It’s no secret that engineering and computer science are among the most challenging and rigorous areas of study on any college campus. There's all that math and physics and difficult intro-level, or “weed-out,” courses to master.
And if a student fails to pass these crucial classes in the first (or even second) year of college, it’s time to change majors, right?
That’s not the mindset at the College of Engineering, where in recent years deliberate choices to support student success are helping students persevere through rigorous coursework to graduation.
The result: The college achieved its highest-ever first-year retention rate this fall, with 80.1% of students remaining with the college.
“If [students] make enough progress in their first two years, they’re much more likely to stay in their program and earn their degree,” said Yingtao Jiang, associate dean for undergraduate programs at the College of Engineering. “Our curriculum is very challenging, of course. But during these critical transition years, we don’t allow our students to fend for themselves. If you’re facing a challenge, there are resources here and somebody is always available to help and guide you.”
What's more, even though first-year students who start in the college may change majors, they are still persisting at at a high rate. In total, 88.7% of first-time, full-time freshmen who started at the College of Engineering in fall 2023 persisted to their second year at .
The college has invested heavily in several initiatives over the years, taking a holistic approach to addressing the needs — from academic to financial to emotional — of a diverse, and growing, student body.
This is why the college not only achieved its highest-ever retention rate this fall, but also welcomed its largest-ever freshmen cohort — nearly 700 students — and just in time for the college’s new Advanced Engineering Building to open its doors for classes.
So why is the College of Engineering retaining more and more first-year students. And how is it setting them up for long-term and post-college success? Here are three reasons.
Freshmen Dive into the Deep End — But with Assistance
Senior design … as a freshman?
When Tony Ferrar, an associate professor in residence for the College of Engineering, pitched the idea of bringing a smaller capstone experience to first-year seminar (EGG 101), it took a bit of convincing.
“They don’t yet have the skills to build a viable prototype,” he recalled leadership saying.
But it didn’t take too long to persuade them otherwise.
“The use of a first-year design project helps us to frame the entire undergraduate engineering experience and awaken students’ entrepreneurial spirits,” he said.
Students work in groups of four to six — alongside a team of Peer Mentors who provide support on the technical challenges and concepts students have yet to encounter or master — on a semester-long design project, which begins the very first day of class.
“The students go hunting for a really good problem to solve and then come up with ideas on how to solve it,” Ferrar said. “They build prototypes that simulate what it would be like if it worked, and they have to test it on real users — the whole nine — in one semester.”
The Peer Mentor team not only helps with technical challenges but also highlights the relevant course that students will need to take along their engineering journey to perform the scientific analyses. The peer mentors are also crucial because the course serves the entire freshmen cohort, which now numbers close to 700 students.
“Despite the class being large, we’ve taken steps to ensure that nobody feels like a number lost in the crowd,” said Ferrar, adding that the college maintains a peer mentor-to-student ratio of no more than 20:1.
“Peer mentors are trained to instruct the lab sessions as well as support our students’ academic, social, and (often) personal needs as they find their place in the Engineering community.”
The semester concludes with a class-wide pitch competition during which promising teams are invited to join the Rebel StartUp RSO — a student organization that supports student-led entrepreneurial efforts. To date, a handful of students who are now juniors and seniors have continued to work on their ideas, with one team close to developing a functional prototype.
“Through the changes we’ve made to the first-year experience, we’ve shown that we can boost student outcomes because the course is large, rather than in spite of it,” Ferrar said. “In our class, we make use of the benefits that arise from the diverse ideas that are only possible when lots of people are involved. And our unique approaches help to build community among students as they transition into the college.”
Engineering a New Way to Teach Math and Physics
In the past few years, the College of Engineering — in partnership with the university’s Math Department — has taken a radical approach to how calculus I, calculus II, and physics are taught.
Typically, engineering curricula begin with flashy, hands-on courses — such as the EGG 101 first-year seminar — and then students are sent off to other colleges for their math and science requirements.
