Co-operative Education and Student
Engagement, Recruitment, and
Retention: early results from a multiinstitutional study in British Columbia
Presented by
Nancy Johnston
Earl Anderson
on behalf of The Association for Co-operative Education BC/Yukon Research
Committee
Charlottetown P.E.I. June 2010
Session Overview
Introductions
 Why We Undertook the Research
 Methodology
 Early Findings
 Lessons and Next Steps

Why Did We Undertake This
Research?

Growing interest in the notion of student engagement across
North America, particularly as it relates to Student Recruitment
and Retention or SEM

Need to have more concrete information regarding the role that
co-operative education programs play in student recruitment and
retention decisions and outcomes

Desire to gain an enhanced understanding of the relationship
between participation in co-op and “known” student engagement
measures

Opportunity to learn more from a cross-section of students
regarding factors that influence their co-op related choices and
decisions
Literature Review: selections
Consulted major publications in the student retention and
engagement literature:
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Noel-Levitz, 2007 – describes factors affecting student
recruitment and retention
Cabrara & La Nasa, 2002 – link student enrollment to financial
drivers
Kuh, 2003 – links student engagement and retention
Pike, Gonyea,& Kuh, 2003 – link educationally purposeful
programs with learning and development
Avenoso & Totoro, 1993 – link persistence with courses seen
as relevant to a career and to co-op
Somers, 1986 – compares co-op students’ completion rates
(higher) with non co-op students (lower)
Tinto, 1993 & 2001 – examines connections between student
engagement (especially outside the classroom) and retention
The Research Questions

What role does co-operative education play in a
student’s decision to attend an institution
(recruitment) and in their level of engagement
with their institution (retention)?

What factors influence a student’s decision to
participate in co-operative education?
Methodology: Subjects

Pan-provincial study involving 12 different public co-op
institutions across British Columbia (colleges, technical
institutions and universities) which included students in
both mandatory and optional co-op programs

This resulted in total of 2,737 participants –
representing approximately a 20% response rate

Subjects varied in terms of gender, program type,
credential sought, special interest groups, and level of
academic and work experience
Methodology: Instrument

The survey design was informed by Kuh’s NSSE framework in
order to:

Link to the significant, existing student engagement and
retention research base in both Canada and the US

Allow for a shared vocabulary in conversations regarding
strategic enrollment management, student engagement,
and student success

Reflect, in the survey, general engagement themes from
Kuh including student /faculty interaction, academic
challenge, supportive campus environment, enriched
educational experience, active and collaborative learning.
Methodology: Instrument

The survey was anonymous and conducted online
 Human research ethics approved at all institutions
 Informed consent obtained from all participants
 Anonymity mitigated potential “power over” issues
 Surveys sent to all students identified by the institution as
registered co-op students (not randomized)

The survey tool consisted of 150 questions, reflecting the
following general themes:
 Student recruitment
 Student retention
 Student engagement
 Demographic data (gender, credential sought, # work terms,
school term, type of institution, etc.)
Methodology: Data Collection

Data collection took place in November and December of
2008

E-mail invitations to participate were sent to ACE member
institutions which included a web link to the survey tool

Once ethics approval was received each institution sent emails inviting all eligible students to participate

Students had incentive to win $25 from their institution for
participating

Data was compiled using Vovici - a web based survey tool
with Canadian based data repository
• http://www.vovici.com/
Overview of Respondents
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83% were from optional co-op programs, 17% from
mandatory co-op programs
54% were female, 46% male
1.4% self identified as first nations, aboriginal, Métis or Inuit
11% were international students
2.4% identified as having a physical or learning disability
The majority (86%) were seeking a four year Bachelors
degree
23% were in their first or second year of school, 70% in their
third or fourth year of school, 6% were grad students
18% had completed 1 co-op work term, 20% completed 2
work terms, 23% completed 3 or more, and 38% had not yet
completed a work term
Overview of Early Findings of
Interest

#1: Co-op clarifies academic pathways

#2: Co-op links school and career

#3: Co-op provides “educational enhancement”

