Purpose: Of 98 students admitted in 1997, 49% were minority students. The failure rate among minority students was 35.4%, compared to 4% among their majority peers. Successful completion of the program by minority students was 50.8%. Therefore, as the initial stage of developing a program to increase the retention of diverse baccalaureate nursing students, early indicators of academic risk were sought using a reading and math diagnostic assessment tool, the Nurses Entrance Test (NET). Design: At a large university-based nursing program in the southern U.S. a group of students (n=53) was tracked from admission to an upper-division generic nursing program, through graduation and completion of the NCLEX examination, or to withdrawal from the program (1998 to 2001). All newly admitted students completed the NET and a demographic data record. Any student with a reading comprehension score of 54, or below, was given the opportunity to voluntarily participate in tutoring activities during their first fall and spring semesters in the nursing program. Findings: Seventeen students (32%) scored 54 or below on the reading comprehension component of the NET. Of all students, upon completion of the two years of upper division classes, 38 (72%) graduated, whereas 15 (28%) did not. Of the 15 students who did not graduate, a significant number, 10 (68%) had scored 54 or below on the reading comprehension portion of the NET (chi square =11.49, sig. =0.001). Furthermore, when success on the NCLEX was examined, 50% of the failures had also scored 54 or below. English as a second language was not related to graduation, but ethnic minority was. Attrition rates were 50% for Blacks and Hispanics, 33% for Asians/Pacific Islanders, and 5% for Whites. Many of the students with low reading comprehension scores declined the opportunity to participate in the tutoring.
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