Purpose: The purpose of this journal-ready dissertation was to examine the 1-year persistence rates of Hispanic community college students in Texas for the 2007-2008 through the 2013-2014 academic years. Specifically, the relationship of the 1-year persistence rates for Hispanic students as a function of their institutional status (i.e., stayed or…

Financial instability is a common fiscal burden for many community college students and can serve as primary barrier to educational success (Quaye & Harper, 2015). Although traditional financial aid is structured to assist students in financing college expenses, many low-income students often face financial emergencies beyond the scope of…

Educators, policymakers, and institutions have worked for decades to increase rates of college graduation, but about half of students who enter college drop out without completing a bachelor's degree. Although the rate of student attrition is higher in the United States than in any other industrialized nation, about 30% of U.S. students will drop…

The current study uses a sample of community colleges to explore the specific organizational practices that mediate the link between entrepreneurial orientation and performance. The study focuses on a set of practices known as strategic enrollment management and finds that a college's entrepreneurial orientation predicts its enrollment management…

This paper examines the graduation rates between 2000 and 2015 of United States colleges and universities at the national, state, and institutional levels. This research focuses on two-year and four-year programs. Rates are investigated longitudinally along with variables that distinguish between public/private institutions, percentages of…

Disparities exist among Latinos in educational attainment. These disparities are magnified when comparing their access, persistence, and degree attainment to their Caucasian and Asian American counterparts. The purpose of this quantitative study is to discover the impact of cultural competence among academic advising professionals as it relates to…

Over 40% of undergraduates in the United States attend a community college; however, fewer than 50% complete a degree or certificate within 6 years. As a result, national and state leaders have endorsed completion agenda initiatives, including performance-based funding (PBF). Texas implemented a form of PBF for the 2014-2015 Academic Year (AY)…

Purpose: The purpose of the first study within this journal-ready dissertation was to determine the extent to which ethnicity/race-based differences were present in Texas community college completion rates specifically within workforce certificate programs. Regarding the second study, the purpose was to determine the extent to which gender…

As the socio-linguistic make-up of the United States shifts from an English monolingual country to a multilingual society, it becomes imperative that a pool of linguistically, knowledgeable, competent nurses are in the pipeline to the nursing workforce to meet the needs of a diverse lingual patient population. The continued lack of…

"Open Educational Resources" (OER) have the potential to replace traditional textbooks in higher education. Previous studies indicate that use of OER results in high student and faculty satisfaction, lower costs, and similar or better educational outcomes. In this case study, we compared students using traditional textbooks with those…

In response to a shortage of qualified Black and Hispanic teachers, community colleges (CC) have developed certificate programs and Associate of Arts degrees in teacher education to address shortages of minority teachers in the nation's classrooms. We examined one CC's effectiveness in transferring Black and Hispanic students to university teacher…

This study uses a unique synthesized set of data for community college students transferring to engineering by combining several cohorts of longitudinal data along with transcript-level data, from both the Community College and the University, to measure success rates in engineering. The success rates are calculated by developing Kaplan-Meier…

Retention is a complex issue of great importance to community colleges. Several retention models have been developed to help explain this phenomenon. However, these models typically have used four-year college and university environments to build their foundations. Several researchers have attempted to identify predictor variables using…

The completion agenda demands higher community college graduation rates among adult learners, and prior learning assessment (PLA) is a promising solution. PLA permits students to earn credit for college-level learning acquired outside of higher education and is associated with improved student outcomes. However, little is known regarding community…

This study uses Astin's (1999) Inputs-Environment-Outcomes (I-E-O) framework to investigate if a developmental math summer bridge program had a significant effect on six (6) student success measures; three pertaining to mindset/behaviors leading to student success: (1) college self-efficacy (CSE); (2) sense of belonging; and (3) engagement and…