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URBANICITY/RURALITY (NCES)

THE NCES locale codes were used to code each student's high school. The codes are as follows:

City – Large (11): Territory inside an Urbanized Area and inside a Principal City with
population of 250,000 or more.

City – Midsize (12): Territory inside an Urbanized Area and inside a Principal City
with population less than 250,000 and greater than or equal to 100,000.

City – Small (13): Territory inside an Urbanized Area and inside a Principal City with
population less than 100,000.

Suburban – Large (21): Territory outside a Principal City and inside an Urbanized
Area with population of 250,000 or more.

Suburban – Midsize (22): Territory outside a Principal City and inside an Urbanized
Area with population less than 250,000 and greater than or equal to 100,000.

Suburban – Small (23): Territory outside a Principal City and inside an Urbanized
Area with population less than 100,000.

Town – Fringe (31): Territory inside an Urban Cluster that is less than or equal to 10
miles from an Urbanized Area.

Town – Distant (32): Territory inside an Urban Cluster that is more than 10 miles
and less than or equal to 35 miles from an Urbanized Area.

Town – Remote (33): Territory inside an Urban Cluster that is more than 35 miles
from an Urbanized Area.

Rural – Fringe (41): Census-defined rural territory that is less than or equal to 5
miles from an Urbanized Area, as well as rural territory that is less than or equal to
2.5 miles from an Urban Cluster.

Rural – Distant (42): Census-defined rural territory that is more than 5 miles but less
than or equal to 25 miles from an Urbanized Area, as well as rural territory that is
more than 2.5 miles but less than or equal to 10 miles from an Urban Cluster.

Rural – Remote (43): Census-defined rural territory that is more than 25 miles from
an Urbanized Area and also more than 10 miles from an Urban Cluster.

The National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) classifies the rurality of each US high school.
These codes are called Locale codes.

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RURAL STUDENTS

We define rural students as students who attended a high school with a NCES Locale code of 42 or 43.

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WHAT THE DATA CAN’T TELL YOU

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DECISIONS MADE IN HIGH SCHOOL ARE CRITICAL

All students in the dataset were at one time enrolled at West Virginia University (WVU); therefore, all students had made the decision to attend college at a major university.
The data cannot explain the decision to attend college and elect a STEM major, or more importantly, the decision not to attend college.

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STEM MATRICULATION

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THE DATASET

We accessed the course records of all students who were enrolled as undergraduates at West Virginia University’s (WVU) Morgantown campus from 2000 to present; 146,000 students.
We restricted the dataset to US citizens who were admitted as First Time Freshman beginning after the Fall 2005 semester when WVU began collecting reliable first-generation data.

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STEM

Defining Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) students is not straightforward.
For this talk, we divide students into four classes:

Non-STEM
Agriculture
Life sciences including biology and health professions. This also includes general science majors.
Physical science including engineering, math, chemistry, and physics.

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STEM MAJOR ELECTION RATES

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COLLEGE SUCCESS – GRADUATION IN STEM BY LOCALE

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COLLEGE SUCCESS

First-generation students graduate at a lower rate (p<.001). This is overall graduation not graduation with a STEM major.

	Graduation Rate Non-STEM Majors	Graduation Rate Physical Science Majors
First Generation	50%	56%
Not First Generation	62%	69%

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HAZARD

When are rural or first-generation students most at risk of leaving STEM?

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DATASET

Data-Products/DataProduct-Institutional-Rural/Ver4/DemoRptMajSeq-Eng-rural-v4.csv
WV engineering students with LOCALE code.
Admit code filtered FTF, readmit, transfer.
Survival plots filtered engineering first semester, fall first semester, FTF.
All plots with 6 year graduation window.

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Major Changing Patterns of Rural WVU Engineering Students

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Rural First-generation students are at elevated risk of leaving college in both the spring freshmen and spring sophomore semesters.

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Rural First-generation students are at lower risk of changing to a non-STEM major in both the spring freshmen and spring sophomore semesters.

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RISK FACTORS

When are rural or first-generation students most at risk of leaving STEM

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MATH READINESS

For engineering students in this dataset, the student is “Math Ready” if they are ready to enroll in Calculus I (MATH 155) in their first semester.
For current WVU students, the math department has recently changed its placement criteria, placing the majority of students in MATH 153. We will have to wait a bit to see what this ultimately does to graduation rates.

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RURAL/FIRST GENERATION DIFFERENCES

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RISK FACTORS – LEAVING COLLEGE

Rural Students are 40% more likely to leave college

High School is still important

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RISK FACTORS – LEAVING STEM WHILE STAYING IN COLLEGE

Only Math Readiness matters for staying in STEM.

Math Ready students have 200% higher odds of staying in STEM

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NON-COGNITIVE FACTORS

But feels and beliefs are important too.

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NON-COGNITIVE FACTORS

We also measure a broad collection of non-cognitive variables possibly related to rurality, first generation status, and retention. Thus far, these factors appear much less important than academic factors.

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DIVING DEEPER

Preliminary results from the First2 survey instruments.

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FIRST2 NETWORK DATA

Preliminary results from the First2 survey instruments.
Data collected at Fairmont State University and Blue Ridge Community and Technical College this spring.

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FIRST2 NETWORK DATA

Which of these choices best expresses your feelings about the statement, "My parents/guardians often discussed preparing for college"? (Options range from 1: strongly disagree to 5:strongly agree.)
First-generation students’ mean was 2.92; continuing generation students’ mean was 4.01.
This was a significant difference (F=18.19, p<.001) between the answers of students.

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FIRST2 NETWORK DATA

Which choice best expresses your feelings about the statement, "I knew many college-educated adults when I was growing up"?

(Options range from 1: strongly disagree to 5:strongly agree.)

First-generation students’ mean was 2.50.

Continuing generation students’ mean was 3.84.

This was a significant difference (F=28.53, p<.001) between the answers of first-generation and continuing generation students.

There was not a significant difference between answers of rural and non-rural students.

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FIRST2 NETWORK DATA

Which choice best expresses your feelings about the statement, "I found the transition from high school to college to be stressful"?(

Options range from 1: strongly disagree to 5:strongly agree.)

First-generation students’ mean was 3.81.

Continuing generation students’ mean was 3.19.

This was a significant difference (F=6.409, p<.05) between the answers of first-generation and continuing generation students.

There was not a significant difference between answers of rural and non-rural students.

WEST VIRGINIA UNIVERSITY

Department of Physics & Astronomy