There are ramifications for the educational loss that comes with student disengagement. Contemporary use of alternative high schools focuses on Tier III responses to intervention for disengaged students at comprehensive high schools. Alternative schools are affiliated with students disenfranchised by traditional educational institutions and are…

Understanding student engagement with the institution from the first day of classes to the end of the semester would help inform the institution of the potential risk that a student will drop out of a class or of the school. Learning Management Systems (LMS) record student interactions with the system and might be able to be used to identify…

The first year of college is a critical time for students, as their early experiences can determine the path of their educational journey. Students are most at-risk for dropping out of college during their first year, and first-generation students have higher rates of departure than their continuing-generation peers. Student engagement, sense of…

This study researched students' perceptions of their adult relationships at school within the Check and Connect™ mentoring program. This research delved into the impact on fostering students' engagement and promoting academic success within a multi-tiered system of support (MTSS) at a suburban high school in Canterbury County, Florida. The current…

The intention of this dissertation in practice is to provide structure to a peer-to-peer mentoring program to improve the academic success of students, while building students' engagement and social emotional skills through connections and relationships within the school district. This study is situated in a rural school community with an…

The purpose of this phenomenological study was to explore the perspectives on engagement of students who had passed Model School Math (Integrated Math 1 or Algebra 1) and graduated within the years 2015 to 2019 from a Model Continuation High School in California. This study sought to discover the strategies, policies, and procedures which best…

A history of trauma can have a significant negative impact on the functioning of a student in the school environment. Check & Connect, a school engagement and dropout intervention program, has been found to have positive effects on student school engagement and decrease the likelihood of dropping out of school. However, a review of the Check…

Disparities in academic performance and degree attainment continue to affect systemically marginalized (SM) college students. Amidst these persistent inequities, this qualitative study aimed to better understand how SM students at a competitive university navigated their choice to engage with support and how they conceptualized success. The study…

Mentorship-based interventions have been found to have positive effects for youth at-risk of negative academic and behavioral outcomes. Implementation studies of school-based mentorship programs, such as the Check & Connect (C&C) program, have mixed results with some studies supporting positive academic and behavioral outcomes for students…

Oftentimes, student engagement in the classroom is a challenge. Traditional instruction does not meet the learning needs of many urban at-risk students because they cannot relate to the teaching practices. Studies show instructional practices rich in culture can be implemented to improve engagement. The problem in this study was the lack of…

The purpose of this interpretive phenomenological study was to explore at-risk students' experiences and engagement with game-based learning in a Northwest Florida middle school through their shared experiences of the phenomenon. At-risk students are in danger of grade-level retention if they do not close their achievement gaps on standardized…

The purpose of this study focuses on the effects of enrollment in Career and Technical Education (CTE) courses on high school graduation rates. The study utilized archival data from 16,953 high school students from the Drowsy Willow Independent School District (DWISD), a large suburban school district in southeast Texas. Archived transcript and…

Research literature identifies that students with more positive student-teacher relationships attain more desirable student outcomes than their counterparts with less positive relationships (Roorda, Koomen, Split, & Oort, 2011). How student-teacher relationships impact students are studied developmentally. The effect of positive relationships…

Though K-12 virtual education has been around for decades, the COVID-19 pandemic rapidly increased the number of K-12 schools offering virtual education to their students. This comparative case study's purpose was to explore secondary virtual schools within a public school environment. The focus of the study was to examine how two secondary…

Students can obtain formal education through many instructional methods, including those offered in online learning environments. Due to their convenience and flexibility in terms of time and place, online resources are a viable alternative for high school students, including those at-risk, struggling to progress academically in a conventional…