Supporting Students for Success in Open and Distance Learning and Reducing Dropout Rates: An Interview with Prof. Ormond Simpson - English version

LIU Yongquan; LI Ying (2012) Open Education Research (China), Issue 5, Page 4-10

http://www.oriprobe.com/journals/kfjyyj/2012_5.html

Supporting Students for Success in Open and Distance Learning and

Reducing Dropout Rates: An Interview with Prof. Ormond Simpson

Question list for interviewing Prof. Simpson

1. Could you make comments on the issue, high rate dropout in ODL? Could you

introduce the past, present and future research on this issue in OUUK and other

countries?

One of the most outstanding characteristics of distance education internationally is its

high dropout rates compared with other forms of education. For example in the UK

the UK Open University has a graduation rate of 22% - in other words only one fifth

of the students starting with it actually graduate with a degree. This compares with

an 82% graduation rate for full-time students at UK Universities, so the OU rates are

only a just over a quarter the graduation rates of full -time students.

Many other distance institutions do worse. The figures range from 14% for the Dr.

Ambedkar University in India, to 6% for the University of South Africa, to 5.3% for

Athabasca University in Canada, to 5% for the University of Phoenix in the USA.

These are just examples - many distance universities do not release their graduation

figures and I suspect that there are even worse figures in other places.

The UK Open University has mostly conducted research into why students dropout

through sending questionnaires to ask students why. But this approach has its

limitations. Students often give reasons that appear to be beyond the institutions

capacity to help - such as illness, work needs, family problems - which allows

institutions to believe that there’s nothing they can do to change their dropout rates.

2. From the angles of sociology, education and economics, what bad effects caused by

high-rate dropout will have?

From a sociological perspective I’ve been unable to find any research into the effects

of dropout on distance students. There is some research in the UK on dropout from

full-time university which is rather worrying. Students who drop out from full-time

university in the UK have a higher probability (up to 40% more) of subsequently

suffering depression, unemployment, indebtedness, physical ill-health and - for

women - experiencing violence from their partners, than either students who

successfully graduate or who never went to university in the first place.

We don’t seem to have that data for distance university dropout. We can hope that

the effects of dropping out of a distance course are less traumatic than from a full-time

course, but we don’t know. Given that distance institutions apparently produce far

more dropout students than graduates, this lack of knowledge is worrying.

From an educational point of view the data is equally worrying. It represents a high

level of inefficiency of distance institutions. What manufacturer could survive an

80% failure rate in their products? More importantly perhaps if a government is

deciding how to resource higher education will they decide that distance education is

too wasteful? Only today I read that in California the state government has

eliminated state student grants to institutions which have failed to reach acceptable

graduation rates. 137 institutions have been affected.

Finally dropout is economically bad news. In the UK the cost to government of the

extra levels of depression and unemployment amongst dropout students must run into

millions of pounds annually; almost certainly more than the cost of reducing that

dropout to a lower level.

3. Compared to the period of the foundation of the OUUK, the issue, dropout in ODL,

is worse or somewhat eased now? With the development of ICT, and many

educational technologies are employed into ODL, such as social softwares, computer

forums, do you think they are helpful for reducing the high-rate dropout?

Dropout in the UK Open University is now worse than when it started. For students

entering in 1971 when it started the graduation rate was 59%. For students entering

in 1997 it was 22% and is apparently still dropping (it can take up to 12 years or

longer for students to graduate. 1997 is the latest entry date for which we have

reliable evidence).

There are some reasons why the graduation rate was comparatively high in the

UKOU’s early years - there was a queue of previously well-qualified students without

degrees who were keen to get them. But that doesn’t explain the more recent drop.

My guess is that there were a number of organizational changes to save money which

tended to reduce support for students. But that’s guesswork. However it does

suggest the introduction of e-learning over the last few years has made little

improvement in retention rates.

4. How to define the concept “dropout”? I have noticed an interesting fact, in the

earlier literatures, including some from the OUUK, preferred the words like

“drop-out, withdraw or attrition ”, nowadays, the more frequent words like “retention

or persistence”, could we say the changes of key words have presented the changes of

focus or showed the progress of action research on this issue?

That’s a very interesting point. It’s partly to do with national differences - the

Americans tend to use ‘attrition’ for dropout and ‘persistence’ for retention. I don’t

think these uses show any particular progress on the issue. But I have come across

one article in which the writer admitted to the very high levels of distance education

dropout, but suggested that most dropout was actually ‘non-engagement’ - students

simply failing to commit to the course right at the beginning. He proposed that we

shouldn’t worry about that too much. That I think is dangerous! It suggests that

most dropout is beyond institutional effort to change so we needn’t bother about it.