“If they make it through two years of hard math and fundamental sciences, we welcome them back to the college,” Ferrar said, referring to the traditional approach of most engineering programs. “Sadly, many students leave engineering programs long before they ever really take an engineering class.”
Research data revealed that this was happening at . So the college’s leadership and faculty started to ask: Isn’t there a better way?
Answer: Indeed.
The initiative of sending engineering faculty to teach math and physics courses was piloted in 2019, with electrical and computer engineering professor Pushkin Kachroo at the helm. Since then, the initiative has turned into a permanent solution with several faculty on the docket — including two new professors-in-residence who were hired this fall to further support the effort.
“It’s not because we’re somehow better at teaching math,” Ferrar said. “But we believed that this initiative would better connect our students to each other, and to a selection of engineering faculty, which would in turn help our students find encouragement and a supportive community that will see them through these challenging courses.”
And because faculty bring the difficult math and physics concepts to light through an engineering perspective, students get a greater sense of why they’re learning these ideas. Also, while each engineering professor still employs their own pedagogy, they all use various forms of evidence-supported active learning approaches.
“These teaching techniques place the student, rather than the professor, at the center of the action and transform the classroom into a collaborative environment in which students and faculty co-create knowledge,” Ferrar said. “Students feel empowered while also learning through a process of mentoring by experts.”
Both Ferrar and Jiang credit ’s math department for being forward-thinking.
“This initiative wouldn’t be possible without their partnership,” Jiang said. “We share the same goal: We want our students, regardless of their major, to thrive in these difficult courses.”
Supporting Evidence: Advising Center Invests in Student Success
It’s no surprise that the College of Engineering’s advising center has been voted the “most welcoming” advising center on campus in previous years. More than just helping students with course requirements and scheduling, the office takes a wraparound and individualized approach to guiding students toward their academic, personal, and professional goals.
“I think what sets us apart is the service we give to our students,” said Chris Parker, director of advising. “As a staff, we have the mindset that if a student is getting the runaround, it stops with us. We will get them the answers so they won’t keep getting bounced around on campus.”
From helping students with food insecurity issues to connecting them with resources such as tutoring, financial aid or Counseling and Psychological Services, the advising center takes a holistic approach to supporting the college’s diverse student body. This also includes relying on college partners to alert advisors to issues that might prevent a student from progressing, said Shae Deschutter, associate director of academic advising.
Deschutter, who also teaches the First Year Seminar course, said that many student needs are identified in class assignments and peer mentor conversations. Typically, a student shares something in a reflection assignment, and a mentor notices and raises it to the attention of the advising center, which in turn connects the student with the most appropriate resource.
“There are so many things that go on in our students' lives that can create barriers to their success,” Deschutter said. “We're being strategic about how we identify those things and implement supports to break some of those barriers down. It's a collective effort, building a community of support within the College of Engineering.”
The advising center also has increased its direct outreach and communication to students, reminding them of important deadlines; advising them to be proactive in meeting with their counselors; connecting them with faculty in their respective departments; and visiting specific classrooms at important stages.
“We like to visit the final class that students take before they can apply for advanced standing so that they don’t get delayed in progressing forward and taking upper-division courses,” Parker said.
More recently, the advising center has increased the number of open advising sessions offered during peak class registration times. Instead of making a typical 30-minute appointment with an advisor, students can drop by for a quick 10-minute chat.
“This new strategy seems to be working,” Parker said. “In the spring, we saw about 600 students over a three-week period.”
A new college policy also has helped advisors support students who might be struggling academically. After a third attempt at passing an engineering-specific course, the student must petition to stay in the degree program.
“If we approve the petition and say, ‘This is your last opportunity,’ it sometimes gives them that final push of motivation, and they tend to pass the course,” Parker said.
Two other important changes: The college recently reduced the number of credit hours to 120 after receiving approval to remove some social science gen-ed courses, and it now offers more courses more frequently.
“These changes have likely made it easier for students to manage their course loads, reduce time to graduation, and increase overall satisfaction with their academic programs,” Jiang said. “Our curriculum is now more manageable, meaningful, and impactful.”
