Abstract:
Between Fall Semester 1993 and Fall Semester 1994 at Ball State University, 4,714 student not yet having earned a degree did not return. A recent telephone survey conducted by Ball State's Student Affairs and Academic Affairs indicated that 83 percent of 3,899 of these non-returning students did not return for reasons other than academic ineligibility.While retaining as many students as possible is a goal for Ball State University, it is not possible to retain all students. They leave college for a variety of reasons. Therefore, it is important to the students, the University, and the State of Indiana, to provide options for these students to complete their degrees. Today's workers need a solid base education and will need to continue learning in order for the United States to remain competitive in the global economy. Edward E. Gordon, president of Imperial Corporate Training and Development in Oak Lawn, Illinois, sites inadequate education of workforce members for lower productivity in American manufacturing. "The chief competitive advantage for any nation in the 21st Century will be its skilled workforce," Gordon stated (Kleiman, 1993)