Understanding the Student-Organization Relationship: An HRD Focus on one Post-Secondary Institution Leah Halliday University of Louisville

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1 Running Head: THE STUDENT-ORGANIZATION RELATIONSHIP 1 Understanding the Student-Organization Relationship: An HRD Focus on one Post-Secondary Institution Leah Halliday University of Louisville

2 THE STUDENT-ORGANIZATION RELATIONSHIP 2 Introduction The most pressing questions in higher education today revolve around how to improve student success, retention, and graduation rates. Post-secondary institutions across the country are constantly seeking out new ways to accommodate the evolving needs and expectations of new generations of high school graduates. In the face of state and national budget crises and with performance funding and other initiatives looming, HBCUs, serving far more traditionally underserved students than other institutions, face average retention and graduation rates far below those of PWIs and are therefore more compelled to improve the standard metrics of success to protect their continued existence. The purpose of this research is to attempt to reframe the view of student success and retention at Kentucky State University, Kentucky s only HBCU, using a human resources lens in order to look for new and actionable perspectives on factors that affect student success and retention and graduation rates. While the institution has explored both student and faculty perceptions of student engagement using the National Survey of Student Engagement (NSSE) and the Faculty Survey of Student Engagement (FSSE) instruments those perceptions of student engagement not only conflict with one another, but neither of the pictures of engagement, however different, reflect so poor a view of engagement as to explain the incredibly low retention and graduation rates experienced at the institution in the same timeframe (Faculty Survey of Student Engagement, 2012). These discrepancies suggest that these views of the perceptions of student engagement are either insufficient, incomplete, or mediated by some other factors. Considering the imperative need to understand the interplay of factors that affect student success, retention, and graduation, the current research aims to answer the following questions:

3 THE STUDENT-ORGANIZATION RELATIONSHIP 3 1. How would students at KSU rate their level of engagement with the institution as a whole, and how might this organizational view of engagement compare to the views provided by NSSE and FSSE? 2. How satisfied with and committed to the institution are KSU students and to what extent is that satisfaction or commitment consistent with their intent to re-enroll in coming terms? 3. How would students perceive the level of organizational support they experience and to what extent does perceived support predict a student s intent to stay at the university? 4. To what extent do students exhibit citizenship behavior towards the institution and towards fellow students and what relationship does this have with their level of satisfaction, commitment, POS, engagement, and intent to re-enroll? Literature Review Tinto s (1975) Integration Model theorizes that student loyalty to an institution and persistence result from a longitudinal series of interactions between his or her own goal commitment, the institution s commitment to students, and the level of social and academic integration he or she is able to attain at the institution. The model is supported by an extensive body of research and according to some researchers has come to define the paradigm for understanding student success at the post-secondary level. While research consistently supports the importance of the interactions suggested by Tinto s model, much of the work that has been done has focused on student interactions with faculty and student support staff as the primary measures of an institution s commitment to

4 THE STUDENT-ORGANIZATION RELATIONSHIP 4 students (dissertation citation). While perhaps less frequently used in the realm of higher education, Albert Bandura s Social Cognitive Theory (SCT) similarly explores causal relationships between personal, behavioral, and external factors in understanding performance, decision-making, and other psycho-social processes. Frequently used to explore organizational settings, the insights that SCT provides into how individuals act and interact both as producers and products of their environments, behaviors, and personal or cognitive processes (Bandura, 2001, p. 1) suggest some additional scales that may supplement or enhance the predictive and/or explanatory power of perceptions of engagement in the student success and persistence arenas. For instance, clearly related to persistence and graduation rates are turnover intentions, but the bi-directionality of causal relationships in SCT suggests that turnover intentions should not be viewed only as products of other problems, but as causative agents as well. In the higher education arena, the human resources concept of turnover intention can be explored as equivalent to a student s intent to re-enroll. While the direct connection to persistence and graduation rates is clear, Christian and Ellis (2014) also establish the connection of high turnover intentions to the weakening of the relational components of the psychological contract between employees and their organization. From this perspective, a student who does not intend to re-enroll at a college or university might experience a similar weakening of the psychological contract with the institution. Christian and Elllis s (2014) results suggest that the weakening of this contract leads to more deviant behavior at work. Behaviors deemed deviant at work are voluntary, [in violation of] organizational norms, and [threatening to] the well-being of the organization or its members (p. 194). Clear correlates to such behaviors in the student/university relationship would include absenteeism, missing assignments, and/or lack of effort on collaborative learning

