Notes
Community Commitment
A Key to Recruitment and Retention at South Carolina’s Rural-Serving Institutions
Todd C. Couch
Page 134 →In recent years, higher education has faced increased public scrutiny. Various factors, including heightened political polarization, economic challenges, and skyrocketing student debt, have fueled demands for colleges and universities to demonstrate their value to the public. A recent Pew Research Center report reveals that only twenty-five percent of adults in the United States view a four-year degree as very important. Furthermore, forty-nine percent believe a four-year degree is less valuable today than twenty years ago, and only twenty-two percent consider it worth the financial investment.1 Adding to this skepticism is the perception that institutions prioritize ideological agendas over equipping students with practical skills for the future.2 Given the public’s attitudes toward higher education, industry consultants have described the contemporary academy as experiencing a “reckoning with relevance.”3
Despite the public’s suspicion, evidence consistently shows that earning a four-year degree significantly enhances life opportunities. Increased career stability, access to diverse professional networks, and eligibility for roles requiring advanced qualifications are among the benefits afforded to degree holders.4 Additionally, college graduates benefit from higher lifelong earnings, improved health outcomes, and increased self-esteem.5 For instance, the 2023 annual report of the Association of Public & Land-Grant Universities notes that individuals with a four-year degree earn, on average, $1.2 million more over their lifetimes than those without.6 Furthermore, individuals with four-year degrees experience better physical and mental health compared with those without.6 These benefits are especially pronounced for students attending rural or rural-serving institutions, including many in South Carolina. These colleges and universities exist within dynamic contexts that must be analyzed to fully unearth the life-changing benefits these institutions offer their students, employees, and the communities they serve.
Rural-Serving Institutions
Page 135 →Rural-serving institutions address the critical needs of rural communities, such as economic development, health care, and education by partnering with local governments, businesses, and nonprofit organizations to drive regional growth.7 Students who attend these institutions often come from geographically isolated communities and have limited access to educational resources.8 For these students, attending a rural institution frequently offers a pathway out of poverty and toward financial stability.9 The Alliance for Research on Regional Colleges (ARRC) identifies thirty-two of South Carolina’s thirty-three public and twenty-seven private colleges and universities as either rural located or rural serving.10 Together, these institutions support approximately 109,484 students, with 100,473 learners pursuing undergraduate degrees and 9,011 enrolled in advanced graduate studies. Of note is the socioeconomic background of the learners at these institutions.
According to the Alliance for Research on Regional Colleges (ARRC), 57.2% of South Carolina’s rural learners are Pell eligible, meaning that they demonstrate significant financial need to pursue higher education. This datum highlights that the Pell eligibility of students attending rural and rural-serving institutions in South Carolina is twenty-seven percent higher than the state’s total average if institutions in larger urban and suburban areas are included.11 This observation highlights the economic disparity experienced by the residents of rural South Carolina. Students among the state’s rural populations are intellectually capable but frequently lack the financial resources to support their education. Fortunately, the Pell program allows these students to experience the social mobility commonly provided by a four-year degree.
In addition to the socioeconomic background of South Carolina’s rural students, the ARRC found that sixteen percent of the state’s rural learners may be classified as nontraditional or adult learners, meaning that they are students twenty-five years of age or older.12 These students often enter higher education later in life as a result of delaying their education for military service, losing access to a recent job or career path, or needing to upskill for a promotion at their existing place of employment.13 The nontraditional rural learner’s pursuit of higher education is frequently connected to the changing economic opportunities available in their community. As the bluecollar jobs that once defined much of rural South Carolina continue to evolve, community members are seeking higher education as a means of competing in a hypercompetitive and globalized marketplace.14 South Page 136 →Carolina’s rural-located and rural-serving institutions provide the state’s rural residents with improved economic prospects and the ability to pivot careers as the demands of the modern workplace continue to shift. By bridging gaps in education and resources, these institutions play a vital role in sustaining rural communities.
The success of South Carolina’s rural-serving institutions and their students is closely tied to their personalized, community-focused culture. At these institutions, students experience small class sizes, faculty who are deeply involved in community activities, and a campus focused on addressing local economic and social challenges. Additionally, the faculty and staff at South Carolina’s rural institutions frequently hold influential roles within their communities, providing them with opportunities to form supportive relationships with students external to the college or university campus.15 Together, the elements of this community-focused culture create an uplifting environment where students are seen not just as learners but as fellow community members contributing to the town’s well-being.
