The purpose of this study is to critically explore low-income women's
experience as they negotiate post secondary education in community colleges. Three
research questions explore the context through which low-income women have
entered the college experience, what that experience is like for them, and how the
community college experience has impacted their consciousness and view of their
futures. This study has significance because poverty is a critical social issue for
women, post secondary education is a route out of poverty yet social welfare policy
does not support access to education, community colleges have traditionally provided
access to education but supports for women have been diminished, and poor women's voices and their own definitions of educational access and success are missing from
the public and academic debate of these issues.
Past qualitative studies that focus on poor women's experience of college are
smaller parts of quantitative studies. Other existing in depth studies have focused on
obstacles, persistence, and support systems, or have been studies of special transitional programs formed specifically for welfare eligible women. There is little
knowledge of women's experience and sense of self from their perspective as
students who are also in poverty. This study uses the research technique of in depth
unstructured interviews with eight welfare eligible women student parents in
Oregon's Parents as Scholars Program. Six themes emerge from the narrative
interviews with the participants that that have implications for educational practice
and add to and expand the small body of qualitative work that has been done on the
college experiences of low-income women students. / Graduation date: 2012
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:ORGSU/oai:ir.library.oregonstate.edu:1957/29218 |
| Date | 01 May 2012 |
| Creators | Barry, Kate R. |
| Contributors | Roper, Larry D. |
| Source Sets | Oregon State University |
| Language | en_US |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis/Dissertation |
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