The Effects of Student Coaching in College: An Evaluation of a Randomized Experiment in Student Mentoring

Recently the What Works Clearinghouse at the U.S. Department of Education’s Institute of Education Sciences published a review of the effects of student coaching services to determine if one intervention in particular reduced student attrition and increased graduation rates.  The review found that students involved with InsideTrack, a one-on-one student coaching service, were significantly more likely to remain enrolled in their educational institutions in the short term than their peers who did not receive coaching from InsideTrack.

The study focused on 13,500 students enrolled in one of eight higher education institutions during the 2003-04 and 2007-08 academic years. The students were randomly assigned by lottery into treatment and control groups. The study sought to determine whether students stayed in school or completed college by comparing students receiving coaching under Inside Track to outcomes of students who did not receive such coaching services.

In the shorter term — after 6, 12 and 18 months — Inside Track students were significantly more likely to continue to be enrolled in school than students in the control group. However, at the 24 month marker, no significant difference in retention and enrollment was evident. Further, no significant difference in four-year graduation rates was found between Inside Track students and the control group.