This qualitative study employed a constructivist, case study approach to explore how faculty made meaning of their experiences in a newly developed residential college at a large, land-grant research university in the Midwest. Findings revealed that faculty focused on determining how to prioritize the numerous opportunities for involvement while…

Residential learning communities often focus on easing first-year students' transitions to college by emphasizing the creation of peer social and academic relationships. However, this relational process is most often examined through analyzing individual student characteristics, behaviors, and attitudes. This study used network analysis to…

Blind dates can go awry, but a roommate mismatch can spoil a semester. Nasty habits. Bitter grudges. Epic stand-offs over square inches. Luckily, most pairings don't get that ugly, whether campuses make them randomly or by running survey responses through a computer. These days many students even control their own fates: More and more colleges let…

Cutting-Edge provides inclusion in college for students with intellectual disabilities (SWID). Cutting-Edge students attended college by taking undergraduate courses, resided in student housing, and engaged in student-life events as well as pursued community service, internships and employment. Undergraduate students were the best means to teach…

Objective: The authors examined the secondhand effects among college freshmen of others' alcohol use and related student characteristics, and perceptions about residence hallmates. Participants: The authors surveyed 509 incoming freshmen residing in predominantly freshman residence halls. Methods: The authors administered a Web-based survey 2…

A key component in the success of students' first-year experience is their successful academic and social integration into the college environment (Tinto, 1993). Researchers have specified integration in terms of student behaviors and perceptions (Berger & Milem, 1999; Hurtado & Carter, 1997) and also studied it in terms of engagement (Kuh, 2009)…

There is this little secret college-bound and first-year college students outwardly deny: They are scared sick about going off to college. In the authors' interviews with 175 college students throughout the United States for "Survival Secrets of College Students" (Barron's, 2007) students talked--sometimes painfully--about what they wished they…

No relationship was found between personality type similarity and relationship satisfaction in male college roommates. A sex difference in compatibility factors is suggested. (Author)

Since study results indicate that the most intimate, meaningful social relationships develop within the residence hall, perhaps the residence hall system can provide for intellectual stimulation along with maximal opportunities for personal-social growth and the handling of developmental tasks of late adolescence. (Author)

Most successful studies of roommate compatibility in residence halls use approaches that match students according to living habits or other factors students view as important. (Author)

Describes factors affecting the development of mutuality of attraction in natural small groups, and tests the hypothesis of the acquaintance process in 41 female residents of three floors of a university dormitory over the course of a year. Two floors showed definite increases in dyadic mutuality over time. (JAC)

Studied the effects of family network therapy on the social climate of freshmen in college dormitories. The University Resident Environment Scale found significant increases in the relationship dimensions of involvement and emotional support for peer network therapy. (Author/JAC)

A novel use of evaluation to define and reinforce authority leads to insights for implementing student employee programs. (Author)

A comparison of commuting and noncommuting college students indicates that a student's residential context has a significant influence on his relationships with his parents and with his peers, and on his self-esteem. (EB)

These two conference papers from the Biennial Conference on Postsecondary Education for Persons who are Deaf or Hard of Hearing focus on campus life issues for individuals with deafness or hard of hearing. The first paper, "A Customized Residence Hall Experience for Students Who Are Deaf or Hard of Hearing" (Nancy Kasinski and others), describes…