#4: Recruiting through and to co-op
Early Findings of Interest #1:
Co-op helps students clarify their
academic pathway
1. Participation in co-op programs directly affected
students’ academic program choices (either by confirming
them or changing them).
“Co-op students engage in affective learning, develop as
professionals, apply content and theories learned in
academic courses, and gain new knowledge through
experience.” (Hoffart et al, 2006).
Early Findings of Interest #1:
Participation in co-op influenced
academic program choices
Early Findings of Interest #1:
Participation in co-op influenced
academic program choices
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“Co-op also helped me figure out my educational goal for
the future.”
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“My participation in co-op has... shown me what I do not
want to do in my area of study.”
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“It has made me realize that engineering is not my
passion, and will likely not be my choice of career in the
long term.”
Early Findings of Interest #1:
Influencing post-graduate studies
choices
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“It has strongly confirmed my choice of academic
program and shown me a tonne about potential graduate
directions.”
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“Although I am still undecided on exactly which field I
want to go into to for graduate studies, I'm pretty positive
it will be directly related to medical physics (I had two coop jobs in this field).”
Early Findings of Interest #1:
Participation in co-op influenced
academic program choices

An Ipsos Reid 2010 survey entitled “Impact of Co-op
Education Programs”, surveyed 1,493 adult Canadians of
who enrolled in co-op programs via an on line poll and
discovered that a majority of them felt that their work terms
had a significant impact on their career choice, getting their
first job, their workplace integration and their academic
learning.
Early Findings of Interest #2:
Co-op helps link professional and
academic careers
2. Co-op serves to link students’ academic and
professional careers
“Students are more likely to persist and graduate in
settings that provide clear and consistent
information about institutional requirements and …
the choices students have to make regarding their
programs of study and future career goals.”
(Vincent Tinto, 2001)
Early Findings of Interest #2:
Co-op helps link professional and
academic careers
Early Findings of Interest #2:
Co-op helps link professional and
academic careers

“I feel more confident in my classes and can
see more clearly how the different aspects of
my education are actually preparing me for the
‘real world’.”
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“coop has given me insight about what it is to
work in the real world, and how different that is
from school.”
Early Findings of Interest #2:
Co-op helps link professional and
academic careers

The Ipsos Reid (2010) survey found that
79% feel their co-op program influenced at
least somewhat their decision about what
career they would choose.
Early Findings of Interest #3:
Co-op serves to enhance
educational engagement
3. Participation in co-op enhances students’ overall
educational engagement.
“The more students study or practice a subject, the more they
tend to learn about it. The very act of being engaged also adds
to the foundation of skills and disposition that is essential to
live a productive and satisfying life after college”
“…student engagement constitutes a constellation of
institutional processes that may ‘add value’ to student
learning.”
(Carni, Kuh & Klein, 2003)
Early Findings of Interest #3:
Co-op serves to enhance
educational engagement
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Students were given the chance to give
additional comments after each question

We analyzed the comments from question 23
which asked students to rate how their work
term affected their classroom learning

We grouped the 112 responses into five
categories:
Early Findings of Interest #3:
Co-op serves to enhance
educational engagement
1.Classroom not teaching real world skills (44%)
2. My work term helped theories in the classroom
make sense (24%)
3. Jobs not linked to any course work (17%)
4. Skills learned are valuable but not directly
relevant (10%)
5. I observed that the workplace has a different
learning style (5%)
Early Findings of Interest #3:
Co-op serves to enhance
educational engagement
Application of Knowledge-classroom based
Early Findings of Interest #3:
Co-op serves to enhance
educational engagement
Additional Comments
Classroom not teaching real world
skills
Jobs not linke to any course work
Skills learned on work term were
valuable but not direclty linked to
course work
Observed that the workplace is a
different learning style
My work term helped theories in the
classroom make sense
Early Findings of Interest #3:
Co-op serves to enhance
educational engagement

