Under a 'widening participation' agenda, universities are currently being encouraged by Government to admit students from under-represented groups and those with non-traditional qualifications. The University of Sunderland has been one of the most successful in attracting students from these groups. but has been less successful at retaining those students and helping them achieve. This research investigates the reasons for this lack of success. It tackles the issue in three phases: An initial investigation into student stress showed significant differences between Alevel entrants and non-traditional entrants to Sunderland Business School. Poor person-environment fit and unmet expectations were identified as important sources of stress. A subsequent investigation of student expectations again revealed significant differences between A-level and non-traditional entrants in areas relating to the academic experience, with A-level entrants showing lower levels of enjoyment of learning and poorer match with expectations, accompanied by a significant fall in the academic performance of the A-level entrants over the first two years at university. The research concludes that there is poor academic integration of Alevel students into a system that has been adapted over recent years to cater for the needs of non-traditional entrants. Other expectations were reported as widely unmet by all students, and these were further investigated using the concept of the psychological contract. The findings suggest that many students have an incongruent psychological contract that can result in their under-achievement at university. The research proposes a model of the student/university psychological contract that can be used as a framework for further research into this issue.

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The purpose of this research was to examine the issues pertaining to the change to a credit based system (CBS) in its first academic year of implementation 1997/98. Through the use of a longitudinal study, interviews were administered to academic and management staff at the beginning and end of the first CBS academic year, to evaluate the expectations and the reality of the implementation of a CBS at The Hong Kong Polytechnic University. The findings disclosed that the faculty and its staff were prepared and reacted well to the introduction of a CBS. However, the development of this new system tended to be an amalgamation of pre-existing programmes. The overall expectations of CBS had to do more with the operational aspects of the new scheme than with the anticipated results of CBS itself. Final examinations were reintroduced to coursework-only subjects. The elective selection process was moved closer to the semester they were offered. A relationship was established between the extent of participants' previous CBS experience and ease of introduction. This finding was further significant as previous CBS knowledge resulted in frustration over the slow pace and the extent of the scheme being introduced. To ease the phasing-in process, it is recommended that staff be involved in the early stages of establishing CBS. There also appears to be a clear need for further advice, explanation and guidelines on the new grading system. The university may need to secure a centralised examination system, including an examination timetable. More training for management and staff on how to advise students is needed. A task group is suggested to standardise CBS administrative procedures university-wide. Furthermore, the university needs to encourage departments to open up their subjects and, at the same time, give their students real opportunities to take up the choices offered.

The problem of this study was to compare the attitudes toward youth of students enrolled in two selected programs of student teaching at North Texas State College.

The purpose of this study was to compare the activities and achievements in college of a population of three groups of academically able students who participated in a high school honors program. The population consisted of (1) those who completed an honors program, (2) those who dropped out of an honors program, and (3) those who entered an honors program at a time later than the entry of the first two groups. This study was concerned with discovering distinguishing activities and achievements of the male and female members of the three groups through an analysis and comparison of data relative to the groups after their completion of two or more years of college.

The purpose of this study was to investigate the relationship of student-faculty interactions, student-staff interactions, and student-peer interactions of Latino students to their intent to persist toward graduation in community colleges in Texas. Parental educational level (for both mother and father), first generation status, gender, and English as a second language served as additional predictor variables. The existing data used for this investigation were collected by the Center for Community College Student Engagement and included longitudinal data from the years 2012, 2011, and 2010. Data from 12,488 randomly selected Latino students enrolled in Texas community colleges were obtained and used for the study. The research design method was non-experimental using extant data. To assess the relationships between student engagement variables and Latino student intent to persist, correlations and logistic regression were used. Though no relationship was found between intent to persist and student-faculty interactions (r = -.017, p = .066, n= 11,824) or student peer interactions, (r = -.012, p = .208, n = 11,766), a positive relationship was found between intent to persist and student-staff interaction (r = .048, p = .000, n = 10,794) with an extremely small effect size (r2 = .002). Among the variables of parental level of education, first generation college student status, gender, and English as a second language status, only mother's educational level emerged as a significant predictor for intent to persist, R2 = .048, ?2 (8, N = 7,862) = 62.606, p < .0001. The findings suggest the possibility that staff availability and accessibility is important for Latino student persistence. In order to retain Latino community college students, knowledgeable staff able to facilitate students' successful navigation of the educational system is recommended to be a part of the community college's student success strategies. In addition the findings regarding parental education indicate that community colleges would be well advised to offer programs that engage and include parents as students proceed toward achieving their academic goals.

