Creating the Path to Success in the Classroom by
This is a book for all faculty who are concerned with promoting the persistence of all students whom they teach.Most recognize that faculty play a major role in student retention and success because they typically have more direct contact with students than others on campus. However, little attention has been paid to role of the faculty in this specific mission or to the corresponding characteristics of teaching, teacher-student interactions, and connection to student affairs activities that lead to students' long-term engagement, to their academic success, and ultimately to graduation.At a time when the numbers of underrepresented students - working adults, minority, first-generation, low-income, and international students - is increasing, this book, a companion to her earlier Teaching Underprepared Students, addresses that lack of specific guidance by providing faculty with additional evidence-based instructional practices geared toward reaching all the students in their classrooms, including those from groups that traditionally have been the least successful, while maintaining high standards and expectations.Recognizing that there are no easy answers, Kathleen Gabriel offers faculty ideas that can be incorporated in, or modified to align with, faculty's existing teaching methods. She covers topics such as creating a positive and inclusive course climate, fostering a community of learners, increasing engagement and students' interactions, activating connections with culturally relevant material, reinforcing self-efficacy with growth mindset and mental toughness techniques, improving lectures by building in meaningful educational activities, designing reading and writing assignments for stimulating deep learning and critical thinking, and making grade and assessment choices that can promote learning.
First-Generation College Students by
FIRST-GENERATION COLLEGE STUDENTS "...a concise, manageable, lucid summary of the best scholarship, practices, and future-oriented thinking about how to effectively recruit, educate, develop, retain, and ultimately graduate first-generation students." --from the foreword by JOHN N. GARDNER First-generation students are frequently marginalized on their campuses, treated with benign disregard, and placed at a competitive disadvantage because of their invisibility. While they include 51% of all undergraduates, or approximately 9.3 million students, they are less likely than their peers to earn degrees. Among students enrolled in two-year institutions, they are significantly less likely to persist into a second year. First-Generation College Students offers academic leaders and student affairs professionals a guide for understanding the special challenges and common barriers these students face and provides the necessary strategies for helping them transition through and graduate from their chosen institutions. Based in solid research, the authors describe best practices and include suggestions and techniques that can help leaders design and implement effective curricula, out-of-class learning experiences, and student support services, as well as develop strategic plans that address issues sure to arise in the future. The authors offer an analysis of first-generation student expectations for college life and academics and examine the powerful role cultural capital plays in shaping their experiences and socialization. Providing a template for other campuses, the book highlights programmatic initiatives at colleges around the county that effectively serve first-generation students and create a powerful learning environment for their success. First-Generation College Students provides a much-needed portrait of the cognitive, developmental, and social factors that affect the college-going experiences and retention rates of this growing population of college students.
On the Borders of the Academy by
One of the most significant achievements in US higher education during the latter half of the twentieth century was the increasing access enjoyed by historically marginalized populations, including women, people of color, and the poor and working class. With this achievement, however, has come a growing population of first generation students, including first-generation graduate students and faculty members, who struggle at times to navigate unfamiliar territory. This book offers insight into the challenges of first-generation status, as well as practical tools for navigating the halls of the academy for both academics and their institutional allies.
The Privileged Poor by
An NPR Favorite Book of the Year Winner of the Critics' Choice Book Award, American Educational Studies Association Winner of the Mirra Komarovsky Book Award Winner of the CEP-Mildred García Award for Exemplary Scholarship Winner of the Thomas J. Wilson Memorial Prize Getting in is only half the battle. The Privileged Poor reveals how-and why-disadvantaged students struggle at elite colleges, and explains what schools can do differently if these students are to thrive. The Ivy League looks different than it used to. College presidents and deans of admission have opened their doors-and their coffers-to support a more diverse student body. But is it enough just to admit these students? In The Privileged Poor, Anthony Jack reveals that the struggles of less privileged students continue long after they've arrived on campus. Admission, they quickly learn, is not the same as acceptance. This bracing and necessary book documents how university policies and cultures can exacerbate preexisting inequalities and reveals why these policies hit some students harder than others. Despite their lofty aspirations, top colleges hedge their bets by recruiting their new diversity largely from the same old sources, admitting scores of lower-income black, Latino, and white undergraduates from elite private high schools like Exeter and Andover. These students approach campus life very differently from students who attended local, and typically troubled, public high schools and are often left to flounder on their own. Drawing on interviews with dozens of undergraduates at one of America's most famous colleges and on his own experiences as one of the privileged poor, Jack describes the lives poor students bring with them and shows how powerfully background affects their chances of success. If we truly want our top colleges to be engines of opportunity, university policies and campus cultures will have to change. Jack provides concrete advice to help schools reduce these hidden disadvantages-advice we cannot afford to ignore.
