Case Study: Deakin University achieves personalized student engagement and 90% retention with D2L Brightspace

How a professor with 2,100 students ensures no one feels like a number

Dr. Jaclyn Broadbent at Deakin University faced teaching a blended first-year Health Behaviour course of 2,100 students spread across four campuses with widely varying backgrounds and skills. Her key challenges were keeping every student engaged and connected, providing equitable learning pathways, and delivering timely, meaningful feedback to improve retention and outcomes.

She used D2L Brightspace tools—Intelligent Agents for automated personalized outreach, a weekly Newsfeed and social media integration for ongoing touchpoints, differentiated resources, and audio‑video feedback via her Model Demonstrate approach—to scale personalization and speed feedback. The results were strong: student ratings of 4.72/5 (vs 3.9 university average), 95% felt the subject team cared, 89% said it motivated them, a 90% retention rate, and multiple teaching awards and national nominations.

Deakin University

Jaclyn Broadbent

Lecturer in Health Psychology