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For universities nationwide, student stop-out—or withdrawal from enrollment—is a barrier that hampers students' success and keeps them from reaching their full potential. In a community college environment, the risk of stop-out is intensified due to (a) personal factors for students and (b) administrative challenges.
A singular intervention alone can’t prevent this, especially within the timeframe community colleges are working with. Instead, institutions must take a holistic approach, build an ecosystem of support, and weave multiple resources together.
Hartnell College has seen the effectiveness of providing a set of tailored interventions rather than siloed solutions, allowing them to mitigate stop-out with a breadth that reaches many and a depth that addresses the root of student hardships.
The college’s Salinas Valley Promise program is a multifaceted intervention that leverages a paid model of peer mentorship, professional development workshops, and more to foster a sense of belonging and encourage student persistence—which both go a long way in keeping a student engaged and motivated. With nearly 2,000 students in the program, Hartnell has made considerable strides in student success and gathered valuable data that will shape the future of their efforts.
In April 2024, Hartnell College’s Student Affairs and Equity Programs officer, Gabriela Lopez, Ed.D., joined Joe Michie, Senior Partnerships Director at Mentor Collective, for a webinar to share how the institution is tackling stop-out by leveraging peer mentorship and other interventions to support students and set them up for lifelong success.
Watch the Full Webinar On-Demand and Read Key Takeaways from the Discussion Below
A Multifaceted, Meaningful Approach 
According to a 2023 community college study by New America, student dropouts aren’t due to just one challenge: “Most students who stopped out had at least four hardships.” From a lack of belonging and self-motivation to being unaware of on-campus resources, many difficulties can hamper a student’s persistence.
Peer mentorship can be instrumental in identifying and addressing these multifaceted hardships, allowing colleges to deploy assistance on many fronts at once. Siloed resources are the enemy of student success; institutions must ensure all their on-campus resources collaborate effectively to flag issues, alert the appropriate parties, and quickly solve students' problems.
“When we think about how we can support our students in a meaningful way, we think about what’s going to last beyond that $400 textbook voucher or beyond the life of the laptop. Creating one-on-one connections and building a support network is important so that if a staff person isn’t available to answer a question immediately, that the students have somebody they can go to at any time of the day. Someone they can send a message to quickly and receive that support.”
– Gabriela Lopez, Ed.D., Director, Office of Equity Programs | Student Affairs
Resource Utilization Reduces the Likelihood of Stop-Out 
Tackling student stop-outs relies heavily on collecting the right data and raising flags as soon as possible through mentor-mentee conversations. Considering that a variety of hardships can lead to students wanting to cut their learning journey short, institutions have to be nimble when providing solutions and interventions.
Mentor Collective offers its partner institutions a secure, easy-to-use dashboard to actively monitor mentorships and discover potential student issues in real-time. This hands-on, on-call data allows colleges to address both larger challenges affecting individual students and those of the larger student population.
“The data that we get from the Mentor Collective dashboard really enables us to look at what students are worrying about and the questions they have,” said Lopez. “If it's a group intervention and a lot of students have similar concerns, we can offer a workshop or a webinar. We can put out information. In some cases it might be calling up a student and doing a one-on-one intervention. The data gives us that real-time pulse on what our students are thinking about, what their needs are, and then it gives us the power to create interventions that they need."
The more a student feels that their concerns are being addressed, the higher their feelings of belonging, motivation, persistence, and ultimately success. It’s not just about gathering insights to assess but using data in an actionable way to intervene with students' needs at that particular moment.
Outcomes
The Hartnell College Salinas Valley Promise program has made great strides toward increasing student belonging, resource utilization, and success:
- 11.4% increase in course success rate
- 10.9% increase in persistence
- 6.7% increase in course success rate with participating students
- 10% increase in both belonging and self-efficacy between the start and end of the academic year
Tap Into the Capacity You Already Have
Staff capacity is a pain point at many colleges and universities, and increasing student support can be difficult when people are stretched thin and wearing many hats. Tap into your capacity by turning alumni and current students into active participants and partners by becoming mentors. Who better to support first-year students than a group that knows their challenges all too well?
What makes alumni and current students want to become peer mentors? “They didn't like all the hoops they had to jump through to figure things out when they were a first-year student, and they want to eliminate some of those for the students coming in,” said Michie.
Encouraging Help-Seeking
Students who find it hard to access on-campus resources have a greater chance of stopping out; however, they also don’t often exhibit proactive help-seeking behaviors, instead signing up for resources after they hear about them from a friend or have been contacted several times. A multifaceted intervention that includes peer mentorship is a way to reach students who usually wouldn't seek support, making them feel supported and more like they belong.
“You could say belonging drives resource utilization, but perhaps the reverse is true,” says Michie. “Students who are aware of things that exist on campus and use them have more belonging.”
Universities should also remember to deliver these mentorship and multifaceted support programs to groups like commuter students or fully online students who are already at risk of feeling less connected to campus and of stopping out at higher rates.
“Many of our students are ‘on the go,’ and through Mentor Collective, they are able to connect with their peers, stay connected to the college, and receive the support they need to accomplish their academic and professional goals.”
– Romero Jalomo, Ph.D., Vice President of Student Affairs, Hartnell Colleg
Empowering Student Success
Student stop-out can’t be attributed to only one factor; a multitude of hardships can shorten a learner’s journey.
Community colleges must employ many arrows in their quiver and build multifaceted interventions to mitigate this. A robust mentorship program like those offered by Mentor Collective can go a long way toward making an impact. Universities can build an ecosystem of resources that wrap around students—including first-years, transfers, online, and commuters—to make them feel better connected and supported.
If you want to learn from some of the best practices in leveraging technology and building a scalable culture of mentorship, download our resource “Breaking Through The Status Quo to Build a Scalable Culture of Mentorship” here.
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