The thesis addresses the relationship of class size to student performance in a rural state. It presents findings from a longitudinal study of a cohort of students who were tested with state assessments at grade 4 in 2000, again at grade 8 in 2004 and, finally at grade 10 in 2006. Graduation rates for five large-class sized schools and five small-class sized school populations were established in 2008. All scores (n=1137) were matched across time enabling students from similar socioeconomic backgrounds from schools that were considered small (average class size, n=11) to schools that were large (average, n= 20). The paper’s focus is on the extent that students from schools that maintained large and small classes differed in selected opportunities to learn and educational outcomes. The approach to the study utilized both large scale state databases for student backgrounds and outcomes and interviews with school personnel in order to identify school policy and practices that might be linked to performance differences. The primary goal of this research study was to determine if small classes resulted in improved student achievement compared to those students in larger classes. Although Vermont does not have the large class sizes of the quasi-experimental studies and policy initiatives cited in the literature, it does have a wide range of average class sizes. The targeted high school math and English classes of this study ranged from an average of 11 students in the average small class to 20 in the average large class. If class size were a critical influence on students’ academic achievement, one would expect to see significant differences between students who were educated in classes nearly twice as large as other classes. This study concludes that there was no such difference. In terms of academic achievement, with the exception of 10th grade math scores, students in larger classes performed the same or better than students in smaller classes. Students in larger classes had slightly higher graduation rates, and a larger proportion planned to attend two or four year colleges.

In my clay, mixed media, and photographic work I present vignettes of my life and aspects of my heritage to the viewer. While working with clay, I create houses that personify different aspects of my personality, depending on what was happening in my life at the time. I also make pots that reflect elements of my environment. My mixed media and digital photography work is a more intimate look at my Middle Eastern heritage from belly dancing to snapshots of my family.

As enrollment of minority students and recruitment of minority faculty in higher education increase, opportunities for students to interact with racially and ethnically different faculty will become more frequent and pronounced. Also, there may be expectations that these interactions will produce greater educational gains and sensitivity to racial issues. A quantitative research methodology was employed to measure the nature of the student-faculty interactions across race and to explore factors that influence undergraduate students’ GPA and multicultural perceptions in order to identify ways in which student-faculty interactions might better serve the students. Mainly, this study focused on the quantity, quality, and socialization of interactions between White and Asian students and faculty members. The instrument used for data collection was a combination of five national online surveys that were designed to assess college students’ perceptions and experiences of their student-faculty interactions and data were gathered with White and Asian faculty and students at Virginia Commonwealth University. Data collection consisted of surveying students and faculty members via email. The researcher found that only the quality of student-faculty interactions, which belongs to the quality of interactions, had a positive impact on students’ GPA (.06) and their multicultural perceptions (.18). A better understanding of factors influencing students’ GPA and multicultural perceptions would be beneficial for both teachers and undergraduate students at VCU.

As the need for graduate education continues to rise, universities must consider new ways to recruit graduate students from all over the world. This practicum document describes the design of a specialized student housing centre at the University of Manitoba that focuses on meeting the needs of graduate students specifically. Literature on community living and human wellness as well as several precedent studies helped to inform the programming and spatial planning of the project as well as each of the interior design considerations. The intense nature of graduate education can take its toll on the mental and physical well-being of graduate students. The interior design of the proposed Graduate Student Housing Centre (GSHC) aims to provide a welcoming and energizing third place environment where graduate students can live, study, network, play, and relax within one convenient location. / October 2016