5. For the improvement of retention, what kind of projects were/are being conducted

in OUUK or other distance education institutions that you are familiar with? What is

the result? Are they effective?

Like many other distance institutions the OUUK set up a ‘Retention Project’ to try to

improve its retention rates. It made some 30 recommendations in 2001 about

improving various aspects of the teaching and support. The recommendations are

too long and complicated to quote here but they were mainly around changing the

OUUK’s administrative systems, (sometimes to undo previous changes!). Typical

examples were:

Recommendation 28. The University should devise and adopt a

communications plan for non-current students and allocate ‘ownership’ of this

process along with associated resources

Recommendation 36. There should be a University Strategy for the

production and dissemination of information relating to student retention

and other very similar recommendations

It is easy to understand why this particular project process was adopted, but there are

a number of problems with taking this way forward:

Many of the recommendations were very general so it was hard to see what

specific action would take them forward

There were so many recommendations that it was impossible to prioritize

them and decide which were the most important to focus on and to fund, given

that funding is always limited. It was equally impossible to evaluate them to

try to see which had been the most effective

It was unclear whose was the main responsibility for the ensuring that project

was mainstreamed (in fact there were even personality problems - I was told

by a senior member of the university that one of the reasons for the eventual

side-lining of the project was a personality clash between the vice chancellor

and the project leader)

Finally - and perhaps most importantly - projects of this nature are often

subject to ‘fade-out’. Without someone very high in the system continually

promoting the project it dies away after a few years. That has probably

happened in this case to the point where few people in the OUUK now

remember that there ever was such a project.

6. What are the main causes lead to the dropout in OUUK? In which stage, the

dropout occurred frequently? Does OUUK have any effective interference? What are

they?

There are many unavoidable causes of dropout such as change of circumstances -

severe illness, pregnancy, change of work, death in the family and so on. If you ask

students they will often tell you that they didn’t have enough time. But in most

cases I think the answer is simpler than that - students drop out because they lose the

motivation to learn. As Professor Edward Anderson said at the National Conference

on Student Retention, San Diego, Calif. USA, 2003:

“The best predictor of student retention is motivation. Most students drop out because

of reduced motivation”

With a high level of learning motivation a student can often overcome problems that

would otherwise make them drop out. What we have to do is to try to maintain that

motivation.

I believe that the kind of interventions have to have three characteristics. They have

to be:

Early - most dropout occurs quite early in a course module - in the OUUK

some 30% of new students drop out in the first few weeks. I’m not sure if

this coincides with the delivery of the first course materials, students looking

at the material for the first time, the first assignment being due, or students

attempting that first assignment and finding that it was too difficult.

But whatever the cause of early dropout it means that to be effective any

support interventions have to be as early as possible, even before the start of

the course, and then again when students start to read the material and when

they start to look at the first assignment.

Proactive - the institution must take the initiative to reach out to students

instead of waiting for students to contact it. As Professor Anderson says

‘Student self-referral does not work as a mode of promoting persistence.

Students who need services the most refer themselves the least. Effective

retention services have to take the initiative in outreach and timely

interventions with those students.’

Individual - targeted at individual students as far as possible. In a current

experiment I am running with London University International Programmes

we are using an ‘e-mail merge’ system to send emails addressed to individual

students by name.

Motivational - aimed at enhancing the learning motivation of students. This

last requirement is the most challenging and much further research is needed

to discover what students find the most motivating. There is a list of

experimental ‘motivational emails’ on my website.

Of course all this takes time and will be expensive. But see my answer to question

9!

7. You have divided learning support into academic support and non-academic

support, for the retention, what are the most effectives measures in academic support

and non-academic support?

I believe that it is non-academic support that is the most important in keeping students

going and stopping them dropping out. Academic support (teaching) is certainly

important, but as Professor Ramsden (2003) says, “No teacher can ever be certain that

their teaching will cause a learner to learn”. So the first job of a teacher (particularly

in distance education) is to try to encourage their students to learn for themselves.

That can be done in various ways but most importantly by being proactive and

motivational.

8. In OUUK, how to handle the problem, the gap of the lower previous education

background and the higher teaching objectives, if the learners were hard to catch up

with the objectives, how to provide learning support for them? Or in another case, do

nothing for them and make them dropout.

This is a very important but complex question! The OUUK is an ‘open entry’

institution - students need no entry qualifications to start study. This means that we

do indeed have a number of new students who have low previous educational

backgrounds starting courses for which they are not well prepared.

Originally the OUUK tried to tackle that problem by giving such students extra

materials to study to bring them up to the right level before the start of the course.

This really doesn’t work - giving such students extra remedial work to do simply adds

to their initial problems and generally leads to early dropout. I think the answer is

ensure that students start on the right course for them (see my response to question 11).

