Education Commons^™

Review Of Years 9 To 12 Tasmania : Final Report, Geoff N. Masters, Kathryn Moyle, Sheldon Rothman, Hilary Hollingsworth, Bill Perrett, Paul R. Weldon, Kate Perkins, Justin Brown, Ali Radloff, Patricia Freeman, Sofi Damianidis

Policy Analysis and Program Evaluation

The Tasmanian Government is currently implementing significant reforms to improve students’ retention and attainment in Tasmania’s schools. There is a concern in the Tasmanian community however, that their students’ performances are among the lowest in the nation. Reasons nominated for these results include weak literacy and numeracy levels; low attendance rates; high anxiety around transitions between Year 10 and Year 11 by some students, especially among those living outside of the larger cities; students seeking alternative education options; and family, financial, health and carer based issues. It is against this backdrop that the Australian Council for Educational Research (ACER) was …

Administrative Strategies To Improve Teacher Recruitment And Retention In Rural Public Schools, Christine Kay Butler

Dissertations

The main purpose of this study was to gain insight into the recruitment and retention strategies popularized due to the need to meet high-quality teacher demands. Additionally, recruitment and retention strategies identified by administrators and tenured teachers working in rural public schools of Missouri as effective were collected through a survey. Administrators, as well as tenured teachers currently on staff in rural public school districts of Missouri, were the population of this study. Among 286 administrators, 95 administrative participants and 33 tenured teachers completed the survey. The survey responses were compared to determine if the administrative point-ofview was similar to …

Vocabulary Instruction And Student Participation And Retention, Jenny A. Kading, Lisa J. Zuther

Masters of Arts in Education Action Research Papers

This action research investigated vocabulary retention and participation gain from integrating close reading passages into a Kindergarten and Second Grade public school classroom. The methods incorporated included turn and talk opportunities, student journals, and close reading passages. Thirty-six primary school aged students were included in the study. Sources of data collection include a teacher self-evaluation survey, vocabulary recognition task, observational checklist, and observational rubric. Students displayed an increase in vocabulary retention and participation. Because of the students’ increase in retention and participation during whole group instruction, we will continue to use close reading passages in our classrooms.

A First-Year Experience Course And Its Relationship To Retention And Academic Success At A Public Community College, Jackie F. Newman

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this quantitative comparative study was to determine the relationship between retention and academic success of students who participated in a First-Year Experience (FYE) course and students who did not participate in a FYE course within a southeastern community college in the United States. The impact of the relationship was to inform an understanding of how a FYE course influences student success.

Archival data were collected from the southeastern community college’s student information system, Banner, Data for first-time full time students were gathered, including whether or not the individuals enrolled in a FYE course. Other data included the …

First 100 Days Persistence-Retention Plans, Kenneth W. Borland Jr.

Journal of Research, Assessment, and Practice in Higher Education

Taking environments, persistence-retention, and social capital theories to the individual student as the level of analyses, and placing them within a “First 100 Days” strategy of prioritized urgency and energy as utilized by presidents of the United States since Franklin D. Roosevelt, the author challenges broad-based, long-term approaches to student persistence and institutional retention of students. A framework for “First 100 Days” persistence-retention plans for improved student and institution success is outlined.

Institutional Racism Through The Eyes Of African American Male Faculty At Community Colleges In The Pacific Northwest, Kimberly Harden

CUP Ed.D. Dissertations

The purpose of this qualitative study is to explore the lived experiences of African American male faculty at community colleges in the Pacific Northwest. Regional data mirrors national statistics denoting the low number of faculty of color working at state-funded community colleges. The literature reviewed for this study suggests that African American male faculty experience racism and gender bias during their academic career journeys. This study sought insight from five African American male faculty to answer the overarching research question: What are the possible perceived institutional barriers that contribute to the underrepresentation of African American male faculty? These individuals were …

Self-Efficacy Score Differences Between First-Year, Male And Female First-Generation And Non-First-Generation College Students As Measured By The College Self-Efficacy Inventory (Csei), Janet Shepherd

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

Students of all backgrounds have a transition period when entering college. However, first-time, first-generation college students encounter more problems and have more difficulties becoming acclimated to college resulting in decreased first-year retention rates for first-generation students. These problems and difficulties are related to course work, socialization, and roommate issues. Research has shown that self-efficacy and collective efficacy are important in student achievement. This research study explored if there was a difference in student perception of self-efficacy among male and female first-year, first-generation college students and male and female first-year, non-first-generation college students. A quantitative, causal-comparative study was conducted utilizing the …

Factors Affecting The Matriculation Of African American Undergraduate Students: An Exploratory Study, Leila Halawi, Andrew Knowles, Richard Mccarthy

Leila A. Halawi

In this study, a regression analysis was conducted to explore the factors associated with African American student retention and graduation. The study sample is comprised of 133 undergraduate African American MIS students at a southeastern, private university. This university uses Blackboard. Using a structure that is grounded on Astin’s student involvement theory, the results of this preliminary investigation indicated that both academic involvement and student involvement share a positive relationship with student retention.

