Beyond the Incentive Threshold: Academic Support Use and Persistence After a First-Year Participation Incentive

Summary

A longitudinal study of \(n=3{,}241\) students examining whether formal mathematics-support use persists from an incentive-linked first-year context into later Calculus I use after that same incentive context is no longer assumed to apply.

Context

The analysis distinguishes threshold-limited participation, persistent use, and later self-selected continuation without treating the three-visit threshold as an exogenous treatment.

Main contributions

• Follows a strict MU-to-Calculus progression cohort with support-centre coverage in both periods.
• Shows later CMAT use rising from 17.25% among students with no prior MU visits to 66.84% among those with four or more.
• Preserves the non-causal interpretation while testing persistence across a change in incentive context.