Supporting Today's Students in the Library by
"Supporting Todays Students in the Library collects current strategies from all types of academic libraries for retaining and graduating nontraditional students, with many of them based on learning theories and teaching methodologies. The book explores methods for overcoming language barriers, discusses best practices, and presents case studies that support the changing student population. Additionally, Supporting Todays Students in the Library provides a variety of ideas for new services, spaces, and outreach opportunities that support nontraditional students on campus and beyond"--
At the Intersection: Understanding and Supporting First-Generation Students by
The experiences of first-generation college students are not monolithic. The nexus of identities matter, and this book is intended to challenge the reader to explore what it means to be a first-generation college student in higher education. Designed for use in classrooms and for use by the higher education practitioner on a college campus today, At the Intersectionswill be of value to the reader throughout their professional career. The book is divided into four parts with chapters of research and theory interspersed with thought pieces to provide personal stories to integrate the research and theory into lived experience. Each thought piece ends with questions to inspire readers to engage with the topic. Part One: Who is a First-generation College Student?provides the reader an entrée into the topic, with up-to-date data on both four-year and two-year colleges. Part One ends with a thought piece that asks the reader to pull together some of the big ideas before moving on to look more closely at students' identities. Part Two: The Intersection of Identityshares the research, experience and thoughts of authors in relation to the individual and overlapping identities of LGBT, low-income, white, African-American, Latinx, Native American, undocumented, female, and male students who are all also first-generation college students. Part Three: Programs and Practicesis an introduction to practices, policies and programs across the country. This section offers promise and direction for future work as institutions try to find a successful array of approaches to make the campus an inclusive place for the diverse population of first-generation college students.
Geographies of Campus Inequality: Mapping the Diverse Experiences of First-Generation Students by
In efforts to improve equity, selective college campuses are increasingly focused on recruiting and retaining first-generation students - those whose parents have not graduated from college. In Geographies of Campus Inequality, sociologists Benson and Lee argue that these approaches may fall short if they fail to consider the complex ways first-generation status intersects with race, ethnicity, and gender. Drawing on interview and survey data from selective campuses, the authors show that first-generation students do not share a universal experience. Rather, first-generation students occupy one of four disparate geographies on campus within which they negotiate academic responsibilities, build relationships, engage in campus life, and develop post-college aspirations. Importantly, the authors demonstrate how geographies are shaped by organizational practices and campus constructions of class, race, and gender. Geographies of Campus Inequality expands the understanding of first-generation students' campus lives and opportunities for mobility by showing there is more than one way to be first-generation.
College Belonging: How First-Year and First-Generation Student Navigate Campus Life by
College Belonging reveals how colleges' and universities' efforts to foster a sense of belonging in their students are misguided. Colleges bombard new students with the message to "get out there!" and "find your place" by joining student organizations, sports teams, clubs and the like. Nunn shows that this reflects a flawed understanding of what belonging is and how it works. Drawing on the sociological theories of Emile Durkheim, College Belonging shows that belonging is something that members of a community offer to each other. It is something that must be given, like a gift. Individuals cannot simply walk up to a group or community and demand belonging. That's not how it works. The group must extend a sense of belonging to each and every member. It happens by making a person feel welcome, to feel that their presence matters to the group, that they would be missed if they were gone. This critical insight helps us understand why colleges' push for students simply to "get out there!" does not always work.
The Hidden Curriculum: First Generation Students at Legacy Universities by
A revealing look at the experiences of first generation students on elite campuses and the hidden curriculum they must master in order to succeed College has long been viewed as an opportunity for advancement and mobility for talented students regardless of background. Yet for first generation students, elite universities can often seem like bastions of privilege, with unspoken academic norms and social rules. The Hidden Curriculum draws on more than one hundred in-depth interviews with students at Harvard and Georgetown to offer vital lessons about the challenges of being the first in the family to go to college, while also providing invaluable insights into the hurdles that all undergraduates face. As Rachel Gable follows two cohorts of first generation students and their continuing generation peers, she discovers surprising similarities as well as striking differences in their college experiences. She reveals how the hidden curriculum at legacy universities often catches first generation students off guard, and poignantly describes the disorienting encounters on campus that confound them and threaten to derail their success. Gable shows how first-gens are as varied as any other demographic group, and urges universities to make the most of the diverse perspectives and insights these talented students have to offer. The Hidden Curriculum gives essential guidance on the critical questions that university leaders need to consider as they strive to support first generation students on campus, and demonstrates how universities can balance historical legacies and elite status with practices and policies that are equitable and inclusive for all students.
First-Generation Faculty of Color: Reflections on Research, Teaching, and Service by
First-Generation Faculty of Color: Reflections on Research, Teaching, and Service is the first book to examine the experiences of racially minoritized faculty who were also the first in their families to graduate college in the United States. From contingent to tenured faculty who teach at community colleges, comprehensive, and research institutions, the book is a collection of critical narratives that collectively show the diversity of faculty of color, attentive to and beyond race. The book is organized into three major parts comprised of chapters in which faculty of color depict how first-generation college student identities continue to inform how minoritized people navigate academe well into their professional careers, and encourage them to reconceptualize research, teaching, and service responsibilities to better consider the families and communities that shaped their lives well before college.
