Education Commons^™

Florida's Bright Futures Scholarship Program: The Effects Of Losing Merit-Based Financial Aid On Persistence, Robert Laws Liddell

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

College completion agendas necessarily presume year-to-year student persistence. Institutional efforts to retain admitted students has emerged for a variety of reasons, some intrinsic and others extrinsic. Some of these reasons include (1) financial exigency as institutions strive to retain tuition-paying students or meet prescribed enrollment and retention criteria currently used in performance funding strategies; (2) reputation enhancement as institutions attempt to ascend annual publications such as the U.S. News & World Report which rely on retention rates as one of several indicators used to measure institutional quality; (3) gaining a perceived advantage in admissions, marketing, and fundraising as persistence rates …

Promoting Adult Student Success At Four-Year Higher Education Institutions, Heidi A. Watson-Held

Adult Education Research Conference

This study surveyed four-year institutions to examine the extent to which different categories of four-year institutions are meeting adult students’ needs and thereby promoting their success.

Can I Do Both? Be Employed And Graduate? Adult Non-Traditional Learners Who Combine Employment And Higher Education Enrollment-A Look At Persistence And Best Practices To Overcoming Barriers To Improve Success And Retention, Lynn Taylor

Adult Education Research Conference

The roundtable discussion critically analyzes two significant research studies on barriers to persistence of non-traditional adult learners who combine employment and higher education enrollment. These studies were conducted by the U.S. Department of Education in partnership with the NCES. Implications for best practices to overcome barriers, improve retention and academic success will be covered.

Practical Applications For Student Affairs: A Phenomenological Exploration Of How Black Male Undergraduate Persisters Describe Retention And Social Integration At A Midwestern Pwi, André L. Fortune

Department of Educational Administration: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

For decades higher education has incurred challenges with increasing undergraduate retention and degree attainment. Lately these challenges, including focus on increasing Black male undergraduate degree attainment, have become a national concern. Scholars like Vincent Tinto (1987, 1993, 2012) have dedicated research to explain why students leave or stay in college. His findings identified the majority of students voluntarily leave institutions for nonacademic reasons that occur outside of class. On many campuses outside of class experiences, which Tinto labeled social integration, are primarily facilitated by student affairs practitioners.

The concept of social integration as a factor in student retention provided …

The Relationship Of Three Financial Aid Appeal Interventions With Academic Progress And Student Persistence, Jeannetta Lynn Hollins

Educational Foundations & Leadership Theses & Dissertations

Poor academic performance can result in financial aid suspension and can decrease the opportunity or likelihood of students continuing their college education. The objective of this preliminary quantitative study was to investigate an under-researched area of financial aid, and Satisfactory Academic Progress (SAP) appeal interventions, to determine whether any of the three approaches studied influenced student academic outcomes. This study was confined to one large, multi-campus community college institution. The study was conducted ex post facto, using binary logistic regression to analyze data collected over a period of four consecutive semesters.

The interventions were designed to provide an academically struggling …

Best Forms Of Involvement For First-Year Student Veterans For Academic Success, Saipraseuth Chaleunphonh

Theses and Dissertations

This study expands the research for the transition of student veterans utilizing the Post-9/11 G.I. Bill enacted in 2008. It presents a quantitative approach to study the relationship between first-time, full-time student veterans and their non-veteran student counterparts in the area of transition to college life and academic success in the first-year of college. Transition to college life is measured through variables that represent pre-entry attributes, skills gained or lost, and student involvement. The results of the study contribute to the efforts of campus professionals to coordinate services and direct resources in order to better serve and increase the academic …

“Warming Up” In The Developmental Sequence? Upward Transfer Conditional On Dependency Status, Cody Davidson, Kristin B. Wilson

Kentucky Journal of Higher Education Policy and Practice

The purpose of this study was to determine predictor factors of upward transfer for Kentucky community college students enrolled in a developmental algebra course. For independent students, a mother with a college degree, a declared major, a federal work-study position, greater adjusted gross income, and a higher grade point average was positively correlated with upward transfer. For dependent students, a father with a college degree, a declared major, and a higher grade point average was positively correlated with upward transfer.

Understanding Doctoral Success Factors In Online Education Programs, Carissa Johnson

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

The doctoral student completion rate in the United States is approximately 57% across all disciplines. The purpose of this mixed-methods study was to investigate doctoral students' perceptions of program completion across multiple online doctoral programs at a single university. The quantitative component examined differences in 4 doctoral program completion-related factors between students in 2 capstone completion stages and 6 academic programs. The qualitative component included an analysis of student perceptions of program completion. Attribution theory was used as a framework to understand the ways that personal attributions influence the success of the participants. The Doctoral Completion and Persistence Scale (DCPS) …

Why Latino American Community College Students Drop Out After One Semester, Rosa Delia Smith

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

The purpose of this qualitative case study was to investigate why many Latino America students at an urban community college in the state of Maryland who were enrolled at least part-time and were U.S. citizens or permanent residents did not continue their education into the second semester. Guided by Tinto's model of student integration and student persistence, this study explored the reasons these students dropped-out using the students' words to describe barriers to success, factors that influenced their decisions not to return for their second semester, and what they believed could have made a difference in their decisions. Five Latino …