Despite advances made in broadening access to higher education, some evidence suggests that college completion rates have actually declined over time, and attainment gaps stemming from race/ethnicity and socioeconomic background have remained stubbornly persistent (Bound, Lovenheim, & Turner, 2010; National Center for Education Statistics,…

Many researchers have explored the relationships between the likelihood of graduating from college and demographic and pre-college factors such as gender, race/ethnicity, high school grade point average (GPA), and standardized test scores. However, additional factors such as a student's college major, home address, or use of learning support in…

Conducting research and engaging in discussions with administrators and legislators can be important contributions toward alleviating the trend toward lower graduation rates among college students. This study used archival data obtained from the university registrar to examine how engagement in a credit-bearing undergraduate career course related…

As the U.S. population ages and policy changes emerge, such as the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010, the U.S. will experience a significant shortage of Registered Nurses (RNs). Many colleges and universities are attempting to increase the size of nursing cohorts to respond to this imminent shortage. Notwithstanding a 2.6%…

According to the U.S. Department of Labor, by the year 2016 an estimated 51 million jobs will require some postsecondary education but not a bachelor's degree (Liming & Wolf, 2008). This represents an increase in these types of jobs of almost 11% over that of 2006. As the demand for these types of workers continues to rise, community colleges…

Every year a group of graduates from high schools enter the engineering programs across this country with remarkable academic record. However, as reported in numerous studies, the number of students switching out of engineering majors continues to be an important issue. Previous studies have suggested various factors as predictors for student…

In an effort to standardize academic risk assessment, the NCAA developed the graduation risk overview (GRO) model. Although this model was designed to assess graduation risk, its ability to predict grade-point average (GPA) remained unknown. Therefore, 134 individual risk assessments were made to determine GRO model effectiveness in the…