Retention and Persistence of First-Year Students

Use this dashboard to explore trends in fall-to-fall retention and persistence each year in Massachusetts public colleges and universities. Use the dashboard controls to filter the view by retention type, segment or institution, student type, and enrollment status, and to select a deeper level of detail for the table. You may use the “Download the Data” buttons to download an image of the view you have created, download an Excel or CSV file of the summary data displayed in your view, or visit the Massachusetts Education-to-Career (E2C) Research and Data Hub to download the full dataset.

Source: Massachusetts Department of Higher Education, Higher Education Information Resource System (HEIRS)

Notes:

• This metric measures the percentage of first-time and new transfer, degree-seeking students enrolled in a given fall who returned to either the same institution or any institution of higher education in the United States in the following fall. Members of the initial cohort who graduate prior to the second fall are removed from the cohort and do not count toward or against the retention rate.
• Figures published by DHE may differ slightly from figures published by other institutions and organizations due to differences in timing of publication, data definitions, and calculation logic. Figures in this dashboard may also differ from other DHE analyses and reports that use a broader cohort to calculate retention, i.e., including part-time and/or new transfer students.