The deep connections established within rural institutions also create personal investments for faculty and staff in students’ success.16 The significance of campus relationships can be observed in the individualized mentorship provided to students in South Carolina’s rural institutions. Unlike the broad-stroke approach often seen at larger institutions, mentorship at rural-serving colleges across the state is tailored to each student’s unique goals and circumstances.17 This personalized guidance leads to higher persistence, shorter time to degree, and improved graduation rates among South Carolina’s rural learners.18 For these students, the promise of higher education becomes a tangible reality through intentional mentorship. The relationships created on rural campuses are not merely transactional. Rather, they are often deep and last well beyond graduation.
Rural-serving institutions’ community-facing culture extends beyond the college and university campus. Frequently hosting community events, such as job fairs and health clinics, South Carolina’s rural institutions actively work to bring students, faculty, and local residents together. These activities help students see the practical impact of their education while simultaneously fostering a sense of pride and belonging.19 Additionally, these efforts by rural colleges across the state provide opportunities for rural institutions to learn more about the needs facing their communities and explore how best they may be of service.20
Page 137 →Rural-serving institutions play an indispensable role in fostering the wellbeing of rural communities by addressing the unique challenges faced by students and industry in these areas. These institutions serve not only as pathways to education and social mobility but also as engines of economic growth and community engagement. The personalized support systems, mentorship programs, and community-focused cultures that they foster enable students to thrive despite financial and geographic barriers. By bridging educational gaps and adapting to the shifting demands of the workforce, South Carolina’s rural-serving colleges and universities empower and uplift the rural populations they serve.
Despite the critical roles they occupy within rural communities, rural-serving institutions face significant challenges in recruiting and retaining faculty and staff. Among these challenges are difficulty in offering competitive salaries, limited professional development opportunities, and geographic isolation, all of which can deter prospective candidates.21 Low educational attainment levels in rural communities further complicate recruitment efforts, as qualified candidates are often reluctant to relocate to areas lacking cultural and recreational amenities.22 Even when candidates accept positions, many struggle to adjust to the rural lifestyle and report high turnover intentions.23 Brantley and Shomaker’s recent report for the College and University Professional Association for Human Resources documents the difficulty of adjusting to rural life and its impact on staff turnover rates, noting that colleges in rural areas experience thirteen percent higher attrition rates compared with their urban counterparts.24
Because of the community-centric culture fostered at rural-serving institutions, the consequences of their recruitment and retention challenges are felt directly by students, faculty, and the local community. As institutions experience increased faculty and staff attrition and prolonged position vacancies, students lose trust in the institution’s commitment to their academic and professional success. Adequate staffing is crucial for addressing the mental health issues, food and housing insecurity, and postpandemic learning loss that many rural learners face.25 Additionally, faculty and staff shortages lead to larger class sizes, reduced course offerings, and diminished opportunities for individualized support, affecting many of rural institutions’ fundamental points of value. Furthermore, as their colleagues exit the institution, faculty and staff lose critical institutional knowledge, and collaborative efforts between the institution and the broader community are disrupted.26 These issues underscore the urgent need for creative solutions Page 138 →to recruit and retain talented faculty and staff in rural higher education. Without strategic innovation, the future of South Carolina’s rural-serving institutions, along with all of the promise they provide for the state’s rural communities, may fall into question.
A More Holistic Strategy
Improving faculty recruitment and retention at South Carolina’s rural-serving institutions requires strategies tailored to the unique qualities of rural colleges and the communities they serve. Unfortunately, most existing research focuses on metropolitan contexts and fails to address rural-specific challenges and opportunities.27 To address the recruitment and retention obstacles faced by the state’s rural institutions, a strategy must be developed that approaches the context of rural-serving institutions holistically. Special attention should be given to efforts that increase employees’ connection to both the campus and the larger community. Examples may include mentorship opportunities for new hires, exposing job candidates as well as new hires to local cultural experiences, and highlighting the institution’s deep community involvement. A successful strategy must explore how South Carolina’s rural colleges may utilize internal and external resources and relationships to construct a well-rounded approach to increasing recruitment and retention.
