Belonging and Mattering in the First-Year Welcome Experience: A Comparison Study Before and During COVID-19.

Institutions value knowledge about programs and services that are most effective at enhancing the collegiate experience, particularly sense of belonging and mattering for their students. The knowledge has become more pivotal due to the COVID-19 pandemic impact and as a result, the transitioning of most programs and services to a virtual environment. This study employs machine learning methods to analyze Fall Welcome survey data from Fall 2019 and Fall 2020. The purposes are threefold: 1) identify, rank, and contrast the top contributors to sense of belonging and mattering; 2) to understand quantitatively the impact of the pandemic on students’ welcoming experience; 3) to introduce and review an AI leveraged analytical visualization tool for key influencer analysis. Results indicated there has been a sharp decline in students’ connection, belonging, and mattering from fall 2019 to fall 2020 due to the pandemic. The opportunities to build connections, have an overall positive move-in experience and welcome experience are the three most common and significant contributors to students’ high level of belonging and mattering.

Examining Growth Among College Students With Intellectual and Developmental Disability: A Longitudinal Study

Inclusive postsecondary education programs for adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD) are proliferating across the United States. Although college can be a formative time for any student, there has been limited research on the growth that college students with IDD may experience during their time on campus. We address this gap by using a longitudinal design to examine the adaptive behavior, self-determination, executive functioning, and social skills of college students with IDD across three points in time—upon initial entry into the program, at the end of their first year, and at the end of their second year. Analyses suggested significant improvements in adaptive behavior and self-determination across the first year of the program. We offer recommendations for research and practice aimed at documenting and promoting growth for students with IDD throughout their collegiate experience.

Best Practices for Growing the STEM Pipeline for Women

In today's fast paced education system, a huge emphasis has been placed on increasing the number of women who want to enter college studying science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM). Many holistic interventions, particularly in engineering happening during the high school years, are already seeing results with college women investigating roles in engineering at a higher rate than in the past. However, the initial success they are experiencing in traditionally male-dominated STEM fields is not manifesting itself long term. It is clear that more strategies are needed to place women in the position to be more confident entering the workforce in all STEM fields especially engineering. This chapter will look at the innovative ways mentoring is being used during the course of a student's collegiate experience to keep women invested in the STEM fields and how more needs to be done in this area particularly for our minority women in order to grow the STEM pipeline permanently.

Crossing Goal Lines and Borders

Many Black male student-athletes suffer from identity foreclosure at rates higher than their white peers as they fail to develop salient aspects of their identity outside of the athlete role (Murphy, Petitpas, & Brewer, 1996; Beamon, 2012). Education abroad offers the opportunity to take advantage of a holistic collegiate experience, which impedes the detrimental effects of the athletic identity foreclosure process. International educational opportunities can positively influence Black male student-athletes’ personal, academic, and professional development as they come to see the world beyond the gym and campus. This article examines the significance and value of creating education abroad opportunities for Black male student-athletes as a means of providing meaningful educational opportunities in the realm of higher education.

Examining the role of perceived prestige in the link between students’ subjective socioeconomic status and sense of belonging

Low socioeconomic status (SES) students have a lower sense of belonging to college than high-SES students. Due to the importance of sense of belonging in the college pathway, understanding the reason for this relation is particularly important. Here, we argue that in addition to having less access to resources, low-SES students in the college context also perceive themselves as having lower prestige than their high-SES counterparts. Thus, in the present research, we tested perceived prestige as a mediator of the link between subjective SES and sense of belonging to college. We conducted 3 studies in 2 different countries (USA and China), and these investigations provided evidence that the lower students’ subjective SES, the lower their self-attributed prestige, and that prestige mediated the relation between students’ subjective SES and their sense of belonging to college. The implications of these findings for understanding the collegiate experience of low-SES students are discussed.

