Reflections: Rethinking Engagement and Student Persistence

We are delighted to feature this timely reflective article on Rethinking Engagement and Student Persistence by Professor Vincent Tinto, Distinguished University Professor Emeritus at Syracuse University, United States of America (USA). It’s timely because six years ago Professor Tinto reflected in this Journal on Student Persistence – and that was pre-COVID, and the associated mass transition to online, flexible and hybrid learning modalities. We are delighted because during the STARS 2023 Conference, it was apparent that Professor Tinto’s work continues to inspire and guide practice as he generously offers his thoughts to practitioners and researchers who share his passion for improving student outcomes. In this article, Vincent explores the role that social networks have in fostering student engagement, leading to persistence. As he puts it ’engagement matters’ and indeed it does, although its impact as he says remains relatively under-explored. Vincent considers social networks using the classroom and curriculum as contexts for understanding how different forms of networks: tight or loose, dense or sparse can engender different outcomes for students noting that the mere existence of a network will not always lead to positive student engagement. He gives attention to the formation of networks and notes that some of these connecting relationships are less visible, especially for online students and for those students whose networks exist in virtual social spaces that are outside the realm of our institution. Acknowledging that staff cannot and should not seek to be involved in all student networks, he implores us to do what we can to foster productive networks within our spheres of influence, because put simply ‘student engagement cannot be left to chance.’