Institutional Factors Affecting Academic Persistence of Underprepared Community College Freshmen PDF Download

Author: Janis Kristine Walker Marsh
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Community college students
Languages : en
Pages : 264

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Author: Falilu Mohammad A. Matti
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Community college students
Languages : en
Pages : 260

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Author: Ann M. Paulson
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781267787552
Category : Academic achievement
Languages : en
Pages : 114

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Book Description
Community colleges provide access to higher education for a broad range of students. The majority require "remedial" coursework in reading, writing and, especially, math. Most students who begin with this remedial coursework do not go on to earn a certificate or degree. Low levels of college graduation have high direct cost, adversely affect the U.S. economy and contribute to socioeconomic inequity. The literature review shows that both academic and nonacademic factors influence both completion of remedial coursework and completion of first year in college. It introduces research on a variety of strategies for increasing completion and persistence for underprepared students. The purpose of this ex post facto study was to identify nonacademic factors that may influence the ability of underprepared, community college students to transition into college-level work and the extent to which these factors could be used to predict persistence. Logistic regression was used to analyze the effect of gender, race/ethnicity, age, enrollment status (full- or part-time), receipt of financial aid, family status and purpose. Each factor was evaluated with the other six factors held constant. The dependent variable was the completion of 15 college-level credits. The population for this study was students in the Washington State system of 34 community colleges. Records for 15,177 students were considered. The findings reflected that at least one category in each of the seven variables had a statistically significant relationship with persistence at the .05 level. The best predictor of student success in transition was enrollment status (full- or part-time) followed by race/ethnicity, gender, receipt of financial aid and family status. The findings are significant because they direct further research into the factors and experiences that influence success, and point toward practices to address gaps.

Author: George Terrence McNulty
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Electronic books
Languages : en
Pages : 260

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College student retention is one of the most significant issues in higher education. Nationally, persistence and graduation rates have changed sparingly over the past decade (Tinto, 2006-2007). In community colleges, one-half of all new students are retained from their first to second year and graduation rates are low. In student success literature, researchers have long discussed the association between academic preparedness and success in college. In his analysis of a National Education Longitudinal Study, Bailey (2008) estimated that 60% of recent high school graduates who enter post-secondary education through the community college enroll in at least one developmental English, math, and/or reading course or more. When compared with students needing no remediation, this group of students is far less likely to persist, or to complete a college degree (Bailey, 2008). The purpose of this single institutional case study was to explore the relationship between student persistence rates and developmental education policy. Specifically, this study examined how assessment testing, placement policy, institutional practice, and initial course enrollment patterns related to student success. With the majority of students entering community colleges academically underprepared, the importance of the evaluation, as well the development of institutional policy, which may aid in increasing success rates, cannot be overstated (Price & Roberts, 2008-2009). The research methodology of this study included qualitative and quantitative approaches. Data was collected from the academic transcripts of a single cohort of all first-time, full-time, associate degree-seeking students who were enrolled at the college during the 2007 Fall semester and tracked for their persistence rates through the 2010 Spring semester. In addition, seven college professionals were interviewed and relevant documentation examined in order to perform the qualitative portion of this study. Descriptive statistics were utilized to report, summarize, and interpret the data. A Chi Square Test of Independence was employed to examine possible differences between groups as determined by selected independent and dependent variables. This mixed methods approach addressed the purpose of this study, that is, the study explored the relationship between student persistence rates and developmental education policy in terms of quantitative representation and qualitative explanation. This study provided an in-depth perspective of the history of developmental education in addition to initial placement policy and practices at the college. Throughout the interviews, two themes emerged institutional struggle with the right to fail philosophy and ambivalence towards/questioning of the validity of assessment testing instruments. The Chi Square Test indicated that there were no statistically significant differences between groups as determined by selected independent and dependent variables. Overall, the quantitative results of this research study did not support the research findings of other studies.

