I definitely agree with Sue on this, and I'll add that attrition is also related to how much you pester people each day.
Some of y'all have experienced how I do it, with a pester e-mail for each individual session each day (so, typically several such e-mails per day, each day of the event). This drives everyone up a wall. But it also keeps people returning at a much higher rate than if I left them alone like a normal person. It also helps to put their first name at the top of the e-mail, so they misinterpret the e-mail as personal instead of as a mass mailing. In fairness, though, I only do it because it works .... In my experience, attrition for multi-week hourly events is *vastly* worse than for a few to several days in a row. This is because, if you spread it out over several weeks, it's no longer special, it's just a weekly session on some topic that's vaguely of interest. And once they miss any of those sessions, they decide they can't catch up, so they're gone forever. An analogy: When my wife and I got married, we held a wedding in my home town for my side of the family, and then another wedding the next week in the city we were living in, for everyone else. We considered having a longer break in between, because stacking them like that was a huge labor load. But we realized that, if we had a longer break in between, then everyone would already be used to us being married, so no one would come, because it wouldn't be special any more. --- Henry Neeman ([email protected]) Director, OU Supercomputing Center for Education & Research (OSCER) Associate Professor, Gallogly College of Engineering Adjunct Associate Professor, School of Computer Science OU Information Technology The University of Oklahoma Engineering Lab 212, 200 Felgar St, Norman OK 73019 405-325-5386 (office), 405-325-5486 (fax), 405-245-3823 (cell), [email protected] (to e-mail me a text message) http://www.oscer.ou.edu/ ---------- On Sat, 13 Feb 2021, Sue McClatchy wrote: >Hi Lauren, > >Thanks for bringing up an important concern regarding >attrition in longer courses that grant neither academic >credit, a grade, nor a certificate or degree. Unfortunately >I don't have data, but I can provide anecdotal evidence from >my experiences running training. I have found that after the >4th session there's no point in continuing a course because >attrition is so high afterwards that few are left in attendance. >Consequently all of our courses are chunked up into 12-hour >instructional blocks of 3 hours each. Motivation is the reason >- people are more motivated by the need to get back to their >work because they aren't receiving credit toward a certificate >or degree. They're only willing to sacrifice a limited amount >of time for training. Our training is free, so nobody feels >that they are losing out on an investment of money either. > >Yours, >Sue McClatchy > >---------- > >On Fri, Feb 12, 2021 at 4:58 PM >Lauren Michael via discuss <[email protected]> wrote: > >Hi all, > >I feel like there are probably data somewhere, but I'm looking >for information about the rate of drop-off at Carpentry-style >workshops (and/or those of similar durations) when taught on >consecutive days, versus when they are spread out over several >weeks (e.g. one half-day session per week). > >Note that information about free workshops would be most >helpful, knowing that charging a fee improves attendance, but >I'll take what I can get. I *am* hoping for data outside of >(although in comparison with) semester-long/for-credit courses >over which the Carpentry materials are taught, for which >I know attendance is improved for obvious reasons. > >Thank you, in advance, for any pointers! > >Cheers, >Lauren > >Lauren Michael >Research Computing Facilitator, >Center for High Throughput Computing, >University of Wisconsin - Madison >Research Facilitation Lead, Open Science Grid; >co-PI, PATh; >-PI, People Network co-Coordinator, CaRCC >[email protected], >tinyurl.com/LMichaelCalendar, >Discovery 2262, >(608)316-4430 ------------------------------------------ This list is for the purpose of general discussion about The Carpentries including community activities, upcoming events, and announcements. Some other lists you may also be interested in include discuss-hpc, discuss-r, and our local groups. Visit https://carpentries.topicbox.com/groups/ to learn more. All activity on this and other Carpentries spaces should abide by The Carpentries Code of Conduct found here: https://docs.carpentries.org/topic_folders/policies/code-of-conduct.html The Carpentries: discuss Permalink: https://carpentries.topicbox.com/groups/discuss/Tfd20e864bc0586ce-M20671a91c203ee2354e8d9b2 Delivery options: https://carpentries.topicbox.com/groups/discuss/subscription