The OUUK now has a series of credit-bearing courses at introductory levels called

‘Openings’ which allow students from a low previous educational level to start at a

pre-degree level whilst still earning some credit. So we can suggest to students who

are not well prepared for degree level courses that they start with such a course and

work up to higher level courses later.

9. If one institution offers learners more personalized online support, the tutors will

increase more workload, it means cost will be increased. How to deal with the

problem in OUUK?

Again a very important question! You are quite right - giving students better support

will mean increased workload for tutors, so they will need more pay or more tutors

and that will mean increased costs for the institution. But in any manufacturing

process you need to look not just at costs but at the benefits. If you invest in a better

quality product you increase your costs, but you can charge more for it or sell more of

it (or both) and make a greater profit.

I believe it is the same in distance education. It does depend on the funding model

of an institution, but to take an example of an institution funded by students fees - if

you invest in more support on one course module more students will succeed on that

module, go on to their next course module so paying more fees giving you more

income (you are selling more). In addition students may be persuaded to pay more

in fees if they feel they are getting better support - in other words a better quality

product (you can charge more).

The important thing is to do a ‘cost-benefit analysis’ - that is, to ensure that your extra

cost is less than the extra benefit you receive. So, for example, if you invest in a

particular support activity that increases your retention then you need to ensure that

your ‘cost per student retained’ is less than the your ‘benefit per student retained’.

There is not enough space here to explore these concepts in full: there is a whole

chapter in my new book on the cost benefits of student support.

10. How blended teaching is conducted in OUUK? What are the percentages

face-to-face tutorial will account for? What are the percentages online tutorial? If

Tutorial time and exam time collide with learners’ working time, how to deal with the

contradiction?

There are no easy answers to these questions. In the OUUK where there are enough

students in a particular town to form a group on a foundation course module (the first

course of a degree) then there will be some face-to-face tuition. But on higher level

course modules tuition is mostly online and by phone and email.

However I don’t think anyone has ever really analyzed what blend of media is the

most cost-effective. I suspect that the move to online tuition is more driven by

trying to reduce costs than anything else. And I don’t think anyone has done a

cost-benefit analysis of this move.

OUUK study is largely designed to be flexible so that students can study in their own

time. Face-to-face tutorials are held in the evenings or weekends for example so

mostly don’t conflict with a student’s employment. And the OUUK tries to contact

employers to tell them of the importance of supporting their staff in the studies and

giving them time off for exams. The OUUK also goes to great lengths to set up

exams for students who have difficulty attending ordinary exams - for example one

year we had to organize an exam on a ferry for someone who was on duty on it.

Sadly the invigilator was very sea-sick!

11. When the learners choose the subjects or programs, are there any guide or advice

to be offered to help them to choose suitable programs? If one learner found he/she

chose a wrong program, what will he/she do? Whether OUUK will offer some help or

not?

Yes, there are a number of ways of helping students choose their subjects and the right

level to study, such as

Course descriptions - detailed descriptions of content, assessment and

outcomes

‘Taster’ materials - samples of course materials

Students’ reviews - what students who’ve taken the courses think of them.

Diagnostic quizzes

There is an article ‘Retention and Course Choice in Distance Learning' on my website

www.ormondsimpson.com which describes these in detail.

If someone has chosen the wrong subject in the UKOU it is sometimes possible to

switch to another subject if they ask early enough. But it is very difficult to catch up

after a late start. I would generally suggest a withdrawal and a transfer to a later

presentation of a different subject or level.

But part of getting learners onto the right course module for them is also helping them

to know what their chances of success on a particular module are. A few years ago I

developed a program which could predict a student’s chances of success on a

particular course from their previous education, sex, age and other characteristics.

So for example we could say to a student ‘Your chances of passing this course are

52%. You can improve your chances by changing to a different course at a lower

level’. I didn’t have a chance to experiment with this approach but a colleague of

mine at the University of South Africa tried telling students their chances of passing

and discovered that they were more successful as a result - a very interesting finding!

The program is described in an article on my website ‘Predicting Success in Open and

Distance Learning'.

12. What is known to all, learners in ODL need strong ability to do autonomic

learning, how to cultivate students ' autonomous learning ability in OUUK? Maybe

some learners have such ability when they enter into OUUK?

I’m not really sure we need to directly cultivate students’ autonomic learning ability.

Remember that as children we are all wonderful autonomic learners - think of how we

learnt our own language! Perhaps as they grow older some people tend to lose that

ability because of poor educational experiences. So what distance educators need to

do is to help our students recover that ability and confidence. I think there are ways

of doing that by using learning psychology, particularly the work of such

psychologists as Carole Dweck. Again there’s an article on my website

'Motivating Learners in Open and Distance Learning: Do we need a New Theory of

Student Support?' which might be of interest. And this argument will be extended in

my new book when it is out.

