A generation ago, Latina sororities were in their infancy on American college campuses. Membership has ebbed and flowed since the founding of the first one, Lambda Theta Alpha, at Kean University in Union, New Jersey, in December 1975. Though still small in member numbers today, compared to more long-established mainstream fraternities and…

In January 2009, in the last week of the Bush Administration, the U.S. Department of Education (ED), upon orders from the departing political appointee staff, published the final report in a long running National Evaluation of Upward Bound (UB). The study was conducted by the contractor, Mathematica Policy Research. After more than a year in…

Obtaining a bachelor's degree favorably makes an impact in marginalized groups because it promotes social mobility to individuals who live in poverty. The students from the Academic Special Services Program of the Rio Piedras Campus at the University of Puerto Rico come from disadvantaged areas of society. The research was focused on finding out…

Undergraduate populations at colleges and universities have become increasingly diverse in recent years, and one of the greatest shifts has been the steadily increasing numbers of first generation college students (FGCS), students whose parents did not attend college. Studies of FGCS have concluded that retention is less likely for FGCS than…

Parents who have not had opportunities to attend college themselves have neither experience with the process of college preparation and college going nor sufficient access to needed information. This article describes a collaborative venture between a university department of education and a cluster of local schools designed to help parents of…

Given the pressure to remain competitive in the global knowledge economy, it is in the shared national interest to act to increase the number of students who not only enter college, but more importantly, earn their degrees. Changing national demographics requires a refocus of efforts on improving postsecondary access and success among populations…

The research citations and resource materials presented here examine Student Support Services, one of eight federally funded TRIO programs designed to increase retention and degree attainment. Student Support Services attempts to bridge the transition from high school to college for over 280,000 first-generation, low-income, and disabled students…

This study examined the relationships among first-year students' employment, engagement, and academic achievement using data from the 2004 National Survey of Student Engagement. A statistically significant negative relationship was found between working more than 20 hours per week and grades, even after controlling for students' characteristics…

The purpose of this analysis was to examine academic intentions, parental support, and peer support as predictors of self-reported academic behaviors among a sample of 329 first- and continuing-generation college freshmen. Regression analyses revealed that different variables predicted academic behaviors for the three groups examined (students…

The author works as an academic adviser and adjunct instructor at a small, public, four-year university that provides the usual spread of bachelor's degree programs, as well as several master's degrees. He has done similar work at a private liberal arts college and at a branch campus of a large state school. He brings to this work not only a PhD…

Yielding to pressure from Congress and grant recipients, the U.S. Education Department has agreed to abandon a controversial evaluation of the Upward Bound (UB) college-preparation program. The study, which began last year, was designed to measure whether Upward Bound would have a bigger impact on college-going rates if it were refocused on…

While open access is still possible at community colleges and state colleges in Florida through the Florida College System, and the numbers of those enrolling are increasing, retention of first generation students is still an issue. Florida has increased the opportunity to attend college by limiting the barrier that inadequate financial support…

This study investigates how community college students' current levels of computer technology competence, confidence and attitudes toward technology in learning at a community college are affected by current access to technology and by demographic characteristics as well as by past experiences with computer technology. The research questions…

"First-generation" college students, whose parents have not attended college, are an increasing presence at elite colleges and universities. Admitting these students, however, is not enough to ensure that they can take full advantage of the opportunities available to them in college and succeed there. Indeed, research indicates that…

The U.S. Department of Education reports that students who are the first in their families to pursue an undergraduate education comprise a minority of the student population at public four-year educational institutions, and comprise an even smaller percentage at elite, private four-year institutions (Engle, Bermeo, and O'Brien 2006). This…