Past research has not established empirical links between living arrangement, identity achievement, and adjustment to college. This study examined the associations of living arrangement on the identity achievement and adjustment to college of first-year college students.

This dissertation is an examination of influences that have contributed to the retention of a group of minority students attending a predominately white postsecondary institution. The focus of the study is on the students' perspectives and the meaning and personal interpretation students draw from influences that impinge upon them and from their interactions with the college experience. From a sociological perspective this view and emphasis on meaning is described as the sociology of everyday life. The component of the sociology of everyday life which directed the methodology is symbolic interactionism. The data collection instrument was a focused interview. Variables from the Metzner and Bean (1987) Conceptual Model of Nontraditional Student Attrition and Tinto (1987) Student Integration Model served as the starting point for the formation of the open-ended questions. The selected group of students were participants in a collaborative program between a school district, a community college, and a state university designed to encourage minorities to pursue careers in education. Twelve out of 25 qualified participants volunteered for the study. They represented a heterogeneous group of African-American, Hispanic-American, and Asian-American students. The data indicated that while the students had divergent family and educational experiences prior to entering the college, certain circumstances took place that were in many instances similar. The findings were multifaceted and represent institutional, environmental, and personal influences. Institutional influences included the encouragement of faculty and staff, introduction of college as a choice either early in their lives or when they were ready to make career changes, academic supports, ethnic and multicultural studies, a familiar site on campus to go for assistance, and the availability of supportive administrators and faculty. Environmental influences included familiarity with the lack of employment opportunities without a college degree, and experience in racially integrated environments. Personal influences included assistance with college expenses from a family member, awareness of the economic limitations without advanced training, and personal commitment and determination to persist. Supportive relationships within the context of the students' families, educational experiences and the broader society of which they were an integral part all played influential roles in the persistence of the students.

The purpose of this study was to describe the resilience in adult at-risk college students who had overcome adverse circumstances and the role resilience played in the post secondary experience in formal education. This qualitative study examined the characteristics and behaviors of resilience within the framework of human development.The eight study participants were clients of the Educational Opportunity Center program in Fort Wayne, Indiana. The study participants were low-income, first generation college students. Several assessment tools were administered to evaluate levels of resilience in the eight participants. In addition, all participants were interviewed, which allowed the participants to share their post secondary experience.The analysis of the evidence gathered showed that the eight participants exhibited traits of resiliency. These traits included being goal-oriented and exhibiting a desire to excel, exhibiting positive responses to new opportunities, using a capacity to delay gratification, demonstrating a high level of personal discipline and responsibility, being self-understanding and independent, exhibiting a high self-esteem, being flexible and creative in responding to life events, displaying a strong internal locus of control, making wise use of the presence and support of a caring person, building positive relationships with others, selecting environments that provided positive and high expectations as well as an opportunity to participate and contribute, possessing an easy-going temperament, finding meaning in life and having a vision of the future, responding with a sense of humor, and possessing a strong faith.All of the eight participants believed that resilience is present in all people and that resilience can be learned. There was not sufficient evidence provided by the assessment tools in this study to support strongly that resilience is a developmental process in adulthood. However, the analysis of the data gathered from the interviews suggest that resilience may be learned and strengthened by observing and learning from others.Conclusions and recommendations of this study focused on the identification of resilient at-risk adult students, determination of the role environment plays in the development and use of resilience in at-risk adult students, and the evaluation of effective assessment tools in identifying resilient at-risk students. Implications of this study for low-income, first-generation post secondary students include providing and strengthening the support of at least one caring adult in students' lives, as well as determining methods to teach or foster resilient behavior in at-risk adult students. / Department of Educational Leadership

Retention, attrition, persistence, dropout literature.

While college completion rates have increased over time for all students, low-income students and students of color remain underrepresented among degree holders. The research presented here explores the role that family, peer, and contextual social capital play in perpetuating unequal representation in college, and whether AVID can increase the social capital resources available to students. Using multilevel models and data from the High School Longitudinal Study of 2009 (HSLS:09), results indicated a positive, significant relationship between social capital and rigorous course taking, high school credential attainment, and college-going, with the relationship with family social capital being the strongest. The analyses revealed no direct relationship between AVID participation and academic outcomes, but results did offer modest evidence that some sources of social capital increase more for AVID students over time than non-AVID students with similar characteristics. These findings suggest that educational reform efforts aimed at building social capital are worth supporting. Keywords: social capital; AVID; HSLS:09 dataset; college access; first-generation students; noncognitive skills; cultural capital; neighborhoods; habitus

This study identified the problems of mature college women students, assessed their intensity, and described relationships between the intensity of problems and the following seven demographic variables: number of credit hours for which they were currently enrolled, number of hours previously earned, age range, marital status, number of dependent children, age range of youngest child, and estimated total annual family income range. The Introductory Chapter includes the problem, purposes, research questions, background and significance, definitions, and limitations of the study. Chapter II contains a review of the literature concerning mature women, with a focus on two areas: (a) motivation for enrolling in college and (b) measured personality traits. The need for further research on the problems of mature women is also presented. Chapter III describes the subjects, the development of the questionnaire, procedures for the collection of data, and the method of treatment of the data. The findings are reported in Chapter IV. The summary, conclusions and recommendations are presented in Chapter V.

