Thesis (M.A.)--University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, 2002. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 40-41).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Oregon, 2005. / Typescript. Includes vita and abstract. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 98-100). Also available for download via the World Wide Web; free to University of Oregon users.

Thesis (M.S.) University of Missouri-Columbia, 2006. / The entire dissertation/thesis text is included in the research.pdf file; the official abstract appears in the short.pdf file (which also appears in the research.pdf); a non-technical general description, or public abstract, appears in the public.pdf file. Title from title screen of research.pdf file viewed on (May 18, 2007) Includes bibliographical references.

Mountain View College is a rural 2-year and 4-year degree granting school in the state of West Virginia that is plagued by declining enrollment, unstable financial assets, and minimum resources. In addition, the college exists in a community plagued by high rates of poverty and minimal racial diversity. Such traits mirror the challenges other rural colleges in the United States are currently encountering. Despite such challenges, the college continues to attract a steady number of Black students to its campus. Current studies indicate that Black students, under the guidance of their parents, are more likely to apply to and enroll in selective schools with stable social and academic environments. Therefore, this unique reversal in traditional enrollment trends among Black students deserves greater scrutiny. Snowball sampling was used to recruit participants. In total, six participants consisting of four Mountain View College personnel and two Black Mountain View College alumni were recruited and interviewed for this study. Both sets of participants completed a survey seeking socio-demographic information and also required participants select a series of attributes (academics, affordability, location, etc.) they believed influenced Black prospects’ decision to enroll at Mountain View College. Following the completion of individual surveys, each participant engaged in one-on-one virtual interviews. Interviews allowed participants to provide greater insight into their initial survey responses. Findings indicated that four major themes were apparent. Safety, affordability, athletics, and the community as a post-graduate safe haven were representative of these themes. They also represented the positive characteristics that attracted Black prospects to a rural school like Mountain View College. / Educational Administration

Thesis advisor: Heather Rowan-Kenyon / Although a college degree is an increasingly important gateway to economic advancement in the United States, high school students with disabilities enroll in postsecondary education at lower rates than nondisabled students. The disparities in college access for these students indicate that there may be differences in how they are navigating the college choice process, or the process of deciding whether and where to go to college, in comparison to their nondisabled peers. In order to better understand how students with disabilities make college-related decisions, this narrative inquiry examined the college choice experiences of three high school students with disabilities. Using a disability studies lens and a conceptualization of college choice that combines models proposed by Perna (2006) and Webb (2000), I studied both how students navigated the pre-matriculation stages of college choice as well as how their understanding of disability and their experiences with special education impacted their choice processes. This narrative inquiry is presented as three stories of college choice, one for each participant, and is based on semi-structured conversations and observations with participants as they worked on their college applications over the course of the 2022-2023 academic year. The narrative themes from participants’ stories suggest that students’ understanding of disability and their academic experiences in school, including experiences with receiving special education services, shaped their student identities and influenced their processes for deciding to pursue postsecondary education, exploring and selecting college options, and completing college applications. Factors such as parental involvement, career aspirations, and school resources, which are traditionally thought to be important in the college choice process, were also important for my participants. Implications from this research include finding ways to build accessible college-related supports into the secondary school curriculum, normalizing special education in school communities, and identifying places where application forms and admissions processes are impeding students’ success. / Thesis (PhD) — Boston College, 2023. / Submitted to: Boston College. Lynch School of Education. / Discipline: Educational Leadership and Higher Education.

No description available.

