This paper addresses the special problems faced by rural community colleges, their staffs, and students. Financing problems are severely felt in rural areas where distances, low tax bases, absence of community resources, and the inability to take advantage of the economies of size add to the inflationary burden. The position of the college in the…

This study examined the critical thinking skills of resident and commuter students during the freshmen year, controlled for precollege background and ability. Differences in commuter and resident students' experience, particularly aspects of academic and social integration were also considered. The study sample was a subset taken from a national…

The higher education system is seen as having deteriorated in the 1970s due to change in academic schedules, increased size of institutions, impaired effectiveness of faculties, inability of institutions to adjust to increased percentage of disadvantaged students, increase in part-time and nonresidential students, and excessive market orientation…

Indian Hills Community College, faced with rising utility bills dues to inadequate insulation in the campus's older buildings, now utilizes a four-day week during the winter quarter as an energy conservation measure. Planning for the implementation of the four-day week, which began in 1976, was coordinated by an overall energy committee made up of…

A study examined university service delivery in an isolated, inland region of south Western Australia. Surveys, focus groups, and interviews with students and former students found that many pre-university youths leave the area because education is only offered through year 10. Therefore, college students in the area tend to be mature-aged. Key…

The interaction between changing student populations and the study-lounge facilities provided for their extracurricular higher educational experiences is considered. Trends indicate that increasing numbers of students are commuting to the college campus and that: the commuting student lifestyle can be characterized by multiplicity of roles;…

Student satisfaction with the environments of five commuter colleges was studied at an eastern university. A reliable instrument was developed to profile 2,392 students' perceptions of 30 aspects of the college environment. To determine how student characteristics relate to their evaluations of the college environment, eight regression analyses…

Diversity is welcomed at the Jefferson Davis Campus, Mississippi Gulf Coast Junior College, where the commuting students include teenagers, retired military personnel, displaced homemakers, the foreign-born, blacks, the full-time employed, and senior citizens. The students are counseled to take a reading and study skills class if their reading…

Needs of off-campus students in Southern West Virginia, and specifically students enrolled at Bluefield State College, are considered. The computer college has several off-campus locations, including one 60 miles away, and it serves a population that tends to have low educational attainment levels. One environmental factor that influences student…

Many research studies which deal with the teaching of economics at the college level conclude that different teaching methods do not lead to very different results in terms of student achievement. This paper suggests that one reason student achievement may fail to demonstrate the superiority of one teaching method over another is that achievement…

Information about and excerpts from the 1981 "Commuter Institution Index," an annual publication on research on commuter institutions of higher education are presented. The Index provides an overview of the demographic characteristics of responding institutions and the functions most frequently performed by these institutions for commuters. It…