A Look At Grit: Teachers Who Teach Students With Severe Disabilities, Donna Baker Martin

Dissertations

This study investigated special education teachers and the grit needed to stay in the field especially for those who teach students with moderate to severe disabilities. The purpose was to explore and describe the impact of Grit on retention as perceived by special education teachers who teach students with severe disabilities. This explanatory, sequential mixed methods study included the Grit-S survey as a locator for special education teachers in five California counties and the target population included special education teachers who taught in California.

Teachers self-reported they were hard workers, diligent and finish what they start and they gave examples. …

Academic Advising Support For Students On Academic Probation, Kaitlyn N. Stormes, Gregg J. Gold

IdeaFest: Interdisciplinary Journal of Creative Works and Research from Cal Poly Humboldt

No abstract provided.

A Qualitative Exploration Of First-Generation Student Experiences At A Rural Community College, Rebecca Margrete Evans

Educational Foundations & Leadership Theses & Dissertations

First-generation students comprise 36% of U.S. community college enrollments but struggle to remain in school to earn a college credential. First-generation students are less likely to enroll in college and have a higher probability for attrition than continuing-generation students. The purpose of this qualitative study was to understand how first-generation students attending a rural community college located in the Southeastern United States perceived that their experiences impacted their academic and nonacademic success. This study replicated and extended the Stansberry and Burnett (2014) study that explored the experiences of first-generation students attending a large, diverse research university.

This phenomenological study utilized …

The Influence Of Balance Within The Competing Values Framework And School Academic Success On Teacher Retention, Charisse Gulosino, Louis Franceschini Iii, Portia Hardman

Journal of Organizational & Educational Leadership

The primary aim of this study is to use the survey items from the TELL Tennessee Survey (2013) using the Competing Values Framework (CVF) to determine whether teachers' observations about a set of topically organized school climate dimensions and school performance levels are associated with their immediate professional plans. Using a three-by-two-level Analysis of Covariance (ANCOVA), we find that the effect of CVF “balance” and school performance level explain much of the variation in the percent of teachers who intend to stay at their current school, independent of the school’s student demographic characteristics. Specifically, the effect of having a balanced …

Late For The Meeting: Gender, Peer Advising, And College Success, Jimmy R. Ellis, Seth Gershenson

Upjohn Institute Working Papers

Many male and first-generation college-goers struggle in their first year of postsecondary education. Mentoring programs have been touted as a potential solution to help such students acclimate to college life, yet causal evidence on the impact of such programs, and the factors that influence participation in them, is scant. This study leverages a natural experiment in which peer advisors (PAs) were quasi-randomly assigned to first-year university students to show that 1) male students were significantly more likely to voluntarily meet with their assigned PA when the PA was also male and 2) these compliers were significantly more likely to persist …

How Math Avoidance Influences Degree Completion For Bible College Students: A Case Study Of A Small, Private Institution In Upstate New York, Bonnie Novak

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

The purpose of this instrumental case study was to describe math perception and avoidance for ministerial undergraduate students at a small, private Bible college in upstate New York. In the research, math avoidance was generally defined as the participants’ perception of math, their delay in completing a credit-bearing math course until their senior year or not at all, and their own learning or degree completion as a result. The theories guiding this study were Tinto’s Retention Theory/Model of Institutional Departure, Bandura’s Social Cognitive Theory, and Estep’s Theory of Christian Formation. The central question was: How does math avoidance influence persistence …

Characteristics Of Early Non-Persisting Developmental Education Students In The Community College: A Nested Analysis, Joseph George Grailer

Dissertations

Many first-year, first-semester community college students take multiple developmental education courses, expending significant time, money and opportunity costs, but do not return for a second semester. Students who do not persist past their first semester are unlikely to ever return to post-secondary education, so it is critical to identify and assist these students as early in their postsecondary career as possible. To assist colleges with this effort, this study employed chi-square and logistic regression analyses on data collected during students' application and enrollment processes, as well as students’ first semester course performance, to create several nested models of characteristics correlated …

Retention And Persistence In Higher Education: An Exploratory Study Of Risk Factors And Milestones Impacting Second Semester Retention Of Freshmen Students, Tyson Ray Holder, Sean Jeremy Chism, Theresa Keuss, Natissia Shonte Small

