The purpose of this study is to find out from transfer students exactly what they are afraid of or nervous about when they start over in a new school and examines the implications these anxieties may have for teachers. During the transition, transfer students often suffer social, academic, and emotional distress which can impede their adjustment…

Between 1991 and 1993, a statewide study of public preschool practices in North Carolina was conducted to determine the characteristics of pre-kindergarten programs and of the children and families they served; short-term outcomes for children; and kindergarten outcomes for children who attended public preschool compared to those with other…

Graduate programs were developed cooperatively by several U.S. universities and the Iranian Ministry of Education in response to the critical shortage of Iranian teachers and educational administrators. A variety of administrative, logistical, academic, and cultural problems were encountered in bringing mid-career educators to the United States to…

Objectively speaking, there has been great historical progress in the educational and developmental opportunities for children and adolescents. However, this progress is not reflected either in an actual improvement of the "qualify of life" or in the subjectively perceived chances of education of adolescents in and out of school.…

A 2-year ethnographic study of the intake process involving preschool-age Hispanic children at a school for the deaf formed the basis for this paper, which focuses on strategies that Hispanic hearing-impaired children develop in response to the sociocultural world of the classroom. The struggle for "ownership" of the child, which begins when the…

In an inter-institutional action research project, seven teachers from three high schools and two colleges in Canada interviewed 88 students as they looked forward to college, experienced the first semester, and looked back after the second semester. The purpose was to discover what student perceptions and what institutional policies and practices…

This guide contains a minicourse based upon the content of "About the Middle School Years, Book 3" of the Educational Opportunities in Virginia publications. The minicourse has been designed to help students, with the involvement of their parents, to begin planning for their middle school education. Included in this guide is a sequential…

Concern for the dropout phenomenon among secondary learning disabled (LD) students led to a preliminary study of an urban school's decision-making structures, as well as events that influence ninth graders' behavior and decisions, increasing their risk for dropping out of high school. Data were collected from three sources: observation of school…

The focus of these two reports is on students who transferred from the University of Maryland, College Park (UMCP), and who were studied as a part of the Maryland Longitudinal Study. Results found included the following: (1) transfers in the Representative Group (containing members of all ethnic groups) were equally likely to be male or female; in…

College student persistence and overall educational attainment were studied, based on data from the National Longitudinal Study of the High School Class of 1972. Attention was directed to the influence of student socioeconomic status, academic aptitude and preparation, educational goal commitment, college quality/selectivity, college orientation…

The influence of family background, including parental education, on college student attrition was evaluated with first- and second-generation American students. A total of 701 enrolled students and those who left before graduation were surveyed at a primarily residential private liberal arts college and at a primarily commuter state-supported…

Proceedings of the first National Conference on Academic Advising, sponsored in 1977 by the University of Vermont, are presented. Among the 36 papers presented are the following: "Making Advising Work: Basic Elements in Developing and Implementing a Successful Academic Advising Program" (David S. Crockett); "A Community College Academic Advisor's…

A handbook for the adult student returning to college is presented. Attention is directed to the pros and cons of reentry; how to choose a program; options for financing an education; admissions applications; maximizing preentry credits; colleges, credits, and degrees; coping with academic demands such as exam-taking; and achieving a balance…

Student attrition was studied in relation to the quality of the interaction between the student and the college environment, using a modified version of the Total Adjustment Scale, a self-report rating scale. Academic functioning, social functioning, and bonding to the college setting were assessed for 459 college freshmen at the University of…

An article and descriptions of programs for first-year college students are presented. In "As Freshmen First," John Orr Dwyer recounts the history of the word "freshman" and outlines some of the characteristics of the 1980s first-year student. Recognizing the problems that face students entering college for the first time, he…