Organizational Commitment
Beginning the process of developing a more holistic recruitment strategy may be informed by the existing research on organizational commitment, which explores employees’ dedication to their organization. According to Allen and Meyer, employees develop a sense of commitment to their organization that is based on connecting to the organization’s mission and goals, feelings of personal obligation, workplace benefits, and relationships with coworkers.28 These types of commitment may be referred to as affective, normative, and continuance commitment. Collectively, the three styles of commitment construct a significant internal instrument for evaluating and increasing faculty and staff retention. South Carolina’s rural institutions can use this mechanism to develop strategies for enhancing internal efforts to decrease employee attrition. The following paragraphs offer recommendations for the practical application of each form of organizational commitment with respect to the state’s rural-serving institutions.
Page 139 →Increasing affective commitment within South Carolina’s rural colleges and universities requires institutions to maintain clear communication about their mission and values. Frequently, candidates and new hires are exposed to these items during the recruitment and orientation processes but are provided decreasing opportunities to explicitly engage with them as they settle into new positions. This creates an increased perceived distance between the employee and the organization’s values, which contributes to burnout and turnover intentions.29 If they are to develop a sense of belonging and commitment to the organization, new faculty and staff must understand the larger impact that their work has on students and how it furthers the college’s mission. To aid in this process, rural institutions may explore hosting regular town hall meetings in which senior leadership clearly articulates institutional values and communicates to employees how their work directly contributes to accomplishing institutional milestones, such as improved graduation rates and community projects. By increasing opportunities for employees to engage explicitly with their institutional mission and values, South Carolina’s rural colleges create an intentional context for improving levels of affective commitment among their employees and reducing turnover intentions.
As faculty and staff experience an increased resonance with their college’s mission and values, their connection often develops into a sense of obligation to the organization. This normative commitment frequently emerges as employees encounter roles with elevated responsibility within the organization.30 South Carolina’s rural institutions may explore implementing formlized mentorship structures within their organizations, in which experienced faculty serve as advisors for their less experienced colleagues as a means of bolstering normative commitment. Many rural colleges have informal mentorship programs, but unless the mentor is already intrinsically motivated to guide less experienced faculty, the informal nature of these relationships does not necessarily communicate a level of increased responsibility on behalf of the mentor.31 A more formalized approach to mentorship at rural institutions, however, may increase normative commitment among more experienced employees, as they would be explicitly given a stake in the success of their less experienced colleagues, thereby formally increasing their responsibility within the organization.
Cultivating campus relationships and, where possible, increasing workplace benefits can not only increase employees’ connection with institutional values and their sense of obligation to the organization but also decrease Page 140 →faculty and staff attrition at South Carolina’s rural institutions. Continuance commitment’s power to reduce turnover lies in an organization’s ability to foster positive interpersonal relationships and invest in the holistic wellbeing of its employees.32 South Carolina’s rural-serving institutions would benefit from offering more dedicated team-building opportunities. Research has long recognized the positive impact of staff retreats on increasing team morale and providing a context for interpersonal relationships to develop.33 As organizations intentionally invest in cultivating these personal bonds between coworkers, they observe improved group cohesion, an increase in team productivity, and a heightened sense of commitment to the organization.34 Should the state’s rural institutions dedicate a portion of their limited resources to campus-wide retreats, evidence suggests that it will likely be a worthwhile expenditure for the return it provides in increased continuance commitment and reduced employee turnover.
Strategically investing in the organizational commitment of their employees is something that South Carolina’s rural-serving institutions must seriously consider as they seek to reduce faculty and staff attrition. Vacant positions on campus erode trust in the organization and directly affect the college’s ability to fulfill its obligations to students and the broader community. However, the research on organizational commitment provides a set of valuable mechanisms for increasing employee retention and fortifying rural institutions against the loss of talented faculty and staff. Through clear, frequent communication of the institution’s mission and values, colleges can increase the affective commitment of their employees. The development of formalized mentorship structures offers valuable opportunities for experienced faculty and staff to guide less experienced colleagues and develop an increased sense of responsibility within the organization. As this normative commitment increases, attrition will begin to decline. Furthermore, by intentionally creating contexts to cultivate interpersonal relationships with coworkers such as campus-wide retreats, rural institutions can increase continuance commitment, which is shown to positively affect employees’ desire to remain at an organization. Through using the three tools of organizational commitment, South Carolina’s rural-serving institutions can empower themselves to continue providing valuable service to the state’s rural communities.
