Understanding Student Attrition in the Graduate Certificate in New Zealand Immigration Advice

The objective of this project was to explore and understand reasons for student attrition in the Graduate Certificate in New Zealand Immigration Advice (GCNZIA), an online qualification.

Findings are intended to enable tutors within the immigration programme to understand what, over and above delivery, the team could be doing to maximise student completion and success in this online programme.

Using geo-demographic data in the Polytechnic’s student database they searched for patterns among students who had withdrawn from the programme, at different points in the programme’s timeline and also collected information from students via phone interviews about their reasons for withdrawal.

Preliminary data analysis indicates no geo-demographic trends impacting on attrition. More than half of the students interviewed were influenced to drop out due to external reasons for which tutors could not control, such as change in family or employment circumstances.

Nearly half of the students interviewed also identified internal factors which contributed to their decision to drop out, including feeling unprepared for the amount of work required (more time demand than they could accommodate), the level of learning (harder than expected), issues with technology (competence and infrastructure), processing errors at the application or enrolment stages, and cost.

Some of these internal factors can be taken into consideration in future programme planning and design, and in the provision of pastoral care. Literature indicates attrition in online study is a significant issue globally, far exceeding the attrition rate for face-to-face learning. Results suggest pre-enrolment pastoral care may play an important role in resolving some significant causes of attrition for online students.