5 THE STUDENT-ORGANIZATION RELATIONSHIP 5 projects. From this perspective, one student or employee s intent to turnover could have indirect effects on the organizational culture as well as other individual members. The HR concept of organizational citizenship behaviors may also shed light on the student retention dilemma. Organizational citizenship behaviors (OCB) refer to behaviors that employees voluntarily engage in over and above their prescribed job duties. OCB may benefit the organization as a whole or other individuals within the organization. Research widely supports that employees with high OCB ratings are less likely to turnover (Chen, Hui, & Sego, 1998) lending predictive power to this construct. Perhaps more relevant in the context of this research, however, when using the OCB lens to explore retention and graduation rates of struggling students in post-secondary institutions might be Duffy and Lilly s (2013) findings on the mediating effects of the needs for achievement or power on the established relationship between OCB and an employee s perception of support (POS) provided by his or her organization. Contrary to their hypotheses, Duffy and Lilly found that employees who exhibited a high need for achievement or power were less likely to exhibit OCB, even in light of a high POS. Employees with a low need for achievement or power, on the other hand, were more likely to exhibit OCB if they also had high POS. In the higher ed arena, this could mean that strengthening POS might inadvertently engage students with a low need for achievement, the students traditionally viewed as most difficult to retain and help to persist to graduation, in OCB, in turn making turnover less likely. The causal line in this scenario is beyond the scope of the current research, but exploring scales of both POS and OCB might indicate whether further exploration is warranted.

6 THE STUDENT-ORGANIZATION RELATIONSHIP 6 Methods The focus of our study is on an higher education institution in the Midwest that is described as a Historically Black College or University (HBCU). Student full time equivalent enrollment (FTE) is approximately 1,600 students. For the purposes of this study, a convenience sample of 300 students will be utilized. While this introduces limitations in terms of generalizability to the entire institutional population, a convenience sample was utilized for ease of access (Creswell, 2009). The sample will include only full time students currently enrolled in courses as of the spring 2016 semester. The online survey tool, Qualtrics, will be used to create and distribute the instrument. A link will be sent out to students enrolled in the following courses: X, Y, Z. To encourage a high response rate, students will be given extra credit for their completion of the survey. Survey completion reminders will be sent out after a one-week interval and two-week interval have passed, respectively. All data collected from the survey will be kept in password-protected databases and no personally identifying information will be gathered. To address our research questions, the survey will include six scales commonly utilized in the HRD and organizational behavior fields to understand aspects of the individual s relationship with the broader organizational system: job satisfaction, employee engagement, organizational citizenship behavior, perceived organizational support, organizational commitment, and intention to turnover. To adapt these scales to the higher education environment and to reflect the perspective of the student, some language in the scales will be modified. For example, an item included on the OCB scale originally stated Defend the organization when other employees criticize it. However, small modifications were made and the item now states: Defend the university when other students criticize it.

7 THE STUDENT-ORGANIZATION RELATIONSHIP 7 Data analysis will include scale validity and reliability statistics to test for appropriateness of the measures utilized. To address the first research question, descriptive data will be reported on overall engagement scores. These data will be compared to the available NSSE and FSSE data for the institution. A t-test will be utilized to determine if statistical differences exist between the sample from our study in comparison to the sample from the FSSE and NSSE studies. To address the second research question, overall descriptive data for satisfaction and commitment will be reported. Further, correlational analysis will indicate whether a relationship exists between satisfaction and commitment and the students intent to reenroll in subsequent semesters. A linear regression analysis will determine whether intent to reenroll can be predicted by a student s level of commitment and satisfaction with the institution. Lastly, to address the fourth research question, descriptive statistics and correlational analysis will be utilized.

8 THE STUDENT-ORGANIZATION RELATIONSHIP 8 Works Cited Bandura, A. (2001). Social cognitive theory: An agentic perspective. Annual Review of Psychology, 52(1), 1 Christian, J., & Ellis, A. (2014). The crucial role of turnover intentions in transforming moral disengagement into deviant behavior at work. Journal of Business Ethics, 119(2), Creswell, J. W. (2009). Research design: Qualitative, quantitative, and mixed methods approaches. Thousand Oaks: CA: SAGE. Duffy, J. A., & Lilly, J. (2013). Do individual needs moderate the relationships between organizational citizenship behavior, organizational trust and perceived organizational support? Journal of Behavioral & Applied Management, 14(3), Faculty Survey of Student Engagement (FSSE). (2012) Kentucky State University, FSSE-NSSE combined report. From KSU website: Pan, Y.J. (2010). Modeling the effects of academic and social integration on college student success: A systematic review. (Unpublished doctoral dissertation). University of Louisville, Louisville, KY. Wood, R., & Bandura, A. (1989). Social cognitive theory of organizational management. Academy Of Management Review, 14(3), doi: /amr