THE INFLUENCE OF STUDENTS' PRE-COLLEGE CHARACTERISTICS, HIGH SCHOOL EXPERIENCES, COLLEGE EXPECTATIONS, AND INITIAL ENROLLMENT CHARACTERISTICS ON DEGREE ATTAINMENT.

The present research examined the extent to which pre-college character-istics, high school experiences, college expectations, and initial enrollment characteristics were related to graduation from college. Data from admission applications, the ACT Compass survey, and initial enrollment measures for Fall 2004 and Fall 2005 first-time students were analyzed. Because almost one-third of the students had missing data, multiple imputation procedures were utilized. Results revealed that several measures of student charac-teristics, high school experiences, college expectations, and initial enrollment characteristics were consistently related to degree attainment. Other variables were related to a single degree-attainment measure. These results demon-strated that pre-matriculation data can be used to identify at-risk students, identify risk factors, and provide institution-specific benchmarks for evalu-ating efforts to improve degree attainment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]