Community Commitment
As noted previously, research on organizational commitment provides rural institutions with mechanisms for increasing faculty and staff retention. Page 141 →These largely internally focused efforts emphasize steps organizations can take within the context of their campus to improve employee commitment. Although these strategies are proven to be impactful, they ignore the fact that South Carolina’s rural institutions exist within a larger community context and that it is this specific context that contributes to faculty and staff attrition.35 If the state’s rural-serving institutions are to minimize turnover and increase recruitment efforts, they must develop a reasonable strategy for integrating employees into the communities they serve. Expanding the fundamental ideas offered by research on organizational commitment to explore methods of increasing employees’ commitment to the community in which they live may provide such a strategy. This expanded framework is referred to as community commitment, the extension of the fundamentals of organizational commitment beyond the workplace and into the larger communities in which organizations exist. Applying the principles of affective, normative, and continuance commitment to a community context may provide a framework for South Carolina’s rural institutions to increase faculty and staff retention.
Improving affective commitment relies on increasing employees’ resonance with an organization’s mission and values. An extension of this concept to the community context would assert that affective commitment may be observed in a resident’s connection to the larger community’s mission and values. In the recruitment process, rural institutions can work to establish affective commitment with the community by providing job candidates with opportunities to meet with local government and community leaders. During these meetings, applicants have a chance to become familiar with the community’s aspirations and values. A candidate who connects with these issues has a higher likelihood of being a future employee who is invested in the success of the larger community. Their investment, which is based on resonance with community values, would reflect the faculty and staff members’ affective community commitment. Thus, if South Carolina’s rural institutions are intentional about incorporating local community leaders into the recruitment process, they will provide an opportunity to establish affective community commitment, which would positively affect retention.
To further strengthen their recruitment and retention efforts, rural institutions should seek to establish normative commitment between employees and the larger community. An investment based on a personal sense of obligation, often in the form of increased responsibility, directly improves faculty and staff’s commitment to their organization.36 Extending this idea to the community context would imply that a personal sense of obligation Page 142 →to the larger community would reduce a resident’s desire to relocate. Beginning with the recruitment process, rural institutions can take an active role in helping employees identify local needs and connecting them with community organizations. Traditionally, this type of networking has been left up to the faculty or staff members to navigate themselves. If South Carolina’s rural institutions took an active role in making these connections for their employees, they would provide a context for establishing normative community commitment. Community-facing activities such as neighborhood cleanups and other volunteer opportunities can be useful in making the connections needed to establish a sense of obligation, thereby increasing employees’ desire to live in the local community and reducing turnover intention for rural institutions.
Continuance commitment relies on institutional benefits and interpersonal relationships’ ability to increase an employee’s commitment to the organization. Extending this concept to the community context would assert that residents will desire to stay within their community if personal relationships and community benefits are strong enough. If rural institutions strategically partnered with local businesses to offer dual-career opportunities for the spouses or partners of college employees, they could offer a significant benefit to prospective employees and strengthen the local workforce. This approach would not require additional financial resources on behalf of the institution in the same way a traditional university spousal hire does, but it would offer the benefit of addressing the employee’s familial needs while providing an additional context for interpersonal relationships to develop. Rural institutions may also invest in sponsoring the many local cultural festivals that are ever present across South Carolina’s rural communities. These events serve as cultural hubs, frequently cultivating personal relationships in rural communities.37 Through establishing intentional partnerships with the local community, rural institutions have an opportunity to increase employment benefits and create contexts for employees to develop meaningful relationships within the community. If this opportunity is taken, South Carolina’s rural colleges should observe enhanced community commitment among their employees and reduced turnover.
Although the data consistently show that increasing employees’ organizational commitment reduces turnover intentions, South Carolina’s rural-serving institutions must explore a holistic approach to improving recruitment and retention efforts. In addition to the more internally focused strategies frequently used by rural colleges, an attempt must be made to integrate external efforts into their endeavors at reducing attrition. Page 143 →Extending the principles of organizational commitment to the community context in the form of “community commitment” may provide a meaningful starting point. If South Carolina’s rural institutions invest in cultivating affective, normative, and continuance community commitment, they have an opportunity to increase employees’ desire to live within the communities they serve. Integrating the framework of community commitment into their recruitment and retention strategy, alongside long-standing efforts at increasing organizational commitment, will provide South Carolina’s rural colleges and universities with a more holistic approach to attracting talented faculty and staff, enabling them to better fulfill their critical role in rural communities.
