In this study, I investigated how information technology (IT) professionals learn/acquire soft skills. Little is understood about how IT professionals describe and apply the soft skills that they consider necessary for their own employability. Exploring how IT professionals describe and apply soft skills is important to their future work and…

Black children today fight to define their own futurity beyond the myth of low aspirations -- a dominant societal ideology which limits Black success to careers in professional sports and entertainment and blames Black families and communities for devaluing education. Informed by career aspiration research and qualitative methodologies, this study…

Historically, the United States (U.S.) has led the world in the development of innovative high-tech solutions that increased employment opportunities, wages, productivity, and the economic growth of our nation. However, STEM workers are in great need to fill the millions of vacancies in the STEM workforce. Despite the increasing demand for STEM…

Prior language and literacy support from home, community and heritage language (HL) schools provides young HL learners with linguistic and metalinguistic foundations for language and literacy development (Chinen & Tucker "Heritage Language Journal" 3:27-59, 2005; Koda et al. Chinese as a heritage language: Fostering rooted world…

Involvement in honors programs provides students an opportunity to grow academically, connect with like-minded peers, and reap tangible and intangible benefits. Understanding the motivations driving this involvement is a crucial task for honors program administrators and faculty alike as different motivations may influence how students engage and…

Social capital can positively influence students' postsecondary aspirations and their postschool transitions to higher education and employment. Educators, families, and young people themselves can play an active role in generating and developing adolescents' social capital. A targeted focus on developing robust social capital could play an…

Reduced formal civic education, a decrease in intergenerational closure, and a drop in participation in political institutions and civic organizations, voluntary associations, and community-focused entities in recent decades mean it is likely that young people are not getting adequate civic training and are therefore less able to contribute to the…

The problem investigated in this study was the lack of persistence of 1st-year African American male students at a community college in a southeastern state. In the fall of 2018, only 55% of African American male students progressed through their 1st year compared to 70% of White male students. The purpose of this qualitative study was to explore…

Youth formerly in foster care (YFFC) are one of the most underserved student populations in higher education, yet they remain on the peripheries of national student success discourse. As momentum for improving postsecondary education completion for underserved students grows nationally, the time seems ripe to take stock of what we know (and do not…

Experiences of and exposures to violence impact older adolescents and young adults in a myriad of ways. While typically conceptualized as interpersonal, other forms of violence, namely structural and symbolic, can be harmful to development for this population. This study utilized qualitative methodologies, including ethnographic field notes and…

This dissertation examined factors affecting the college choice of African American male undergraduate students at two private liberal arts colleges in the South. The study explored African American male undergraduate students experiences, perceptions, and attitudes toward the college selection process, using Hossler and Gallagher (1987) College…

Reading interest serves as an inherent driving force for children's reading. Current research shows that family cultural capital, school reading environment, and community reading culture all influence children's reading interests. According to the "family-school-community" collaborative education model, families, schools and communities…

Purpose: Research shows that family is influential to African Americans in college choice (Chapman "et al.," 2018; Chapman "et al.," 2020; Freeman, 2005; Hines "et al.," 2019; Lowry, 2017; Williams, 2018). However, it often overlooks unique, African-rooted characteristics of African American families and culture. This…

This article considers how the experience of community for young people from rural places (inclusive of regional and remote) can be influential in building a legacy of strengths and qualities, much like an inheritance. While there are many studies of rural youth, few consider rurality through complex social-relational dimensions; fewer still…

This dissertation was an investigation of how students in two-way bilingual immersion (TWBI) programs construct their bilingual identities inside and outside the school setting, highlighting the unique and multifaceted nature of their language development and cultural identity formation. TWBI programs aim to cultivate bilingualism and biliteracy,…