Objective: Early college high schools (ECHSs) allow high school students to accumulate credit toward an associate degree at little or no cost, often through partnerships with community colleges. The goal is to facilitate students' socialization into higher education, or the process of learning the skills, knowledge, and dispositions required for…

The purpose of this qualitative study was to explore single-mother college students' perceptions of their college-related experiences and to learn about campus services related to these experiences that could help them during their college journey. Ten single mothers were interviewed using a semi-structured interview guide. Five themes emerged…

In order to explore themes of privilege in regard to policy availability, language accessibility, and underlying bias, policies related to two topics of interest to higher education campus visitors, campus firearm carry policy and smoking policy, are explored to determine how Web-based information is presented to various audiences. Implications of…

The 2007 mass shooting at Virginia Tech is one part of a decades-long increase in the frequency of gun violence on U.S. college and university campuses (Drysdale, Modzeleski, & Simons, 2010; Ferraro, 2015). The events at Virginia Tech also served as a catalyst for the spread of so-called "campus-carry" laws, or acts of state policy…

Addressing the widespread problem of sexual assault in college environments requires both prevention programming and policies addressing sexual misconduct in institutions of higher education. Through the Campus Sexual Assault Policy and Prevention Initiative, nine programs funded by the Office on Women's Health approached this problem within a…

Ethnic studies programs have recently been the target of positive and negative scrutiny in both the K-12 system and in 4-year institutions. There is a critical disconnect in the research on ethnic studies in community colleges, which serve a large proportion of racially minoritized students. Moreover, studies tend ignore how ethnic studies courses…

Access to sexual and reproductive health care and information can affect college students' ability to succeed in higher education. Yet community colleges often do not consider students' reproductive health access when considering how to promote their academic success. This report summarizes findings from original research conducted by the…

The purpose of this study is to assess the effectiveness of the Texas "Closing the Gaps by 2015" plan to increase Hispanic enrollment into and graduation from institutions of higher education. This study uses Interrupted Time Series with Comparison Group to analyze 26 years of student cohorts in Texas universities. Controlling for…

This study focuses on advising international students in a Texas community college. Guided by Bronfenbrenner's ecological model, I explored how academic advising with international students was shaped by individual backgrounds and environmental influences. I utilized a qualitative research design and analyzed information collected from interviews…

To make the transfer student pathway viable to meet workforce needs, it is essential to think beyond simply linking two institutions and getting students in the door--students need to be supported throughout the adjustment period. In this article, we address the "support" aspect of the problem by reporting findings from 306 engineering…

Objective: Guided by validation theory, this study aims to better understand the role that academic advising plays in international community college students' adjustment. More specifically, this study investigated how academic advising validates or invalidates their academic and social experiences in a community college context. Method: This…

The purpose of this study is to explore factors that may contribute to the persistence and graduation rates of African American and Hispanic undergraduate males enrolled at regional fouryear public universities in Texas. African American and Hispanic males have lower graduation rates in both secondary and post-secondary education than their White…

Emergency response systems can be improved by investigating the motives and manner in which people share information during an active shooter crisis. This article analyzed survey data collected from undergraduate participants at The University of Texas at Austin who were enrolled during the fall of 2010 when an active shooter event occurred on…

Through an analysis of relevant social science evidence, this article provides a deeper understanding of critical mass, a concept that has become central in litigation efforts related to affirmative action admissions policies that seek to further the educational benefits of diversity. We demonstrate that the concept of critical mass requires an…

The purpose of this mixed-method case study was to explore the institutional practices that may influence persistence for Hispanic undergraduate students at a four-year public research university in Texas. Data were gathered from 255 students using an on-line survey and follow-up interviews with ten students and three administrators. The combined…