Club Rugby, the University Student Collegiate Experience, and Perceived Gains

To examine the relationship between club rugby participation, collegiate experiences, and perceived gains, 37 rugby players and 33 nonathlete students completed the Student-Athlete Experiences Inventory–Revised, Student-Athlete Gains Inventory, and Perceived Stress Scale at the start of a Spring semester. Linear regressions were used to determine the relationship between rugby participation, stress, participation in experiences, and perceived gains of students. The two gains modeled were practical and liberal arts gains. Practical arts gains were predicted positively by the experiences of active campus involvement and social interaction, while rugby was a negative predictor, adjusted R 2 = .280, F(3, 65) = 10.90, p < .0001. Liberal arts gains were predicted by social interaction, academic pursuits, and active involvement, adjusted R 2 = .22, F(4, 64) = 6.06, p = .0005. This study confirms how experiences predict different perceived gains. Club rugby players should be encouraged to take advantage of support services on campus to prepare them for their careers.

Collegiate Sport Participation and Student-Athlete Development through the Lens of Emotional Intelligence

A continued debate persists over the place of sport within institutions of higher education. Proponents of sport champion its ability to contribute to a holistic notion of education and develop an array of competencies touted in institutional missions. There is however a dearth of empirical data examining the educational impact of athletic participation at the college level. This paper assessed the educational ability of collegiate sport participation in a unique manner, through the lens of Emotional Intelligence (EI). Student-athletes and students at five NCAA Division III institutions completed online assessments prior to and after the completion of the winter sports seasons. Evidence was produced that participation in a single season of collegiate sport does not develop interpersonal, intrapersonal, and leadership capacities significantly differently from the collegiate experience of students not participating in athletics. Institutions are advised to explore EI interventions as way to maximize the educative potential of sport.

Redesigning Traditional Programs to Meet the Needs of Generation Y

The 14th American generation is defined as those born after 1981, numbering between 31 and 55 million people who are now arriving on college campuses. These students bring to campus distinctive characteristics, attitudes, and expectations for the collegiate experience. College and university orientation program administrators have an opportunity to adapt to this generation by examining their characteristics. The current discussion provides an outline of how orientation programs meet changing student needs. Specifically, they need to convey institutional concern for new students, demonstrated through creative, unique programming that expresses a caring attitude toward students.

From acceptance to graduation: Supporting students in recovery throughout their college experience

Students entering universities while in recovery from addiction face unique challenges, such as transitioning from a high school to a university, adapting to life after treatment, and/or transferring from a junior college or different university setting. Students in recovery also encounter challenges upon graduation including addressing gaps of employment on resumes, interviewing skills, and general professionalism. Cougars in Recovery offers support to students in recovery at the University of Houston in their academic journey through the use of programs including Source of Strength, offering peer to peer mentorship within the community and Career Ready Coogs, providing support for students approaching graduation with professional development resources. Longitudinal data is still being collected to demonstrate the influence of Source of Strength on Cougars in Recovery member retention and how Career Ready Coogs influences professional growth and preparation for graduation. Peer mentorship and professional development programs can help students in recovery navigate the challenges of the collegiate experience and entering the professional world.

Influence of Participation in Athletics on Students’ Academic Performance in Uasin Gishu County

The study investigated the influence of learners’ participation in athletic activitieson academic performance of students in secondary school Uasin Gishu County. The study was grounded on Astin’s theory of involvement, whichasserts that students learn more when they are involved in both academic and social aspects of the collegiate experience. The study employed both quantitative and qualitative research process with a target population being students and teachers of Uasin Gishu County. Sample of 378 was calculated with aid Krecie &amp; Morgan sample table and sample was arrived at through stratified sampling on secondary schools and simple random sampling on selected secondary schools whose students were picked without bias. Tools for data collection included questionnaire, in-depth interview and review of literature. The tools were calibrated on validity and reliability through expert check and Chronbach’s Alpha Coefficient, which was 0.76, which was fair enough for utility of the questionnaires.The achieved data was analyzed based on confidence level of 95%and person correlation coefficient and using descriptive statisticsthat included frequencies, standard deviation and mean. The analysis was carried out with help of SPSS program. The finding indicated that participation in athletic activities has potential to positively influence students’ academic performance (R=0.632; p&lt;0.05). Athletics participationstimulates fine and gross motor growth, learner concentration and cognitive development. The finding suggests that schools need to create a conducive environment for participation in athletics and encourage the students to participate in order to enhance their performance.