Clearing the Path for First-Generation College Students by
Clearing the Path for First-Generation College Students comprises a wide range of studies that explore the multidimensional social processes and meanings germane to the experiences of first-generation college students before and during their matriculation into institutions of higher education. The chapters offer timely, empirical examinations of the ways that these students negotiate experiences shaped by structural inequities in higher education institutions and the pathways that lead to them. This volume provides insight into the dilemmas that arise from the transformation of students' class identities in pursuit of upward mobility, as well as their quest for community and a sense of "belonging" on college campuses that have not been historically designed for them. While centering first-generation status, this collection also critically engages the ways in which other dimensions of social identity intersect to inform students' educational experiences in relation to dynamics of race, ethnicity, socioeconomic class, gender, and immigration. Additionally, this book takes a holistic approach by exploring the ways in which first-generation college students are influenced by, and engage with, their families and communities of origin as they undertake their educational careers.
Higher Education and First-Generation Students: Cultivating Community, Voice, and Place for the New Majority by
Offers readers a rich understanding of the experience of students who are first in their family to attend college. This book is a theoretically informed study of the lived experience of FG students and draws on their voices to demonstrate how their insights interface with what we, as educators, think we know about them.
First-Generation Student Experiences in Higher Education: Counterstories by
In First-Generation Student Experiences in Higher Education: Counterstories, we meet eight students who attended university through an access program, and hear their stories of deciding to enter university, navigating and negotiating the institution, and bringing their university experiences with them into adult life. Their "counterstories"-drawn from application statements, weekly group meetings, diary entries, group conversations, interviews, and media reports-challenge the stereotypes commonly applied to marginalized students in higher education. Chapters offer insights into a range of salient themes and highlight the students' strategies, challenges, successes, and trajectories, as well as their nuanced relationships with their networks, communities, families, and significant others. With this volume, James and Taylor present a valuable resource for educators, administrators, scholars, students and community agencies interested in extending understandings of first-generation university students.
Developing and Implementing Promising Practices and Programs for First-Generation College Students by
As first-generation students gain greater access to higher education, faculty, and staff at colleges and universities must provide intentional engagement that supports their persistence and graduation. This book serves as a guidebook for higher education practitioners seeking to implement or enhance first-generation programming at their institutions. The chapters provide detailed descriptions of the development, implementation, and assessment of programs and practices intended to support the success of first-generation college students. Authors share insights on building allies, identifying and working through challenges, and applicable takeaways for implementing similar practices and programs at the reader's own institutions. Programming discussed in the book ranges in funding levels and includes activities such as faculty dinners, study abroad, bridge programs, living learning communities, peer mentoring, intrusive advising, and holistic well-being. This valuable resource helps higher education practitioners better support and position first-generation students for success.
The Journey Before Us: First-Generation Pathways from Middle School to College by
More students are enrolling in college than ever before in U.S. history. Yet, many never graduate. In The Journey Before Us, Laura Nichols examines why this is by sharing the experiences of aspiring first-generation college students as they move from middle-school to young adulthood. By following the educational trajectories and transitions of Latinx, mainly second-generation immigrant students and analyzing national data, Nichols explores the different paths that students take and the factors that make a difference. The interconnected role of schools, neighborhoods, policy, employment, advocates, identity, social class, and family reveal what must change to address the "college completion crisis." Appropriate for anyone wanting to understand their own educational journey as well as students, teachers, counselors, school administrators, scholars, and policymakers, The Journey Before Us outlines what is needed so that education can once again be a means of social mobility for those who would be the first in their families to graduate from college.
Technology and Engagement: Making Technology Work for First-Generation College Students by
Winner of the 2018 Association for the Study of Higher Education Outstanding Book Award​ Technology and Engagement is based on a four-year study of how first generation college students use social media, aimed at improving their transition to and engagement with their university. Through web technology, including social media sites, students were better able to maintain close ties with family and friends from home, as well as engage more with social and academic programs at their university. This 'ecology of transition' was important in keeping the students focused on why they were in college, and helped them become more integrated into the university setting. By showing the gains in campus capital these first-generation college students obtained through social media, the authors offer concrete suggestions for how other universities and college-retention programs can utilize the findings to increase their own retention of first-generation college students.
First-Generation Women College Students Starving to Matter: Revealing the Lived Experiences of a Student Population in Crisis by
The Impact of Food Insecurity on First-Generation Female Higher Education Students seeks to emphasize the importance of mattering, belonging and effective student resources in the lives of first-generation women college students. They face unique obstacles that if not adequately addressed could impact their retention and persistence. Success in higher education relies on access to resources, connection, and a sense of meaning and purpose. Based on a yearlong qualitative study the book highlights the ways in which access to student resources, mattering and marginalization frame larger issues including mental health and food and housing insecurities. Interviewing both students and staff provides a window into Riverside's campus climate and solidifies the importance of positive interactions. First-generation women striving to matter explain a need for faculty that understand their strengths, staff that encourage them to ask for assistance, and peers that invite them to join the conversation.