This study explored why academically qualified African American students, those eligible to attend four-year institutions, choose to attend community colleges and are, thereby, undermatched. This qualitative study investigated how these students navigated the college choice process, what influenced their decision to attend a community college, what their experience at a community college was like, and their aspirations to obtain a baccalaureate degree. Purposeful sampling was used to gather a sample of 19 African American students attending community college in Dallas, Texas. The sample included 14 females and five males. Data were collected through 40-60 minute semi-structured interviews and a brief demographic survey. The conceptual frameworks for this study included Kassie Freeman’s predetermination model that includes cultural considerations in college choice and the Somers et al. model that addresses factors that increase the likelihood of a student choosing to attend a community college. This integrated framework captures the role that family and culture play in African American community college choice. Findings suggest that the community college choice influences for academically eligible African American students vary from traditional college choice models. Whereas factors such as cost, location, and the role of peers played somewhat of a role in their choice, participants were also heavily influenced by sports, self-perceptions of maturity, and the perceptions of their families. Another key finding was that the effects of undermatching vary. All of the participants in this study felt that attending a community college fostered transfer preparedness, supported personal development, and promoted their academic success. However, some of the participants also felt that attending a community college hindered their sense of autonomy and limited their social engagement. This variation leads to the conclusion that undermatching effects vary and are dependent upon a variety of contextual factors. Policy and practice recommendations are provided for parents, teachers, counselors, and higher education professionals.

This study identified and described the experiences of twelve African American men that influenced the choice to participate in postsecondary education. This qualitative study used a phenomenology framework to determine 1) the formation of predisposition in the college choice process, 2) the messages received about college from influential people, and 3) perception and interpretation of the importance of a college degree. The overall theme arising from the data is that the college choice process was complicated and inconsistent; however, ten of the twelve participants completed some type of postsecondary training. Deficient messages about postsecondary education manifested as low parental support for college attendance, low academic expectations, withholding of important information from school officials and little or no exposure to postsecondary institution campuses or students. Influential people for the participants ranged from parents to themselves, and from a combination of characteristics from different people, to peers, to no one. The informants did not consistently identify their role model as the one who influenced them to attend college. The perception of the value of a college degree varied among the participants. Some described the degree as a requirement for success; others felt that strengthening family and achieving financial independence was more important.

College recruitment practices have remained stagnant for quite some time. However, due to decreases in state funding and hypercompetitive applicant pools colleges must adapt their recruitment practices to remain competitive. Due to precautions and social distancing guidelines which occurred in 2020 caused by the coronavirus pandemic, college information sessions, college fairs, campus tours and other recruitment events were suspended. As such, admissions administrators were forced to rely on virtual recruitment practices, including virtual campus tours, to recruit applicants. Virtual campus tours allow colleges to expand their applicant pool by engaging with prospective students, who may not possess the required finances or ability to travel to campus. While considerable research has centered on the factors that influence the college choice process, there is a lack of research pertaining to virtual campus tours. This study reviews the influence of virtual campus tours in the college choice process by interviewing 13 matriculated college students about their experiences with virtual campus tours. This qualitative phenomenological study focuses on the role of virtual campus tours in the college choice model and their influence on perceived levels of student-institution fit.

Understanding how prospective students make their final choices of colleges or universities is important to students, their parents, and to the institutions. When it comes to academically advanced students, or Honors students, there is a question as to whether the same factors are influential to their higher education decisions. The purpose of this study was to compare the responses of Virginia Tech Honors students with current literature to determine the influences associated with college or university selection between the two data sets. The methodology used in this study included qualitative focus-group interviews of Virginia Tech Honors freshmen who had been admitted into the Program for the fall semester of 1992 and had remained Honors eligible for the spring semester of 1993. six interview sessions were arranged for 50 students. An interview protocol was designed to ask six questions to the participants, focusing on how they made their final decisions to attend virginia Tech. Thirty-six students actually participated in the interviews. Six conceptual categories emerged from the interviews. These categories included: (1) Academic Programs; (2) Campus Atmosphere/Life; (3) Influential People; (4) Location; (5) Money; and (6) Recruitment. Seven conceptual categories were discovered in the literature. These categories were discovered included: (1) High School Grade Point Average; (2) Tuition; (3) Geographic Location; (4) Parental, Peer, and Alumni Influence; (5) Academic Reputation; (6) Job Placement; and (7) Campus Visit. The results from the study indicated that most students, regardless of their status, consider similar factors in their choices of colleges. Most important among the factors included the cost, campus visit, and reputation. / Master of Arts