ERIC Number: EJ1393897
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2023-Oct
Pages: 22
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-0894-8453
EISSN: EISSN-1556-0856
Available Date: N/A
"It Felt Like a Little Community": Supporting Rural Appalachian College Students
Gibbons, Melinda M.; Cain, Leia K.; Gantt, Henrietta; Riley, Kertesha; Hanley, Covington; Hardin, Erin E.; McCollum, Timara
Journal of Career Development, v50 n5 p997-1018 Oct 2023
Students from rural Appalachian regions often face increased career development barriers within university spaces. As part of an NSF-funded program, we provided diverse, structured supports for a group of STEM majors from rural Appalachian backgrounds. We utilized narrative inquiry to interview 10 Program participants, which allowed us to explore which supports they described as impactful, including graduate student mentors, their fellow program peers, program coordinators, campus supports, and other various campus faculty. Participants further described being impacted in a variety of ways: as an individual person, in their research pursuits, in their future plans, academically, and financially through the program's scholarship. Specifically, they described strategies for success and the importance of belonging as impactful. Implications for future college support programming and for how to best support the career development of rural Appalachian college students, along with suggestions for future research needs and limitations to the research, are provided.
Descriptors: Sense of Community, Rural Areas, Rural Population, STEM Education, Majors (Students), Program Evaluation, Student Attitudes, Success, Undergraduate Students, Scholarships, Mentors, Career Development, Low Income Students
SAGE Publications. 2455 Teller Road, Thousand Oaks, CA 91320. Tel: 800-818-7243; Tel: 805-499-9774; Fax: 800-583-2665; e-mail: journals@sagepub.com; Web site: https://sagepub.com
Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Research
Education Level: Higher Education; Postsecondary Education
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: National Science Foundation (NSF), Division of Undergraduate Education (DUE)
Authoring Institution: N/A
Grant or Contract Numbers: 1643393
Author Affiliations: N/A