Sociohistorical, sociopolitical and sociostructural barriers in American society create different paths in the college-to-work transition. Some individuals can follow their natural calling for a vocation, while others must contend with limited access to occupational opportunities. The emancipatory communitarian (EC) framework advocates for resisting and changing of structural barriers that hinder the career path of oppressed groups. Social Cognitive Career Theory (SCCT) explains how sociocultural and background contextual factors interact with self-efficacy, outcome expectations, and career goals to shape career behavior. The present study investigated the relation of ethnic identity and acculturation to self-efficacy beliefs and outcome expectations by testing the validity of SCCT tenets with a sample of 357 Latina/o college students. An EC-SCCT framework was used to explore the relationships among ethnic identity, acculturation level, career decision self-efficacy, coping efficacy, and perceived barriers. The results of a modified path model demonstrated that, for this sample, career decision self-efficacy mediated the influence of ethnic identity and Anglo bicultural orientation on the perception of career barriers. The findings also point to the role of ethnic identity in augmenting Latina/o students' career decision self-efficacy and increasing awareness about career barriers (e.g., ethnic discrimination). The current study contributes to the literature promoting a liberational approach to vocational and counseling psychology theory, research, and practice. Limitations and implications for theory, research, training, and practice are discussed.

Contrary to the model minority myth that portrays Asian Americans as academic all-stars over-represented in elite four-year institutions, half of all Asian American college students do in fact attend community colleges, and many experience myriad challenges. This exploratory study investigated the community college pathways of Asian American community college students, the role of family and culture in shaping expectations for higher education, and participants’ perceptions of the model minority myth and the degree to which this myth influenced their college experiences. Institutional practices and policies, or lack thereof, that support the success of this highly diverse population were also studied. Purposeful sampling was used to gather a sample of 28 students, who self-identified as Asian American and attended one of the three largest community college districts located in North Texas. The sample included 16 males and 12 females, whose ages ranged from 18 to 49 years old, with a mean age of 24. Data collection involved a demographic questionnaire and semi-structured individual interviews. The participants represented 13 different ethnicities, and nine were members of more than one ethnic or racial group. Ten participants were foreign-born citizens, and all of the participants had at least one foreign-born parent. Qualitative data provided description rich information that shed light on the expectations, experiences, and views of Asian American community college students, a virtually unstudied population. Consistent with current literature on Asian American college students, the findings suggest many Asian American community college students struggle with tremendous cultural and familial pressures for succeeding academically, and many described their experiences with racial microaggressions related to model minority stereotypes that they perceived their peers and instructors to have held. Recommendations for policy and practice designed to improve educational outcomes for Asian American community college students are addressed.

The problem of this study concerned the relationship between the academic achievement of students in Jordan state universities and the socioeconomic status (SES) of their families. A survey composed of questions regarding demographics, SES background, cultural factors, and accumulated grade point average (GPA) was administered by four Jordanian professors in four state universities in Jordan. Of the 620 surveys made, there were 609 usable surveys analyzed using the Statistical Package of Social Science SPSS/PC+. Data were sorted so that families' SES variables, namely fathers' and mothers' income, occupation, and education, and students' GPA were identified on a 9-point ordinal scale. Pearson's chi-square was used to determine whether relationships existed between parents' SES and with students' GPA. Spearman's correlation was also used to determine the direction and strength of the relationships. The same data were then compressed from 9 to a 3-point ordinal scale and were used to determine the relationship between studendts' GPA and their parents1 SES. For this purpose a one-way Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) was used. Five additional related questions concerned relationship between degree of religious commitment of parents, number of siblings, parents' kinship, parents1 educational aspiration, and reason for parents' educational aspiration, and students' GPA were identified on a 4-point ordinal scale and also tested using the one-way ANOVA, the Tukey/Kramer method, and the Eta coefficient.

Much scholarship on first-generation students has focused on their academic and social integration in college (Collier & Morgan, 2008; Lowery-Hart & Pacheco, 2011; Stuber, 2011). Little is known about the experiences of first-generation students in schools of social work. In this research I've expanded the focus beyond students' experiences of academic integration to explore how first-generation students in a school of social work describe their relational worlds and the implications for professional socialization. Informed by Standpoint Feminism and Postmodern/Post structural Feminism, I conducted focus groups with 19 students in two undergraduate programs and one graduate program in a school of social work and analyzed these conversations using Voice-centered Relational Data Analysis (Brown & Gilligan, 1992). This research highlighted how students bridge the cultures of home and school through 1) Experiences of support from home cultures while 2) pursuing school largely on their own and experiencing 3) the potential for distance from cultures of home, as they 4) work to stay integrated in home cultures while simultaneously 5) working to become integrated in school. I've also written about students' experiences of becoming caught "in-between" the cultures of home and school (Anzaldúa, 1987/2012), a less common but nevertheless important experience for educators to attend to. Here I've argued for broadening the focus beyond academic integration (Tinto, 1975, 1993) and underscored the relational nature of first-generation status, as well as drawing attention to potential for relational injury embedded in our narratives about educational attainment and class mobility. Implications for social work education, practice, and research are discussed.