“I learned and understood concepts during work
that I couldn’t understand in school.”
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“Co-op helped me become more outgoing and
confident in my knowledge. It helped me see
how textbook knowledge is different than
applied knowledge, and that you must have a
solid base of textbook knowledge in order to
succeed and apply it properly.”
Early Findings of Interest #3:
Co-op serves to enhance
educational engagement
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“Going to a work term as an intern, you enter with nothing
but your classroom-based ideas as your foundation.
Although you may be able to compare some theories
ideas or experiences from previous work terms, an intern
student generally does not have enough experience to
judge importance of information. Generally information is
thought to be overly valuable. However, you do use the
theories and ideas you learned from school
synchronously with new knowledge in order to apply
them to the new situations and problems at work.”
Early Findings of Interest #3:
Co-op serves to enhance
educational engagement

“More than anything, my 2nd workterm in particular helped
me to decide what I want to do with my life and that
increased my motivation, and I started working harder
when I went back to school and got better grades…so
that now I have a chance of going to grad school.”
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“Co-op has really opened up my social circle and
expanded my network. I feel a lot more confident in my
classes and can see more clearly how the different
aspects of my education are actually preparing me for the
"real world". Having worked with many professionals in
my co-op term, it has also increase my confidence in
speaking with professors and building relationships with
my peers.”
Early Findings of Interest #3:
Co-op serves to enhance
educational engagement

The Ipsos Reid poll documented that
84% of Canadians who enrolled in coop programs felt the co-op work term
assisted them with the academic
learning
Early Findings of Interest #4:
Co-op and recruitment
We analyzed participation in co-op from two
perspectives:
1. Recruitment to the institution
2. Recruitment to co-op
Early Findings of Interest #4:
Co-op and institutional
recruitment
Early Findings of Interest #4:
Co-op and institutional
recruitment
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“I specifically came to SFU because they
mentioned career jobs that I could attain with
my degree. Co-op provided the link between
school and career.”
Early Findings of Interest #4:
Co-op and institutional
recruitment
Early Findings of Interest #4:
Recruitment into co-op
Early Findings of Interest #4:
Recruitment into co-op – how did
you hear about co-op?
Early Findings of Interest #4:
Recruitment into co-op – how did
you hear about co-op?
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Among the 83% of Canadians with postsecondary education who did not participate in a
co-op program, fully half (50%) say they would
have liked to study in this type of program,
knowing what they know now about their
education and work experience.
In Summary…

At this point in the analysis, we can say with confidence that:

Co-op participation influences students’ academic choices to better
align them with their career choices, thereby enhancing student
retention and success.

Participation in at least one work term has a positive impact on
students’ academic engagement which is linked to Kuh’s notion of
“enriching educational experience” – a positive contributor to
overall institutional student satisfaction.

The ability to participate in co-op was a factor considered by
approximately 50% of co-op students when they chose their postsecondary institution.

Recruitment into optional co-op programs is greatly influenced by
friends, family and institutional web-based outreach.

More students would consider co-op if they could obtain credit for
work terms towards their academic degree and end on a co-op
term.
Things We Have Learned
In addition to the early findings of interest, through doing
this work we have also learned:

About the challenges and rewards of large scale
collaborations

About the true value of a co-op student researcher

That weak questions make for lousy data (too many
neutral answers) and produce knowledge gaps

That we needed to ask more direct questions
regarding recruitment and co-op
Things We have Learned
(cont’d)

That we need more authentic learning frameworks to help
in assessing the nature of learning in co-op (pre-, duringand post-work term)
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That a 20 minute survey takes 40 minutes to complete
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That a bit more demographic info could have allowed for
more discipline specific reports
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That this work has given practitioners and the co-op
community in BC a boost
Acknowledgements

Thank you to…
…you for your time and feedback regarding this work
…the Association for Co-operative Education BC/Yukon for
their moral and financial support and to its members for their
active participation on the research team.
…the thousands of co-op students from 12 institutions that took
substantial time to complete the survey and provide their
honest comments regarding their experiences with co-op.
For Further Information

Copies of this presentation will be posted
on the ACE web site:
www.co-op.bc.ca/

For further information regarding this
research project please contact Norah
McRae, Chair, ACE Research
Committee at nmcrae@uvic.ca