As part of a two-semester advanced research methodology course, five PhD students completed three sketches--beginning, middle, and end of course--to represent how they were thinking and feeling about themselves as doctoral students as they progressed through their first year. They also wrote reflections to complement the sketches and shared their…

First-year students enrolling into higher education institutions experience multiple transitions requiring the support of student success programs. Students who enter college undecided about a major face additional hurdles to their success and may experience low academic self-efficacy as a result. A strengths-based approach to assisting these…

Forest school is a pedagogical practice widely used in the U.K., and increasingly in other parts of the world. This paper contributes to the growing body of research on forest school by focussing on how children engage with and respond to forest school. It draws on practitioners' experience of working with children to examine their perspectives on…

Academic integrity concerns related to students' use of technology have renewed calls for teaching, assessment, and learning best practices, including those that involve and empower students. Empowerment is a benefit of developing students' assessment literacies, or how students contextually understand, plan, and undertake assessment and use…

The role of university student housing in the lives of undergraduate students has changed. While student housing used to be understood only as a space to accommodate students who primarily come from out of town, now universities have started using student housing strategically to advance the success of the students. Student housing is now used to…

Can residential experiences help undergraduates develop holistic competencies? To answer this question, a study was conducted based on the insights of 211 residents in Hong Kong. Deductive and inductive content analyses were respectively used to examine residence life outcomes, particularly in holistic competencies, and to categorise the types of…

This study investigates Chinese international students' acculturation strategies and pragmatic intentions to address identity conflicts in Hong Kong study experiences through a developmental lens. We treat conflicts and stressors as indicators of active commitments and the process of engagement as strategic, goal-oriented, intentional investments…

The early college experience is different for everyone, but most would concede that the transition to college requires students to develop new social and academic habits. This transition can be daunting, especially in light of early coursework that sets the groundwork for competitive admission to professional programs. Further, the literature…

Research has articulated the benefits of autonomy in outdoor programming (e.g., Chang, 2017), and the independent student expedition (ISE) is one type of autonomous experience that has received attention across the literature. Research suggests that ISEs have the potential to foster personal growth and promote group development (e.g., Daniel et…

Purpose: The number of international students in China has been increasing over the recent decades. The rapid expansion of the international student population aroused concerns over the capacity of Chinese universities to fulfill international students' expectations toward academic development. Perceiving student learning experiences as an…

The purpose of this qualitative narrative inquiry was to explore the impact of institutional context on Black first-generation college women's identity development. We examined their experiences along the lines of their minoritized race, gender, and first-generation student status using intersectionality theory. Six Black, first-generation college…

The focus on equity and inclusion in the Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s led to the creation of Upward Bound (UB). The core mission of UB is to prepare high school students with the academic and social skills necessary to enroll in post-secondary education and beyond. However, there is a lack of empirical studies on how the growth of students'…

This qualitative study investigates, through focus groups, how students in upper secondary school in Norway experience schooling. The background for the study is a tension between measurable outcomes and the educational aim of supporting students' human growth, their "Bildung." As teacher educators, we wanted to learn about situations…

This qualitative study explored the experiences of 23 food insecure undergraduate students. We interviewed participants about their experiences with hunger and food access, including how food insecurity affected their daily lives. Using holistic student development as a theoretical framework, our thematic analysis of individual student interviews…

Utilizing Validation Theory through a social constructivist lens, this phenomenological study explores the ways in which institutional agents, peers, and family members contribute to the academic and interpersonal self-validation of Latine aspiring bilingual teachers who begin their higher education journey in the community college. All…