By Meredith Lyverse
Students are leaving Bellarmine in higher rates than in the past several years. The 2021-2022 retention rate is 77%, which is 3% lower than last year, and 6% lower than 2019-2020.
Dr. Paul Gore, Vice President of academic affairs and provost, said the drop in retention is mainly due to the class of 2024 feeling unprepared during the transition from online to in-person classes.
The university is looking for new ways to keep students from leaving for other schools.
Gore said there might be a shift in the way scholarships are given in the future. Those who have the means to pay tuition with little financial aid would have to give up some scholarships so that more funds can go to those who can’t pay tuition.
“In order to leverage more financial aid to students in need and still make payroll, we’d have to give less financial aid to people with means,” Gore said. “It’s like a tax.”
Every student receives a scholarship when they enroll at Bellarmine. “No matter who you are, you’re getting a discount,” Gore said.
If Bellarmine does change how students receive scholarships, Gore said that students with more means won’t get the discount if other students need the money more.
“Does Bellarmine have one price? No,” Gore said. “There’s dynamic pricing and for higher education, the pricing might be to expect a little bit more family contribution from families that can afford it.”
Former Bellarmine student Deven Cannon failed one nursing class by one point in fall 2020, which was a grade that would have set her back an entire year, ending her scholarship.
“I couldn’t retake the class until a year later and my scholarship didn’t allow me to take a fifth year,” Cannon said.
Cannon said the only way she could afford to attend Bellarmine was with her scholarship.
She said she asked her professors for assistance, but none of them offered their help. Cannon also applied to a committee that could consider her financial circumstances, and allow her to pass, but they declined her appeal.
“I was upset, but then I heard through some friends in the program that a swimmer was in the same situation as me, but the committee let him pass and move on,” said Cannon. “That made me angry.”
According to Gore, all students are allowed to file a grading grievance appeal, but those in the healthcare field are held to a higher standard because of the life-and-death nature of their work.
“They [healthcare students] have standards by which they are held accountable, not by the university, but by their accrediting unit,” Gore said. “They’re often being trusted with the lives of children and adults in high-stress environments.”
Grade grievances are considered only if a faculty member has discriminated against a student and graded them unfairly.
“If the faculty member held you accountable to the same standard as everyone else, that is acceptable and you probably won’t win the grievance,” Gore said.
Cannon was the vice president of the Nursing Club. She said she often stayed at school late to help clean the department classrooms and storage closets. She said she was active in the program and felt close to her professors.
“I considered myself close with them and then they were like ‘that’s too bad’ when I asked for help,” Cannon said.
Now Cannon attends Galen College of Nursing and works for Norton Health Care as a patient care associate.
Brooke DiPaolo decided to leave Bellarmine and transfer to Northern Kentucky University after her sophomore year because of costs. She is financially independent and pays for college by herself. She said it was hard to manage being a full-time student, full-time employee and a college athlete.
“The cost of room and board was just way too much,” DiPaolo said. “I even took out loans specifically to pay for the dorm.”
DiPaolo said she was willing to commute from her home in Northern Kentucky to Bellarmine because she still wanted to attend the university, but Resident Life wouldn’t allow it.
“It felt like they [Resident Life] weren’t on the side of the little man, which is what made me love Bellarmine in the first place,” DiPaolo said.
DiPaolo was also on Bellarmine’s golf team but wasn’t enjoying her time on the team by the time she wanted to move off campus. She said the only way she could afford to go to the university was her golf scholarship.
“The more I thought about it, NKU made more sense,” DiPaolo said. “It was more affordable than Bellarmine with scholarships and I didn’t have to play a sport anymore.”
DiPaolo ended her sophomore year at Bellarmine in spring of 2020 and started at Northern Kentucky University in the fall.
“I miss Bellarmine so much,” DiPaolo said. “The friends I made, the small community, I thought it was great. But I had to move so I could afford to live.”
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