We evaluate the impact of a low-stakes easy-to-implement course-level intervention, Scientist Spotlight assignments, which feature personal and professional stories of diverse scientists. This work extends previous studies by examining whether shifts in relatability differ across student identities, particularly students who identify as…

There is limited understanding of how women of Mexican heritage transform cultural and familial protective factors into strategies to help navigate their education. This study helps bridge the gap between students' cultural wealth and the ways they utilize this protective factor in college. I analyzed the strategies used by seven first-generation…

Using a cross-sectional survey (N = 1,225), this study examines the psychological well-being (stress, anxiety, depression), life satisfaction, supportive parent communication, and likelihood to seek mental and emotional support from different sources between FGCSs and non-FGCSs during the early period of the COVID-19 pandemic. Results show that…

Current approaches to building inclusive classrooms for first-generation and working-class students tend to emphasize communicative strategies: receiving students with welcoming messages that acknowledge and value their life experience and promoting a growth mindset. These methods are important, but they do little to address structural sources of…

First-generation and working-class (FGWC) students bring a different set of life experiences to the classroom than students of privilege. As an instructor from an FGWC background, I use the poverty simulation game Spent! to make economic stratification understandable to students who have led lives of economic privilege and bring FGWC…

El Puente Research Fellowship is a transformative program that uses culturally relevant and reflective pedagogies, curriculum, and praxis for first-generation, working-class college students beyond the traditional classroom. Drawing on the Chicana/Latina feminist epistemologies of "plática" and "convivencia," we argue that the…

First-generation and underrepresented minoritized (URM) students may have greater challenges in online learning than other students. Communities of support can help these highly motivated students be more engaged and successful in the remote learning environment. In this scoping literature review, we identified fifteen categories of…

U.S. Census Bureau Report (2020c) showed Hispanic students constituted 18.5% of the U.S. population, 36% attended higher education and only 14% completed postsecondary education. Research has shown Hispanic, specifically Latinx, students faced barriers in accessing higher education's hidden curriculum, compounded by deficit beliefs about their…

A growing number of college students today are First-Generation. First-Generation (FG) college student experiences and performance on student success measures differ from their peers whose parents have earned college degrees (Astin, 1975; Chen & Carroll, 2005; Ishitani, 2006; Pascarella et al., 2004). The purpose of this quantitative study was…

This study explores the experiences of first- and second-year first-generation college students at Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) related to the college admissions process and finding financial aid. This applies the digital divide to determine whether the three levels of the digital divide still impact first-generation…

Hmong Americans' postsecondary completion rates remain low when compared to other Asian ethnic groups. As the Hmong population continues to grow, so does the need for intervention to increase the total number of postsecondary graduates. Many Hmong Americans are first-generation college students and continue to face challenges and barriers that…

The purpose of this interpretative phenomenological analysis was to understand how first-generation college students have experienced involvement in college during the pandemic at a New England University. Astin's (1999) theory of student involvement served as the theoretical framework for the study as it focuses on the interconnected relationship…

Although the gap in enrollment rates of Latinas in higher education has narrowed in recent years, there is still a staggering gap in the degree attainment rates for Latinas in higher education that only gets more and more discrepant as the level of higher education increases (PNPI, 2021). Studying the systemic inflexibilities that lead to…

This study examines the relationship between support from comprehensive college transition program (CCTP) staff and students' academic self-efficacy, academic behavioral change, and achievement. We surveyed 1,197 students across three campuses of the University of Nebraska system. Path analyses revealed CCTP staff support had direct and indirect…

The purpose of this narrative inquiry was to explore how first-generation college students in the southwestern United States narrate their experiences facing academic challenges and choosing whether to ask for academic help. The theories of academic help seeking and cultural mismatch provided the theoretical foundation. The research questions…