Dropout problem, motivation, student, higher education, strategy for persistence.

The question of monitoring the reasons for dropping out of studies in general at various levels of education, and especially at universities, is topical not only in the Czech Republic and Europe, but has recently become an important topic of professional discussions all over the world. Especially in the case of university studies, in addition to the economic consequences that the high rate of early leaving of study entails, the reason is also that it significantly hinders the fulfilment of the goals for the share of the university-educated population (which is increasingly important for employment on the labour market). Although the students´ dropout problem occurs across disciplines, in the case of natural sciences the rate is really high and the Faculty of Science, University of Ostrava is no exception. Therefore, based on the data, we screened individual reasons for dropping out of studies that are relevant for our case and developed a strategy to solve the problem. We primarily focused on areas, measures and interventions that can be implemented "on the fly" meanwhile not disrupting the complex structure and operation of the faculty or degree programme. It means to be realistically feasible with the minimization of administrative obstacles and the changes will only be dynamic enough to not burden the functioning of the environment (smooth course of changes so that the reaction to new procedures is positively accepted). As part of our strategy concept, we have structured the phenomena that have a positive effect on reducing the rate of unsuccessful finishing of study from the point of view of the timeline of work with the student from a potential applicant to a successful graduate. The paper will present this strategy, especially the identified most common problems and reasons for leaving studies in each of the specified time periods and proposals for specific measures.

The question of monitoring the reasons for dropping out of studies in general at various levels of education, and especially at universities, is topical not only in the Czech Republic and Europe, but has recently become an important topic of professional discussions all over the world. Especially in the case of university studies, in addition to the economic consequences that the high rate of early leaving of study entails, the reason is also that it significantly hinders the fulfilment of the goals for the share of the university-educated population (which is increasingly important for employment on the labour market). Although the students´ dropout problem occurs across disciplines, in the case of natural sciences the rate is really high and the Faculty of Science, University of Ostrava is no exception. Therefore, based on the data, we screened individual reasons for dropping out of studies that are relevant for our case and developed a strategy to solve the problem. We primarily focused on areas, measures and interventions that can be implemented "on the fly" meanwhile not disrupting the complex structure and operation of the faculty or degree programme. It means to be realistically feasible with the minimization of administrative obstacles and the changes will only be dynamic enough to not burden the functioning of the environment (smooth course of changes so that the reaction to new procedures is positively accepted). As part of our strategy concept, we have structured the phenomena that have a positive effect on reducing the rate of unsuccessful finishing of study from the point of view of the timeline of work with the student from a potential applicant to a successful graduate. The paper will present this strategy, especially the identified most common problems and reasons for leaving studies in each of the specified time periods and proposals for specific measures.