Eric McCrae is a senior graphic designer and web developer at Blue Octopus Printing Company, a large printing and mailing facility in Indianapolis, Indiana. He has over 17 years experience in the printing and mailing industry specializing in graphic design for print and mail marketing. Eric is the father of 1 and husband to Mia the love of his life. Identifying Factors Impacting First Year Persistence in Computer Graphics Technology AbstractThe retention of students is a goal that all universities strive to achieve. With more and more emphasis placed on degree completion, retaining students becomes even more important. University faculty and staff continually try to identify what possible factors affect a student's decision to remain in their chosen field of study. Faculty in the Computer Graphics Technology (CGT) program are concerned with what factors, if any, affect the persistence of students in the CGT program. The goal of this study was to determine if personal factors such as gender and being a first-generation student and/or academic factors such as admission status, semester course load, and academic grades are related to the first-year persistence of CGT students.Results indicate that first semester performance is a significant indicator of persistence. Gender, first generation student, and admission status were not found to be significant indicators. This points out the importance of efforts focused on students in their first semester of college.