Dissertations

This study investigated individual factors and milestones which may assist institutions in predicting first to second semester retention rates of freshmen students. While the data examined were limited to the student population enrolled at a rural community college, implications from the study could be meaningful for all institutions of higher education. The investigators examined extant data to determine whether exam scores, graduating high school GPAs/rank, and Pell Grant eligibility could be used as predictor variables in identifying students at-risk of leaving the institution. In addition, key milestones (time of registration, participation in a first year experience (FYE) course, declaring a …

Best Practices In Student Persistence And Completion: A Program Evaluation Of Three Student Services Units In A Rural Community College, Antionette Sterling, Felicita A. Myers

Dissertations

Student services units in community colleges are now encouraged to assume a larger role in supporting student retention and are charged with implementing intervention strategies that improve student success and persistence. Yet, many community colleges, especially those in rural communities, struggle to define the role of student services in improving retention, especially between the first and second semesters. A process program evaluation of three student services units at a rural Missouri community college was conducted in order to assess whether the outputs (activities) identified in the logic models for each of the three units had occurred. At the conclusion of …

Addressing The Tension Between Open Access Admission And Improving Retention Rates At Crowder College, Earl Ray Macam, Brittany Lynn Neunuebel

Dissertations

Most community colleges embrace an open-access admission policy. At the same time, community colleges are pressured to improve retention rates. This project sought to address the tension between open-access and improved retention rates by determining which markers of academic preparedness predicted fall-to-fall retention in past admission cohorts of a community college. Data for three incoming classes of new students were analyzed using two separate logistical regressions, one on Pre-Admission/Enrollment variables and one on Post-Matriculation variables. The analysis of Pre-Admission/Enrollment variables, suggested that students who were male, 23 years or older and who had a low ACT Math Sub Score, and/or …

Academic Outcomes In Higher Education For Students Screened As Twice-Exceptional: Gifted With A Learning Disability In Math Or Reading, Elizabeth Ann Hays

Doctoral Dissertations

To investigate academic outcomes for twice-exceptional (2e) students who pursue higher education, a pool of 20,761 undergraduate students at the University of Tennessee were screened and 244 were selected as potentially 2e because they matched certain criteria traditionally used for the determination of giftedness and a specific learning disability (SLD) in math or reading. First-year retention rate and final college GPA were significantly lower for students screened as gifted with a SLD in math or reading than for students screened as gifted without a SLD (p< .05), but were not significantly different from other students in the general population. Students screened as 2e were more likely to be undecided in their choice of major than students screened as gifted (pp<.001).

Academic Performance, Retention Rates, And Persistence Rates Of First-Year, First-Generation, Latino College Students, Jaime Duran

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

The purpose of this causal-comparative quantitative study was to examine the relationships between the efficacy of a Summer Bridge Academy (SBA) and the impact on students by measuring the Grade Point Averages (GPAs), retention rates, and persistence rates of first-generation, first-year, Latino college students who participated in a SBA at Central Valley Community College against like students who did not participate in same program. The independent variable was participation in a 6 week long SBA, which took place during the summer of 2011. The dependent variables were GPAs, retention rates, and persistence rates, and the control and intervening variables, students …

Profiles Of Academic Commitment, Anna Jill Womack

Dissertations

Tinto (1993) found that only 15-25% of students who dropped out of college did so due to academic failure, while the reasons for leaving among the remaining group of students who dropped out were unknown. This suggests that the majority of students who drop out of college are likely doing so for reasons other than academic struggles. Researchers have suggested that individuals who are committed to their major are more likely to obtain a bachelor’s degree (Bowling, Beehr, & Lepisto, 2006; Den Hartog & Belschak, 2007; Duffy, Dik, & Steger, 2011; Goulet & Singh, 2002; Landrum & Mulcock, 2007), indicating …

Teacher Retention: Perceptions Of The Organizational Factors That Influence Teacher Transition From Private School Classrooms Of Individuals With Autism To Public School Autism Classrooms, Kathryn Cerino Britton

Seton Hall University Dissertations and Theses (ETDs)

Nine experienced certified special education teachers who chose to move from the private sector to the public sector were interviewed to gain knowledge and information that could be used to improve the private sector school for learners with autism spectrum disorders (ASD). Using Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs as the conceptual framework, this study explored the respondents’ beliefs about their workload, work responsibilities, compensation, and perceptions regarding their teaching experiences in private and public schools. Specifically, telephone or face-to-face interviews were conducted to ascertain the motivating factors that led the respondents to leave one private school, The Apple School, for teaching …

Developing Mobile Apps For Improving The Orientation Experience Of First-Year "Third Level" Students, Nevan Bermingham, Mark Prendergast, Trevor Boland, Mary O'Rawe, Barry Ryan