Conclusion
As higher education finds itself at a crossroads in terms of its perceived value to the public, it has never been more important that South Carolina’s colleges and universities be able to communicate the life-changing opportunities they offer students effectively. This conversation must emphasize the social mobility experienced by rural learners and the impact of rural institutions on local economic development. However, for the state’s rural colleges to continue to serve as vital resources for rural communities and their residents, they must develop holistic approaches to employee recruitment and retention. Traditional efforts aligned with strengthening organizational commitment only address half of the retention issues facing South Carolina’s rural institutions. In addition to these internally directed endeavors, rural colleges must invest in integrating faculty and staff into the larger community as early as during the recruitment process. By increasing the campus’ connection to the surrounding community, rural-serving institutions have an opportunity to increase the community commitment of their employees. Combining this community-focused approach with institutional efforts to increase organizational commitment will provide South Carolina’s rural colleges with a holistic approach to recruitment and retention that empowers them to continue offering life-changing opportunities to rural communities for years to come.
Todd C. Couch is an associate professor of sociology and codirector of African and African American Studies at Francis Marion University. He is professionally interested in applied sociological research focused on creating, promoting, and maintaining equitable communities and organizations.
Notes
- 1. Page 144 →Fry et al., “Is College Worth It?”
- 2. Parker, “The Growing Partisan Divide.”
- 3. Workman, “Higher Ed’s Reckoning with Relevance.”
- 4. Workman, “Higher Ed’s Reckoning with Relevance.”
- 5. Fry et al., “Is College Worth It?”; Horowitz and Parker, “How Americans View Their Jobs.”
- 6. “2023 Annual Report,” Association of Public & Land-Grant Universities.
- 7. Koricich, “Crafting Better Rural-Focused Postsecondary Policy, 67–69”; McNamee, “Rural-Located Institutions and Rural-Serving Institutions.”
- 8. Manly et al., “Who Are Rural Students?” 1–5.
- 9. Iselm and Boatman, “Exploring Economic Returns Across Rural-Serving Colleges.”
- 10. Koricich et al., “Introducing Our Nation’s Rural-Serving Postsecondary Institutions.”
- 11. Koricich et al., “Introducing Our Nation’s Rural-Serving Postsecondary Institutions.”
- 12. Koricich et al., “Introducing Our Nation’s Rural-Serving Postsecondary Institutions.”
- 13. Kenner and Weinerman, “Adult Learning Theory,” 88.
- 14. Bellare et al., “Motivations and Barriers for Adult Learners,” 31.
- 15. Mitchell et al., “Recruiting and Retaining Higher Education Leaders,” 30–34.
- 16. Schulte and Schreder, “Rural Students Find Their Voice,” 71–72.
- 17. See Martinez et al., “Landscape of Mentorship Programs,” and Anderson et al., “Experiences of Students in Recovery,” 1; 3–6.
- 18. Islem and Boatman, “Exploring Economics Returns Across Rural-Serving Colleges.”
- 19. Olcoń et al., “No University Without Community,” 2004–2006.
- 20. Olcoń et al., “No University Without Community,” 2009–2010.
- 21. Wood et al., “If We Get You, How Can We Keep You?” 6–12.
- 22. See Leist, “Exemplary Rural Community College Presidents,” and Murray, “Recruiting and Retaining Rural Community College Faculty,” 3–7; 57–61.
- 23. Mitchell et al., “Recruiting and Retaining Higher Education Leaders for the Rural Community College,” 26–27.
- 24. Brantley and Shomaker, “What’s Next for the Higher Education Workforce?”
- 25. Weissman, “The Great Resignation at Community Colleges.”
- 26. Menzies, “Continuity and Churn,” 5.
- 27. Mitchell et al., “Recruiting and Retaining Higher Education Leaders,” 26–27.
- 28. Allen and Meyer, “The Measurement and Antecedents of Affective, Continuance, and Normative Commitment,” 13–14.
- 29. See Bucklin et al., “Predictors of Early Faculty Attrition,” 4–6.
- 30. Meyer and Parfyonova, “Normative Commitment in the Workplace,” 290–92.
- 31. Herrbach et al., “Undesired Side Effect?” 1562–66.
- 32. Vandenberghe et al., “Continuance Commitment and Turnover,” 404–5.
- 33. Traba and Yoo, “Staff Retreats,” 55–56.
- 34. Schrank et al., “Institution-Wide Retreats,” 372–73.
- 35.Page 145 →Mitchell et al., “Recruiting and Retaining Higher Education Leaders,” 26–28.
- 36. Verma and Kaur, “Faculty Retention Dynamics.”
- 37. Hjalager and Kwiatkowski, “Entrepreneurial Implications, Prospects and Dilemmas in Rural Festivals,” 3–6.
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