Four-year graduation rates and job placement after graduation for Winthrop students are exceeding expectations, according to President Daniel Mahony.
Mahony shared recent accomplishments of students and the university as well as updates on the Winthrop Plan at the third annual State of the University Address, held on Oct. 16.
Mahony spoke about the recent rebranding of Winthrop with the message: We belong here. You belong here. He said that the recent push for rebranding was done to promote a consistent image to prospective students and to create an image that was unique to Winthrop.
“I think what we tried to do was something that was uniquely ours. It was actually one of the things our consultants said from the beginning,” Mahony said.
Mahony also gave updates on certain aspects of the Winthrop Plan. He spoke about enrollment, retention and graduation rates and diversity on campus.
Though six-year graduation rates fell below target at 56 percent, four-year graduation rates have seen a growth of 7.7 percent over the past three years. Mahony said that this was due to the university’s evaluation of what prevents students from graduating on time.
“I think it’s become more of a focus for us, probably as well as other institutions, of trying to look at roadblocks that are keeping students from finishing on time. I think it’s also helped that students are coming in with at least some credits, so that makes the path to graduation a little bit easier,” Mahony said.
Another area that did not meet the target goal was enrollment at Winthrop. Mahony said that an increase in four-year graduation has affected enrollment rates.
“The only downside about people graduating on time is that they’re not paying tuition anymore, so actually when you look at the decrease in students, about 150 were degree-seeking students. I’d probably say that roughly 90 to 100 were related to student[s] graduating quicker, so that was the biggest chunk of it,” Mahony said.
In order to increase enrollment in the upcoming years, Winthrop has added four fully-online Master’s programs, including a Master’s of Business Administration, Education in Special Education Intervention, Social Work, and Art in Arts Administration.
Mahony also announced a proposed Bachelor’s of Professional Studies that is aimed toward nontraditional students. He said that enrollment is hopeful for the fall 2019 semester.
Retention rates at Winthrop were reported at 75 percent, which was 3 percent below target. Mahony said that implementing a new technology to keep better track of students who might be in danger of dropping out could help improve those rates.
“There actually is technology available that would really allow us to do more of a student–by–student assessment of who may be in danger of dropping out, what types of interventions are needed. It would allow you to pinpoint more accurately what students are in the wrong major, not on the path to graduation, they’re not taking the right classes,” Mahony said.
Though the percentage of diverse students on campus was just 1 percent below its target of 41 percent, this number is above the average in South Carolina. The diversity of the freshman class increased. Mahony said that this means that Winthrop’s diversity goal is likely to be met in the future.
Mahony also spoke about many of the achievements from the past year, such as new and redesigned programs, concentrations and minors, upgraded technology and employment upon graduation.
Mahony said that the Winthrop Plan is all about improving the student experience and doing what is best for the student body.
“When you look at what we see coming in an increase in graduation rate, that’s significant. When you look at the job placement and graduate school placement that went up and met our goals, that to me is really significant. The things that really relate to the student experience, those are the most critical things,” Mahony said.
