Retaining your international students at your university can be a significant challenge. Especially in the competitive global arena, international full time students are more important then ever.
International offices employ various tactics to give international students the confidence to succeed, but strategies for keeping students through graduation go far beyond encouraging strong academic performance. Retention means ensuring students’ ability to overcome the myriad challenges they face.
Provide a Sense of Belonging from the Beginning
Student retention efforts often begin before an international student sets foot on campus; they begin with international office staff reaching out. At the University of Minnesota, a first step is enrolling international students in a mandatory online course designed to ease the transition to a U.S. academic institution. Some information in the course is simple—how to get from the airport to campus, how to find the international student office—while others, such as what academic expectations are in the United States, are meant to prepare students for the classroom.
Read the whole article at https://www.nafsa.org/ie-magazine/2020/1/1/staying-power