A realist evaluation framework asks what works best for whom under what circumstances. This study utilized a realist evaluation framework to determine which students benefited under what circumstances from supplemental instruction, an academic support program using peer-assisted problem-solving techniques. The study setting was a large urban…

The past five years have brought tremendous upheaval to Rhode Island schools. The COVID-19 pandemic has dramatically disrupted and reshaped education across the state and the nation. Emerging from the pandemic, schools face numerous challenges -- pervasive concerns about student mental health and well-being, substantial learning recovery needs,…

This report is intended to show the changes in attendance patterns for traditional college students enrolled in the North Dakota University System (NDUS) over a sixteen-year period between 2001-2016. This encompasses the entirety of Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS) reported data since the inception of online IPEDS reporting.…

This report is for students who wish to be full-time, but because of competing demands in their lives, attend part-time. Community colleges have long known that full-time students are more likely to complete college than are their part-time peers. In fact, a number of new completion efforts focus on full-time attendance throughout college.…

Community colleges have changed notably over the past quarter century, as have the demographics and educational trajectories of the growing proportion of traditional-age college students who attend them at some point along their transition to adulthood. This dissertation extends the literature on how institutional attendance intersects with change…

This study examines the relationship between community college enrollment patterns and student outcomes--credential completion and transfer to a 4-year institution--introducing a new way of visualizing the various attendance patterns of community college students. Patterns of enrollment intensity (full- or part-time status) and continuity…

Background/Context: Student utilization of complex enrollment patterns has been identified as a significant recent development in higher education. Nearly a dozen different multi-institutional attendance patterns have been identified, including co-enrollment. Co-enrollment is simultaneous enrollment at two or more colleges or universities during…

The purpose of this study was to investigate Black male graduation rates in public two-year, degree-granting institutions. Specifically, the researchers were interested in determining the influence (if any) of select institutional characteristics (e.g., attendance intensity, degree of urbanization, geographic region, institutional size) on…

Increasingly more service members are separating from the military as the United States draws down the force and moves towards a post-war era. Tens of thousands of these veterans will leverage their GI Bill tuition and housing benefits in an attempt to access Southern California community colleges and bolster their transition into mainstream…

In the United States, community colleges serve nearly half of the 18 million students enrolled in postsecondary education. However, it has only been the last decade or so where these public, two-year institutions have claimed substantial attention from the research community. This dissertation consists of three essays that focus on aspects of the…

The number of students attending higher education institutions has increased across the nation over the past few decades. Nearly 46% of students chose to begin postsecondary education or technical training at a community college (American Association of Community Colleges, 2008). Accessibility and lower tuition have contributed to the enrollment…

In recent months, some legislators, government agency officials, segments of the media, and campus administrators have called attention to perceived and proven instances of abuse of the federal student financial assistance programs. Concerns have focused on students enrolling in courses primarily to secure student financial aid funds rather than…

An early warning system is a data-based tool that helps predict which students are on the right path towards eventual graduation or other grade-appropriate goals. Through such systems, stakeholders at the school and district levels can view data from a wide range of perspectives and gain a deeper understanding of student data. This "Statewide…

Community college students take circuitous routes through their education; very few enroll full-time and continue until they graduate. Erratic enrollment patterns have been negatively linked with academic progress and eventual credential completion--students enrolled continuously and on a full-time basis are more likely to attain their academic…

We identify "tenacious persisters" as returning students who have stopped out of college or who delayed their entry into college for more than three years after high school. Using a mixed method approach, we compare the experiences of tenacious persisters enrolled in a community college to students who followed more standard persistence paths.…