In this paper, we identify the use of Digital Storytelling (DS) as a mode of pedagogy aligned with an ethics of care. We consider how DS, as summative assessment, may foreground care ethics such as attentiveness, responsiveness, and trust. Our interest in this topic stems from our concern over the impact on staff and students of the massification…

This article describes the success of a class at Greenville Technical College through the 360 Institute grant from the Department of Education. In the First Year Seminar (FYS) class, the instructor also serves as the students' advisor, and the class focuses on financial literacy and eight career readiness competencies focusing on key…

Nearly half of all students in the United States are placed into at least one developmental course in college. Many of these students fail to complete developmental course sequences and persist to degree completion. First-Year Seminars are one of several high-impact practices associated with increased persistence, retention, and graduation rates…

In 1970, American institutions of higher education were faced with the dissatisfaction of their student populations due to intense social and political clashes transpiring throughout the nation. To gain the students' loyalty, the University of South Carolina introduced a groundbreaking course and program designed to counteract the discontent felt…

Milner (2012) defines opportunity gaps as the uncontrollable factors such as race, language, or economic status that can impact students' success in schools. Rather than placing focus on students' achievement, examinations of opportunity gaps emphasize the systems and structures that may contribute to disparities in student outcomes. The…

This article reports on data collected from a study of 101 students taking a first-year experience course. Using a mapping methodology in an effort to understand what resources students could identify and what relationships they saw between resources, the study showed that resources associated with a specific location or connected with people were…

This study aimed to explore writing requirements and lecturer expectations in first-year humanities and social science courses at a New Zealand university. Document analysis and lecturer interviews were used to collect data. The document analysis included writing assignment types, rhetorical functions of writing tasks, and descriptors in marking…

The Valparaiso University Department of Biology is responding to a change in student needs post-COVID by implementing a seminar for all first-year students. The first-year seminar (BIO 101) was taught for the first time in the Fall semester of 2023. This course is designed to integrate new biology students into the Biology Department. It is the…

This paper explores an inter-learning teaching method designed and utilized by the authors in the Winter 2021 term for first- and upper-year therapeutic recreation (TR) students in an online platform. This collaborative teaching method sought to make intentional space for upper-year students to take the lead on and facilitate seminars for…

We report the short- and longer-term impacts of offering a 1-credit introductory seminar to first-year chemical engineering students. Students who completed the seminar demonstrated a better awareness of the major, career opportunities, and academic success strategies than students who did not enroll in the seminar. A longer-term comparison showed…

The transition to college can be challenging for first-year students, impacting their academic performance and overall well-being. One strategy employed to ease the college transition is the first-year seminar, designed to introduce students to academic expectations, build social connections, develop self-management skills, and support students'…

I conducted a narrative literature review on first-year seminars to provide practitioners and researchers with a current, comprehensive review of the research investigating the effectiveness of this widely used, high-impact practice so that they could use this information to improve the course at their institution. I searched for peer-reviewed…

At an institution which serves mostly commuting students who are first generation and often balancing life responsibilities, online learning is enticing and presents challenges. Students can struggle with the required skills of self-regulation, effective time-management, communication, and balancing needs. In the spring of 2022, an innovative…

This qualitative case study examined the efficacy of one university's academic interventions in support of conditionally admitted (CA) students during the COVID-19 pandemic. The objective was to gain insights into how academic interventions changed for CA students and how the students used academic interventions during COVID-19 at one four-year…

First-year seminar courses have become increasingly popular for colleges and universities as they are expected to help aid in the transition to college and help students persist to graduation (Culver & Bowman, 2020). Utilizing pre-existing data from the Office of Institutional Research Effectiveness and Planning (IREP), the…