Strengths

• Millersville's extremely strong retention and graduation rates are powerful evidence of the success of not only the University as a whole, but specifically our enrollment management and support efforts.
• The strengths and successes of our retention efforts may be credited to the widespread assumption of responsibility for student retention across the university, especially alumni, faculty, and administrators of color who work tirelessly and creatively on behalf of our students (see Chapter 8).
• The Enrollment Management Steering Committee is a welcome effort to identify areas of vulnerability. Retention and graduation rates for African-American and Latino students have been and continue to be the locus for improvements.
• University strengths are the underlying rationale for a number of enrollment management recommendations. Our strong reputation and student body (see Chapter 2), allows us to focus on fine-tuning the composition of our student body rather than merely generate applications.
• Most support services have completed program reviews and honestly identified shortcomings.

Areas of Concern

• While African-American student retention rates have improved steadily and significantly over the last three years, Latino retention and graduation rates are not yet showing significant improvement.
• The Academic Advisement office lacks a clear mission, vision, goals, assessment program, and campus-wide leadership in improving advising services.
• The Center for Counseling and Human Development is seeing greatly increased demand for its services.
• Dining and Conference Services may not be meeting the nutritional needs of students of color, particularly African-American students.
• Many students feel the University does not have available the classes that they need.

Recommendations

• Continue to strengthen efforts to improve the recruitment, retention, and graduation of Latino and African-American students.
• Develop a strategic plan for improving academic advisement to students. Establish a mission for the Academic Advisement office that clarifies how it supports faculty advisement of students.
• Strengthen our tutoring assistance in writing across the disciplines.
• Continue to implement appropriate coordination among the Admissions and Financial Aid offices and academic departments in order to award financial aid packages earlier.

Suggestions

• Develop a fuller understanding of long-standing student dissatisfaction with course availability, and address those concerns within our resource capabilities.
• Determine if Act 101/PACE program brings students' reading, writing, and mathematics skills to levels adequate for success in college-level coursework.
• Identify cost-effective ways to increase counseling and psychiatric services to students.