scientist had their freedom in research and a duty to teach. There were few if any incitements to prepare students for success. At the end of the 90ties there came clear political signals that this would change. Future grants would be connected to students success, resulting in a clear change in attitude to teaching.
Research
Research grants are important, however, lack of enough good students working with their master and doctor degrees is maybe even more crucial in science. Drop in recruitment and low retention will of course reduce this important resource.
Bad results in calculus
Several of the subject areas in science are getting more analytical and calculus and statistics will become even more important. But the results in our basic calculus courses showed very weak results. Fewer chose the hardest math-subject, a high number of students withdrew from exams, the marks went down and a growing number of students failed.
Philosophy behind "We care!"
Recruitment
Our students are our main ambassadors for recruiting new students. Brothers, sisters and friends are the main source when we ask new students what triggered them to choose our studies. Meaning, - happy and satisfied students recruit new generations of students while unhappy and displeased students give us a bad reputation.
Students with success
An active learning community depends on social comfortable students.
Student 2002'
Students of today get huge amounts of information, not existing only 10 years ago: Mobile-phone, E-mail, Internet, television etc. are competing to get their attention and the youngsters have to choose. If we want student success we have to demand participation in the learning activities. All activities that they do not have to follow they do not follow!
The situation before 1999
The Students' first meeting with our Faculty used to be an assembly of 500 people in a big auditorium. Here they were told how to register and wished good luck. Afterwards we sent them in lines to register for courses. Mostly they ended up with some fellow students in one course and others in another. Older students usually arranged some parties but only 25% of the new students used to participate and there was no focus on students in the same course becoming acquainted.
Throughout the semester students would follow lectures in groups of 200-300. They were also offered to follow smaller groups (15-25) in which an older student showed them how to solve problems mostly in the form of mini-lectures.
Philosphy at that time (before 1999)
Many people at the university felt that too many students could enter, making it necessary to select those with the ability to study. For this reason the first semester should be tough in order to scare those who did not fit.
We lost some good students and kept some lazy ones.
As an academic adviser I used to meet many of the new students and learned that many of them felt socially isolated. Girls were over-represented in this group of students and many of them changed to other educations such as medicine and nursing. They were clever girls but changed to class-based educations where students easy got aquatinted.
That these educations also had safe job opportunities was also important.
Some other students found the freedom of doing nothing at the university to be very attractive. They could tell everybody that they were students and did not really care too much if they failed at exams. In this group boys were over-represented.
What we did in "We care!"
In 1999 we did a lot of work before students entered the university. We collected information to co-ordinate groups on 15-25 students that followed the same courses trough the whole semester. We also tried to put students with the same fields of interest together. When they arrived we gathered them in these small groups for 2 days where we focused that they should learn to know each other and the university. (We used some of the methods from First-Year seminar, Instructor Training Workshop.)
The course content was the same and includes one course of calculus and a course in philosophy. In 1999 we introduced a lecture where scientists in biology, geology and chemistry showed how they use calculus in their research. This to motivate students to put some effort in calculus in first semester.
Active learning
The main purpose was to change our new students from passive listeners to active participants. We trained the group-leaders to lead a process not to be an oracle. As leaders they should support but be as invisible as possible.
The students in calculus were first told to solve problems by themselves, then they should work together in groups of 4-5 students and help each other. In the end they met in a group of 15-25 were representatives from the smaller groups presented solutions.
1999 - catastrophe in calculus
After all our good intentions the results in calculus came as a chock to us.
54% failed the exam in the easiest calculus course and we had to give the results a thorough analysis. We then found that exceptionally many students with weak knowledge in calculus from high school kept on for exam. Before 1999 this group would have disappeared earlier. The social focus functioned as glue and kept the students together the whole semester.
Our theory is that not only did we have too many "without a chance" on the exam, but the social relations gave the students responsibility for each others success. In this way the weak students took some of the students with possibilities with them into failure.
New action in 2000 and 2001
After the bad results in 1999 we had to diversify our courses in calculus to meet everyone on their level. This was implemented in 2000 together with regular tests that should be a pressure on working all semester.
Results
After adjustments of our project "we care!" it has now come out as an success story. So positive that the Norwegian government gave it an award on 30.000$ for high quality in higher education.
Higher retention?
More students register in their first semester than earlier. This means that the Faculty has just the same amount of students as when applicant number was higher. But in the 3rd and 4th semester we still loose students in the same extent as before.
Better retention among women!
It is clear that the main results in the project is better retention among women. The illustration show how big share women have among students x semesters after they started. The tendency was clear before 1999 with continuous loss of women. After 1999 it is the other way around especially if we just consider the first year.
Better results in calculus
After some bad results in 1999 we have broken the negative development connected with calculus. More students have choosen the hardest course, and more students pass their exam.
In 1997 139 passed one of our two calculus courses, in 2001 the number was 191.
Better recruitment
In 2001 the University of Bergen had 12% growth in applicants for science while the other universities all had a drop. In 2002 there are evenmore applicants than in 2001.
Satisfied students
The University of Bergen has also a Faculty of Arts and a Faculty of Social Sciences that both have free entrance and can be compared to our Faculty. They have not implemented "We care!" in their routines. The Faculty of Arts have thou grouped students in classes. In a written evaluation November 2001 new students from all tree faculties gave their view on how they where treated in their first semester. The illustration shows that students at the Faculty of Mathematics and Natural Sciences are more positive to the reception than the other students.
Some science students cited:
"This faculty have given a good impression an I feel very comfortable"
"Busy. Fun to be Student"
"Today we sit together and help each other often"
And last but not least: We use less money!
Next page:
More information about Norway and University of Bergen.
And some Contact information:
Context
Norway have 4,5 million people that have large land areas to live on, but people move towards the cities. Chief industries are oil/gas, fish/seafood and tourism. The oil business give our country a healthy economy. The education starts at the age of 6 with 10 years of obligatory school. Then everybody can take 3 years on high school. When students start at the University they are 19 or 20 years of age. Everybody can enter most of the studies on our universities.
Bergen has its background as an import trade center in the Hanseatic period. For a period it was the capital of Norway. In Norway it is with 220.000 inhabitants the second largest city.
The University of Bergen has 17.000 students and 2500 employees. It has 7 faculties and is maybe most known for the finding of the Lepra-bacterium.
Faculty of Mathematics and Natural Sciences
The faculty has about 1400 undergraduate, 800 master and 350 PhD students.
The largest research-groups are in marine biology and geology, but all fields in science are covered. The faculty is particularly proud of the Bjerknes -school of meteorology that is said to start up modern weather-forecast. Also the famous polar scientist Fritjof Nansen had here his daily work in an early stage of the faculty.
Contact information:
Harald Åge Sæthre
Project Manager
Student and Academic Affairs
TLF. 47 55 582024 FAX. 47 55 583199
e-mail:
Address:
Faculty of Mathematics and Natural Sciences
University of Bergen
Postboks 7800
5020 Bergen
Norway
www:
Project Manager Harald Åge Sæthre
(only in norwegian)
Faculty of Mathematics and Natural Sciences
University of Bergen
International Conference on The First-Year Experience
July 1-5, 2002, Bath, United Kingdom