13. The in-service learners need strong ability to do time-management, are there any

related training or course instructing learners to do time-management?

There are some pages on the OUUK website on time management. I’m not sure how

effective they are. There’s some evidence that courses on time management are not

very effective - people change their attitudes and activities for a few weeks but then

soon revert to their previous behavior. Students do tell us that running out of time is

a factor in dropping out, but I’m not sure if this is not partly about priorities - other

things becoming more important than study such as family and work.

My feeling is that it may be best to address issues such as motivation, will power,

prioritization, overcoming procrastination and the organization of study and then deal

with getting behind with study with some tips when it happens. There’s some

suggestions in the ‘Motivational Emails’ package on my website but I’m still

developing my ideas on this - ask me in a year’s time!

14. As you know, the development of economy is not balanced in China, the eastern

parts are developed, and the western parts are developing. It is found that most

dropouts in the western parts caused by low per capita income, such as cannot afford

the PC, cannot afford tuition fee, etc, do you have the similar dropouts in the OUUK?

For the learners who are able to accomplish the course but cannot afford tuition fee,

what steps can be taken to help the learners in the OUUK？

The OUUK has a ‘financial assistance scheme’ which allows students from poor

economic backgrounds to study for free. But of course it is very limited. The UK

Government has now introduced a fees loan scheme - students can borrow the money

for their fees which has to be repaid after they have graduated. The idea is that as

graduates they will get better jobs and so will be able to repay the loan easily. It is

hoped that this will encourage poor students to study by not requiring them to pay

‘up-front’ fees. However it is not clear yet whether this will work well. And it is

not clear what will happen to dropouts who won’t have the better jobs to repay the

loan.

15. In 2002, your book Supporting students in online, open and distance learning has

been translated into Chinese, which has great influence upon many Chinese distance

education institutions, staff and researchers. We are very pleasant to learn your new

book entitled STUDENT RETENTION IN ONLINE, OPEN AND DISTANCE

LEARNING will be published. Could you introduce some main points in the book in

advance for the Chinese readers?

The book’s title will be ‘Supporting Students for Success in Online and Distance

Learning’ and should be published by Routledge in December this year (if I can finish

the editing and indexing in time!). It will be based on the previous book with

sections on academic and non-academic support but with additions and updates on the

social and economic consequences of dropout, the cost benefits of support, learning

motivation psychology, retrieving dropped out students, course design for success,

and assessment amongst other topics.

16. In China, there are many researchers conducting the project A Study on Dropping

Out in Open & Distance Learning, some findings have been reported by the project.

The attached report is one of the findings. Could you make brief comments on it after

reading the report? Could you compare the difference between Chinese research and

Western research on the same issue in ODL? What suggestions would you provide for

the Chinese researchers and practitioners?

I thought this was an excellent report - I do hope the authors will seek to publish it in

one of the English language distance education journals such as Open Learning.

There is a great deal of international interest in how China is developing its distance

education programme.

Despite many cultural differences the report’s findings feel similar to the answers to

dropout questionnaires used in the OUUK. Certainly identifying time and subject

choice difficulties are very familiar. Of course we must remember that what students

tell us about why they dropped out may not always be accurate - as I suggested earlier

not having enough time is also about losing the motivation to study and allowing

other things to take greater priority.

Nevertheless there are many important things to draw from the report. I particularly

liked the emphasis on the final questions which I thought were very appropriate - as

Marx famously said ‘philosophers have only interpreted the world, in various ways;

the point, however, is to change it’. There are so many ideas that could be taken

from the report - let me just make three suggestions:

The need to build motivational support into the course materials and teaching

The need to design as much flexibility into the system as possible. Students

have many things in their lives - the courses need to fit round the students

rather than the other way round.

The need to get students onto the right courses at the right level for them. I

would suggest using diagnostic and taster materials if they are not already

available.

Meanwhile it seems to me that your researchers are working along exactly the right

lines - testing our distance educators’ perceptions against the reality for the students

and always questioning the evidence. In the West it often seems to me that

researchers spend far too much time looking at elaborate e-learning developments and

too little time looking at the evidence and asking the basic question ‘Does this

increased student success?’ I hope you maintain this skeptical approach!

Finally let me say thank you for the opportunity to see this report and to be

interviewed by you. Your questions have been most interesting and challenging - I

hope my answers have been at least a little helpful! My warmest wishes to my

Chinese distance education colleagues for your success in researching and improving

distance education in China.

Ormond Simpson

7 August 2012