Placement as a form of work-integrated learning is a valued element of undergraduate education. Prior work explores how placement provides a site for developing professional values, skills and competences as well as identifying how students build awareness of professional requirements. Greater focus on how such processes of awareness are realised,…

Social group disparities persist in who chooses to pursue Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) fields in higher education. Goal congruity theory has highlighted how perceptions of other-oriented opportunities in STEM can spur interest among underrepresented students. The present work extends this framework by considering how…

The value of higher education, and particularly the four-year undergraduate venture influenced from the liberal arts tradition, is largely framed around the impact it has on a broad range of skills and dispositions that serve to enhance human flourishing. Employers and society more broadly can benefit from individuals who are committed to careful…

Black women have a unique process in forming their identities, because of the subordinated status of both their racial and gender identity. Black women in America have urged American society at large to understand the complexity and multidimensionality of the Black woman identity, due to issues of inequality being addressed through a single axis…

Reported herein are the findings from a grounded study probing the impact of graduate student mentors in a National Science Foundation (NSF)-funded research experiences for undergraduates (REU) program (2014-2016) in chemistry & chemical biology at an urban private research university on undergraduates' development through the lens of…

Research has articulated the benefits of autonomy in outdoor programming (e.g., Chang, 2017), and the independent student expedition (ISE) is one type of autonomous experience that has received attention across the literature. Research suggests that ISEs have the potential to foster personal growth and promote group development (e.g., Daniel et…

This article describes through the lens of self-authorship development the meaning-making processes of South African postgraduate psychology students who are expected to undergo significant growth as they journey towards becoming mental health professionals. Reflective writing tasks and individual interviews of 4 postgraduate students were…

This dissertation examined narratives of seven current and former students of a Southwestern university in the United States who participated in short-term study abroad language and culture immersion programs (3 to 4 weeks) in three different locations outside of the United States. The research explored how the short-term study abroad participants…

The study looked back on the one-year experience of the first group of peer mentors of a university at northern Taiwan. Twelve peer mentors (six males and six females; with an average age of 21.45) took part in the study. A qualitative phenomenological approach and in-depth interviews were adopted. The results showed that participants deemed the…

This study applies Baxter Magolda's theory of self-authorship (2001) from the literature of student development theory to examine the experiences of undergraduate adult learners. The purpose of this study was to explore the experiences of undergraduate adult learners enrolled in an adult degree program and whether their experiences were influenced…

Informal (and sometimes formal) assessments in higher education often ask students how their skills or attitudes have changed as the result of engaging in a particular course or program; however, it is unclear to what extent these self-reports are accurate. Using a longitudinal sample of over 3,000 college students, we found that students were…

This study sought to construct rich accounts of the remembrances of Catholic grade school and high school graduates in the USA related to their school experiences and the continuing impacts of these experiences on their lives. Ten former students (comprised of five males and five females) who graduated from Catholic schools in the 1950s, 1960s,…

The purpose of this study is to answer the call of the National Endowment for the Arts (2011), and various other arts-related organizations, for extensive research on the ability of the fine and performing arts to improve the quality of life for those who participate in them. Guided by C. Robert Pace's theory of quality of student effort, this…

Despite much research into doctoral education over the past two decades, theorising the field remains challenging. Recently, identity has been taken up as a conceptualising frame. Views of identity vary but often privilege the reproductive features of society, downplaying how individuals can be intentional in pursuing their desires--with the…

The authors begin this chapter by revisiting Astin, Panos, and Creager (1967), who developed a conceptual scheme to guide the selection of various types of measurements organized by three dimensions: (1) type of outcome; (2) type of data; and (3) time. In assessing basic skills, general education, and attainment of the major, the focus is on…