Previous research has suggested mixed results concerning gifted populations and achievement goal orientation. This study investigated achievement goal orientation in honors and general education undergraduate students, exploring the factor structure of a commonly used assessment and looking at ability level differences using two types of…

The first-year seminar Why Are We Here? Student Culture and the Problem of College (WAWH) helps high-achieving students become motivated agents in their education by changing attitudes toward themselves, college, and their roles as students. The author presents the intentional design, execution, analysis, and results of the WAWH seminar, a…

The purpose of this study was to apply several measures of learning and engagement to a comparable cohort of honors and non-honors students in order to generate a preliminary model of student engagement. Specific purposes were the following: (1) to determine the feasibility for use of several measures of student characteristics that may affect…

For decades, research has shown that higher levels of education correspond to increased interest in politics and civic engagement. Despite the vast amount of scholarly attention, why this link exists is still disputed. One theory about the connection is the civic education hypothesis, which claims that the causal link between education and civic…

This qualitative, multisite case study used Dee Fink's taxonomy of significant learning as a lens through which to examine the curricular structure, academic practices, and graduate outcomes for honors programs at Jesuit colleges and universities in the United States. Special attention was given to the distinctive quality of Ignatian pedagogy and…