Author: Dave Pelkey
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 125

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The purpose of this study is to identify factors that support the likelihood of persistence of academically underprepared community college students to 45 college level credits. Factors considered in this research include: (a) race/ethnicity, (b) age, (c) enrollment status, (d) socio-economic status (SES), (e) first quarter GPA, (f) developmental need, (g) participation in a learning community, and (h) completion of a first year seminar course. The population of students used for the purposes of this research was a cohort of first time, full and part-time, community college students enrolled in associate degree pre-baccalaureate programs of study at Tacoma Community College during Fall quarter 2005. Students in this cohort placed below college level in mathematics, reading or English. Binary logistic regression was used to evaluate the existence, direction and strength of the relationships between each of the independent variables and the dependent variable the completion of 45 college credits. Findings from this study indicate that enrollment status, specifically full-time enrollment and first quarter GPA, both had statistically significant positive relationships to persistence of academically underprepared students at the community college. Although this research only identifies only two elements as having statistically significant relationships to the completion of 45 credits the data does indicate several other variables with high odds ratios that suggest a possibility that they influence the persistence of academically underprepared students and should be considered by practitioners at community colleges.

Author: Lea C. Maue
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 398

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The purpose of this study was to illuminate the barriers to persistence underprepared students at the community college experience after the initial successful completion of one semester. A qualitative interview study, grounded in phenomenology, was implemented. Participants were identified through a process of purposeful selection, which included the following criteria: (a) beginning the development reading sequence at the most basic level (DEV 65) and passing that course; (b) immediately enrolling in a subsequent semester at the institution; and (c) exiting the institution before acquiring any credit-bearing English coursework. The examination of institutional archival data resulted in 42 potential participants. Participants were recruited via telephone and mail, and of the 42 attempted telephone and 39 mailed contacts, five individuals volunteered to participate in the study. Each participant was interviewed individually, with sessions varying in length between 51 and 119 minutes. Immediately after each interview was complete, the audio recording was listened to in its entirety and transcribed verbatim. The resulting transcripts were analyzed through a modified version of Devinish's (2002) applied method for phenomenological explication of interview transcripts. This involved a multi-layered process of recursive analysis beginning with line-by-line open coding, extracting 333 natural meaning units (NMU). In a second stage of analysis, the NMU were further sorted, analyzed, and grouped to arrive at 46 central themes. The third stage of analysis involved collating and grouping central themes into related fields employing a concept map to form at 13 interpretive themes. The final stage of analysis included a further examination of the 13 interpretive themes, where each was rank ordered by importance (frequency x intensity = priority) and then synthesized with data from lesser themes, which resulted in the following six explicative themes: (a) significant environmental stressors; (b) a sense of self-sufficiency and independency; (c) reading problems; (d) a belief in the power of perseverance; (e) instructor characteristics; and (f) financial aid restrictions. These six explicative themes captured the essence of what it meant for the participants to be an underprepared student at the college and identified the perceived barriers to persistence.

Author: Kathryn Claire King
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Academic achievement
Languages : en
Pages : 304

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Author: M. Eileen Morelli
Publisher: Universal-Publishers
ISBN: 1581123027
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 109

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This ex post facto study was used to compare community college transcripts of African American students who participated in a developmental reading course at a multi-campus, urban community college and those who declined to participate in the developmental reading program. The study examined 513 records to determine if participation in a developmental reading course in a community college improved achievement and persistence for African American college students. Results discuss the positive relationship of overall and third semester achievement to enrollment in a developmental reading course as shown in the student QPA. Neither enrollment in a developmental reading course nor reading level was related to persistence as measured by the number of semesters enrolled in college.

Author: Dionne J. Jones
Publisher: Jossey-Bass
ISBN:
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 148

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Examines the factors that affect minority, female, low-income, and handicapped students. Discusses differential preparation, negative teacher attitudes, systemic forces, institutional impact, and strategies for achieving success.

Author: Ben Kei Daniel
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 3319065203
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 287

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Book Description
​This book focuses on the uses of big data in the context of higher education. The book describes a wide range of administrative and operational data gathering processes aimed at assessing institutional performance and progress in order to predict future performance, and identifies potential issues related to academic programming, research, teaching and learning​. Big data refers to data which is fundamentally too big and complex and moves too fast for the processing capacity of conventional database systems. The value of big data is the ability to identify useful data and turn it into useable information by identifying patterns and deviations from patterns​.