Persistently low graduation rates continue to leave educators in search of ways to promote the success of college students. One understudied factor that scholarship has linked to student persistence and success is students' confidence in their major and career paths--their major and career self-efficacy (MCSE). Ways to increase students' MCSE in…

Theoretical modeling has been a widely used tool in the student persistence literature for many years; however, only recently has it been applied to the Historical Black College or University (HBCU) context in an intentional way. We investigated a theory of student persistence in commuter institutions at 2 commuter HBCUs (N = 147 students).…

This qualitative study describes the experiences of 16 successful first-generation college students (FGCS) utilizing a theoretical lens, informed significantly by bioecological systems theory (Bronfenbrenner, 1979), which guided our qualitative analyses of interview transcripts to examine the activities, roles, and relationships of these students…

Little research has focused carefully on the means by which peer mentors foster development in undergraduate protégés. Two faculty members developed a holistic, peer-mentoring project in which 26 upperclassmen mentored 74 underclassmen at a midsize, 4-year institution. Mentor journal notes, open-ended protégé responses, and participant…