A student success program is the coordinated set of people, services and outreach a college uses to get students from their first day to a credential. The programs that work pick one outcome, find the students most likely to miss it, and make sure those students use the help that already exists.
The National Student Clearinghouse numbers show how much room there is. Of students who started college in fall 2024, 69.1% were back at the college where they started a year later. Six years out, 61.1% of the fall 2019 cohort had earned a credential, and 51.7% of students who started part-time had stopped out.
Most colleges already have the advisors, tutors, aid counselors and career staff. Students have to use them. We mapped 22 target actions in a student’s first year, and 9 of them are campus support: meeting an advisor, using tutoring, the writing center or the library, and visiting the career center, the internship office, the health center, counseling or the fitness center. A student who never takes those steps gets none of the help.
This guide covers what a program includes, two programs with public evidence, how to build one and how to tell whether it worked. For the term-to-term tactics, see our 8 student retention strategies. To have us run outreach on your own list, see our student retention solutions.
Student success vs. retention
Retention measures whether a student comes back next term. Student success covers the whole path: learning, steady progress toward a credential, finishing, and what comes after. Retention is the earliest outcome you can measure, so most programs start there and build toward completion.
What a student success program includes
A program works as one system. Each part has an owner, a group of students it serves and a step it wants those students to take.
| Part | What it includes | The step you want students to take |
|---|---|---|
| Advising | An assigned advisor, required check-ins, degree maps | Meet an advisor before registration opens |
| Academic support | Tutoring, the writing center, supplemental instruction in gateway courses, a first-year seminar | Use tutoring before the first exam |
| Financial support | Emergency grants, completion grants, payment plans, aid counseling, a review of registration holds | Contact financial aid and clear holds |
| Belonging | Orientation, learning communities, peer mentors, clubs and campus events | Join a club or an academic group |
| Wellness and basic needs | Counseling, health services, help with food and transportation | Use counseling or health services |
| Career preparation | The career center and internship office, starting in the first year | Visit the career center |
| Early alerts | Registration status, holds, attendance, midterm grades, learning management system logins | Hear from someone within the week of a flag |
| Outreach | Messages from the office that owns each step, timed to the academic calendar | Take the next step this week |
Several of these have their own guides: financial barriers to retention, institutional engagement and belonging, mental health support and career path alignment.
The last two rows turn a list of services into a program. Early alerts tell you which students need help. Outreach gets them to use it.
Two programs with public evidence
CUNY ASAP
The City University of New York’s Accelerated Study in Associate Programs (ASAP) wraps several supports around community college students at once: full-time enrollment, advisors with small caseloads, career services and tutoring, blocked first-year courses and a seminar, a tuition waiver that covers any gap left by financial aid, free textbooks and free MetroCards tied to taking part in key program services.
In MDRC’s random-assignment study, 40% of ASAP students had earned a degree after three years, against 22% of the control group. Three Ohio community colleges adapted the model, and their programs nearly doubled degree receipt through three years.
Georgia State University
Georgia State rebuilt its advising around data. Its GPS advising system alerts an advisor when a student shows any one of 800 indicators of being off track for graduation, from failing a quiz to missing FAFSA forms.
Both programs pair support with a push to use it. ASAP ties free MetroCards to taking part in key services. Georgia State’s advisors reach out when an alert fires, before the student asks for help.
How to build a student success program
1. Pick one outcome and one date
Start with the outcome you can measure soonest, like first-year students registered for spring by census date. One outcome keeps the team focused and gives you a number to judge the program by.
2. Find where students stall, using last year’s data
Pull the students who didn’t come back last year and look at what they had in common: holds, credits completed, gateway course grades, advising visits and aid status. Those patterns tell you which students to reach first and what to fix. More in student success analytics.
3. List the steps and name an owner for each
Write down every action a student has to take to reach the outcome, and the office that owns it: the advising appointment, the aid form, the hold, the registration window. A step with no owner is a step students miss.
4. Put one leader in charge across offices
Advising, financial aid, the registrar, student affairs and institutional research each own part of the path. A program needs one leader who sets the goal for all of them, and a weekly meeting where they look at the same list of students.
5. Close the gap between help and use
Reach each student at the step they’re on, from the office that owns it. Picture a first-year student stuck on his first big college paper who hasn’t used the writing center. A short social video from the Writing Center shows a tutor at a table with an open laptop: “First big paper due Friday? Bring a rough draft. Drop-in hours start at 3.” It shows him someone is paying attention and gives him one easy next step. That’s concrete expressions of care, one of the motivational principles behind every GuidePost we build, paired with a timely reminder.
Every student on a list can be reached across five channels: social media, streaming TV, email, SMS and direct mail, each timed to the step they’re on.
6. Pilot with a holdout, then scale
Run the program with one group of students first, and keep a random group out of it. The gap between the two groups is what the program changed. Expand what worked and drop what didn’t.
What this looks like in practice
Amarillo College needed to reach two groups before fall 2025: continuing students at risk of missing registration and advising deadlines, and students who had stopped out in the past 24 months. A social campaign prompted students to meet with advisors, clear holds, finalize financial aid and register. In all, 121 continuing students met with an advisor, and 149 registered for classes. The college broke even on the campaign at its 43rd enrollment.
Across our retention campaigns, the average conversion rate is 20%, from our results.
Want to see what this does on your own list? Start a pilot with one list of continuing students and one goal: next-term registration.
How to tell whether your program worked
- Watch the leading signals. Advising appointments booked, tutoring and writing center visits, holds cleared and aid completed show movement within weeks. More in student success indicators.
- Judge the outcome you picked. Term-to-term retention, credits completed and gateway course pass rates come first, then completion.
- Compare against a holdout. Keep a random group of students out of the program, the same students the whole time. The gap is what the program changed. New Motimatic campaigns hold out a random 5% of the list. More on how we measure.
- Break results out by student group. First-generation, part-time, transfer, adult and online students often face more barriers, and an average can hide a gap.
Common questions about student success programs
Where should a small college start? With one outcome, one group of students and one office. First-year registration for spring, run with the advising office, is a common first pick.
How is a program different from a list of services? A program has an owner, a goal, data on who needs help and outreach that gets those students to use it. A list of services waits for students to find it.
What does technology add? It flags students early, books appointments and sends each student the right message at the right time. That frees advisors to spend their time with the students who need a conversation.
Who should own it? One leader with authority across academic affairs and student affairs, with a team that includes advising, financial aid, the registrar and institutional research.
Keep reading on student success
- 8 student retention strategies
- Student success indicators
- Student success analytics
- Student engagement strategies
- Measuring student engagement
- Undergraduate retention challenges, our white paper
- Everything on retention and student success
