My impression is that schools try to out do each other and out do themselves in constructing facilities and programs to attract and retain students. However, in the process a central (and exquisitely simple) thing may not be given the laser-focus it deserves because it is so hidden and so obvious. That is, to attract and retain and graduate students, a university needs to remember and continually re-create why it exists: imaginative, persevering and effective support for what happens between and among students and faculty intellectually, developmentally, ethically, etc. In other words, perhaps the best student retention “initiative” is not really an initiative at all, but developing a first-class academic/intellectual climate and context for students and faculty that fully supports, encourages and rewards intellectual growth and achievement.

For me, a (perhaps “the”) key way to do that is to have an academic community/culture infused with inquiry about teaching and about learning, with an evidence-based approach to teaching the disciplines and through interdisciplinarity so that it is known how, when, why, and if students are authentically learning in significant, enduring ways, and are not stuck in first-order, lower-level thinking that results from academics being perceived by students as a required “game” where the best “players” get the best results (grades/credits/degrees). 

 The scholarship of teaching & learning (SoTL) could be the quiet and radical recalling of individuals and schools to their roots and vision for how students learn, how best to teach for that learning to occur, and how to apply and continually re-vise and re-form the teaching/learning continuum as needed so the learning continues, deepens.To have the best possible teaching and scholarly faculty simply may be the key to recruitment and intellectual growth of students.  It seems that anything else — anything — is secondary to that.  Therefore, is there anything that could attract faculty to a place in a consistent, across the disciplines way?  Again, it is my view that the key is SoTL.  If an academic culture recaptures and recapitulates its roots, its ancient heritage — teachers working with and for students in enjoyable, highly effective ways — then what students would not want to be part of it and what faculty would not see it as a compelling attraction for the kind of professional experience they inherently seek? Like a new harvest from old seeds (Thomas Merton), the contemporary university needs “memories of the future.”