Julia Li 

Julia Li is a fourth-year Rotman Commerce student in the Faculty of Arts & Science. Through the Work Study program, Julia worked as a Research Assistant in the Office of the Vice-Provost, Innovations in Undergraduate Education (OVPIUE) to examine student success initiatives and learning analytics across North American Universities. These initiatives focused on retention and graduation rates for undergraduate students.

Through her research experience, Julia learned how to review a breadth of literature for relevant information such as podcasts, journal articles and institutional reports. At the end of the term, Julia consolidated the most data-driven and implementable initiatives by creating a report and then shared her findings with the OVPIUE and other divisional offices. Her work will inform future discussions about student success. 

Her biggest takeaway from her research was that, “no student has the same experience, even if they are at the same university. Everyone has different financial, mental, social and academic barriers they need to learn to overcome over the course of their time at a higher education institution. The real challenge is finding initiatives that positively affect students at such a large scale.”

This research experience was meaningful to Julia as a student herself; she is interested in learning more about initiatives that help students succeed in the higher education space. She encourages other students to seek out research opportunities through the Work Study program.

Research Type(s): Work Study Program