Due in part to the growing popularity of the Advanced Placement program, an increasingly large percentage of entering college students are enrolling in calculus courses having already taken calculus in high school. Many students do not score high enough on the AP calculus examination to place out of Calculus I, and many do not take the…

Today's grading practices mirror those of the early 1900s, and despite myriad research suggesting they are invalid, unreliable, and a hindrance to student learning, many teachers continue detrimental practices such as using 100-point percentage scales averaging all academic and nonacademic factors together into a single grade, and using grades to…

This study presents a survey developed to measure the skills of entering college freshmen in the areas of responsibility, motivation, study habits, literacy, and stress management, and explores the predictive power of this survey as a measure of academic performance during the first semester of college. The survey was completed by 334 incoming…

Student persistence continues to be a topic of much research and discussion in higher education. Based on Bean and Eaton's (2000) psychological theory of persistence for its theoretical framework, this study examined the effect of students' demographic and background characteristics and students' self-perceptions on their…

This study explored the learning perceptions and literacy practices of three successful African American male first year college students in order to expand what is known about how African American males attain and sustain academic success over time. Each of the three participants were interviewed, participated in blogging, and corresponded…

The purpose of this study was to learn more about the transition experiences of one group of high school students (N = 75) as they began attending one alternative pathway: an Early College High School program on a community college campus. A four-part conceptual framework of college readiness provided a structure from which to explore the…