Many nontraditional students specifically enroll in online degree programs for the scheduling flexibility they afford, given that these students are often balancing work, family, and other obligations. Nevertheless, obligations beyond the classroom are often prioritized when compared to traditional students. Lack of resources and a general…

The literature on college choice is extensive and navigating it for purposes of review is complicated by the dual meaning given to the word choice. To clarify, in this article, the phrase "college choice" refers to the concept defined by Don Hossler and Karen Gallagher in their seminal 1987 article entitled "Studying Student College…

In the United States, approximately 33 percent of all community colleges offer at least one type of international education program; of those, about 13 percent offer designated education abroad programs (Malveaux and Raby 2019). Advocacy for community college international education is also not new and is evident in publications, reports, and…

This literature review examines student retention in higher education institutions. Specifically, it looks at the background and history of student retention, three student retention theories, and current literature on student retention within the social system. The three theories are Spady's (1970, 1971) Undergraduate Dropout Process Model,…

The American Association of Collegiate Registrars and Admissions Officers (AACRO) examined eight areas of research interest to our members in 2018. They had enough longitudinal data to make comparisons of 2018 data to years past. For example, they repeated the registrar's career profile report and learned there will be a large number of…

A review of the literature reveals that low-income students encounter barriers to higher education. Common barriers include the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) (Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, n.d.; College Board 2010; Dwyer 2015; Feeney and Heroff 2013; Goldrick-Rab 2016; Nagaoka, Roderick and Coca 2009; Perez-Antonia 2016)…

The American Association of Collegiate Registrars and Admissions Officers (AACRAO) examined nine research areas of interest to its members in 2017. Six took the form of 60-Second Surveys; one was a career profile; another examined community college completion initiatives including student attitudes about community college; and one was completed in…

In 2016, more than 1.6 million students took the Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT), a standardized college admissions test (College Board 2016a). Researchers have estimated that 33 percent of students who take the SAT participate in some mode of formal test preparation, such as private tutoring or classes, to prepare for the exam (Buchmann, Condron…

This study provides an overview and a snapshot of new student orientation (NSO) and new student e-orientation (NSEO) programs, with a focus on the content and feature analysis of the NSEOs. It offers an overview of currently available NSO programs of 100 randomly selected community colleges from a master list of nearly 900 community colleges in…

During the past few years, "soft power" has been widely discussed and studied in China. Higher education, one of the largest components of national soft power, has begun to play an active and important role. In this article, we review the literature on the soft power of colleges and universities and describe ways to enhance it; we also…

With the development of mass higher education in China, confusion--a contradictory state between college students' awareness of employment, learning, morality, and their own behavior and societal requirements--is proving a ubiquitous problem among college students. His confusion has garnered much social attention. In this paper, the origins of…