Conference papers

Smartphone usage by students has increased rapidly over the last number of years, and research points to an expectation for increased utilisation of mobile applications in college educational environments. First year students have particular needs when they transition to higher education (or 'third level'), as they can experience a number of personal, social and cultural difficulties. Orientation is a critical stage for these students and the earlier students have access to important orientation information, the less stressful the initial stages of college are. At Dublin Institute of Technology (DIT), the authors designed a bespoke mobile application tailored to the particular …

A Study Of The Academic And Personal Impacts Of A Literacy Intervention Course: Stories From Stakeholders, Jeremy Ray Logsdon

Dissertations

This study aims to illuminate, via the qualitative method of portraiture, the academic and personal impacts of both faculty and student stakeholders of a literacy intervention course, offered as an alternative to the traditional developmental reading model, taught at a regional southeastern United States four-year public university. Students who enrolled in the course from the semesters of fall 2012 to fall 2015 were given the opportunity to complete a survey about their experiences with the literacy intervention course. Faculty stakeholders were interviewed for their perspective on course creation, implementation, and delivery, focusing on the six curricular core competencies of reading …

Traditional Student Perceptions And Experiences Contributing To Community College Persistence, Naomi Elizabeth Simpson

Educational Foundations & Leadership Theses & Dissertations

An increased effort to improve the retention percentages and number of college graduates must address the unique characteristics and experiences of the traditional-aged community college student population. Models of student departure and attrition seek to explain why a student stops attending a college through the analysis of quantitative data. These data, whether about student demographic characteristics, academic intent, institutional factors, motivational factors, etc. are used abundantly to predict persistence and retention patterns of 4-year college and university students. Perceptions and experiences of traditional-aged community college students relating to persistence and retention is an area of higher education research with insufficient …

The Relationship Between Undergraduate Hispanic Students' Choice Of Living Arrangements And Retention, Academic Achievement And Graduation At A Hispanic-Serving Institution, Lynn N. Hendricks

FIU Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Retaining and graduating Hispanic students are paramount to the overall success of colleges and universities. Given the excessive amounts of money spent to recruit students, and the impact on the institution when students depart prematurely, action needs to be taken by institutions to increase Hispanic student retention and counter the negative impacts on institutions including: instability of institutional enrollments, decline in institutional budgets, and public negative perceptions of institutional quality. Despite significant efforts on the part of many colleges and universities to increase Hispanic student retention and graduation rates, these rates have remained relatively low.

A possible solution to disappointing …

Adult Entrances And Exits: What Does Retention Literature Inform Us About Urban Adult Higher Educational Participants And Student Success?, Debra Fenty, Jonathan Messemer, Elice Rogers

Adult Education Research Conference

This research purpose, derived from a larger study shares findings which help explain retention and, success outcomes associated with Urban adult learners in a 4 year higher educational setting. A critical analysis of the literature reveals in retention, understanding barriers is a key indicator of an institution's effectiveness.

Building An Evaluation Model Of Academic Advising’S Impact On Progression, Persistence, And Retention Within University Settings, Abhik Roy

Dissertations

Academic advising is at a point in its maturation as a field of study where anecdotal evidence is no longer sufficient to inform the measure of effectiveness. As the area becomes more research-based, advising’s measurable impact should be based on an evaluative framework; no such structure currently exists. In this study, three methods were used to investigate this problem and ultimately to create a model and checklist. Firstly, a descriptive study was used to examine if there is an understanding of what evaluation is within the advising community, one where assessment has been the dominant practice. Secondly, a quasi-experimental design …

Retention And Attrition Of Students In Higher Education: Challenges In Modern Times To What Works, Marguerite Maher, Helen Macallister

Marguerite Maher

Retention and attrition rates in higher education have long been a focus of research. This paper presents findingsof a single case study, undertaken in a School of Education, which identify important strategies that have led to attrition of five to eight per cent, compared with 18 per cent cross the education sector in Australia (Department of Education, Science and Training, 2004). Findings include: individual admissions interviews, funding of an Associate Dean Pastoral Care, course coordinators providing continuity of support, easy access for students to academic staff, well-supported, extended professional experience, senior staff lecturing undergraduates, congruence between co-curricular supports and the …

Relationship Between Financial Support And Retention Of Economically Disadvantaged Students In An Undergraduate Baccalaureate Nursing Program, Karen Lynn O'Brien

Theses and Dissertations

Retention in baccalaureate nursing programs has been a concern for administrators and educators for decades. The non-traditional students of the past have become the traditional students of the present and as such lead complex lives. The emerging group of students that requires more attention in nursing education research is the economically disadvantaged students. Economically disadvantaged students typically come to college less prepared for the rigors of higher education and are at-risk for leaving post-secondary education. Retention of economically disadvantaged students can potentially increase the diversity of the nursing workforce since many economically disadvantaged students also come from ethnically diverse background. …