The purpose of this study is to revisit the widely held assumption that the impact of socioeconomic background declines steadily across educational transitions, particularly at the postsecondary level. Sequential logit modeling, a staple methodological approach for estimating the relative impact of SES across educational stages, is applied to a…

According to prevailing theory and anecdotal evidence, the congruence between institutional attributes and students' needs, interests, and preferences plays a key role in promoting college satisfaction and retention. However, this assertion has received little direct empirical attention, and the few available studies appear to have some key…

Comparisons of large samples of course and teaching evaluation questionnaire data show consistent disciplinary differences. The current study examined the disciplinary differences in a theoretical model positing the impact of the perceived nature of teaching and learning environment on the development of generic capabilities by testing of (1)…

The purpose of this paper was to investigate a model for describing the relationships between the extent to which learning environments are activating and students' interaction with teachers and peers, sense of belonging, and study success. It was tested whether this model holds true for both ethnic minority students and ethnic majority students.…

There has been wide recognition that today's graduates need the type of generic capabilities necessary for lifelong learning. However, the mechanism by which universities can develop these generic skills is not clearly established. This study aimed to investigate the mechanism for their development. Structural equation modeling (SEM) was used to…

A common finding in the literature is that institutional structures have little to no impact on student engagement and development. I argue that theory suggests peer ability (as measured by selectivity), institutional density, the differentiation of the curriculum, and the research orientation of the institution should all affect student…

Postsecondary institutions seek to create a pedagogical environment that increases students' knowledge, expands their powers of reasoning, and shapes their psychosocial dispositions. In this study, we examined a conceptual model of academic attainment including two aspects of the pedagogical environment experienced by students, namely the…

Using constructs from Bean's (1990) [In: D. Hossler and J. P. Bean (Eds.), The strategic management of college enrollments. San Francisco:Jossey-Bass] student attrition model and the Berger and Milem (2000) [In: J. C. Smart (Ed.), Higher education: Handbook of theory and research (Vol. XV, pp. 268?338). New York: Agathon Press] college impact…