Experiences Of Non-traditional Students Research Articles

Exploring psychosocial experiences of non-traditional students in a vocational and technical education: a case study of fashion students

ABSTRACT The aim of the study was to assess and contrast psychosocial wellbeing of traditional and non-traditional students in fashion programme. The study was necessitated by a lack of evidence on students’ general psychosocial wellbeing, especially the increasing number of non-traditional students who are choosing to pursue higher education for a myriad of reasons. The study utilised a cross-sectional approach in which data were gathered from a sample of 394 traditional and 207 non-traditional students. Data were analysed by means of independent t-test and Pearson correlation. The study found a high prevalence of anxiety–stress and depression among the participants which require attention, even though non-traditional students coped better and performed academically better than traditional students. Again, anxiety–stress and depression were positively related to academic workload such that students who experienced higher academic workloads tended to also experience higher levels of anxiety–stress and depression.

Dynamic Becomings in the Transition to University: Experiences of Non-traditional Students across Contexts and Writing Practices

Dynamic Becomings in the Transition to University: Experiences of Non-traditional Students across Contexts and Writing Practices

Supporting students from equity groups: experiences of staff and considerations for institutions

ABSTRACT In light of widening participation initiatives internationally, including those in Australia, much has been written about equity policies in education. There is a growing body of research related to the outcomes of such policies and the experiences of non-traditional students, including those from low socio-economic status (LSES) backgrounds and students who are First Generation and/or First in Family, as well as other equity groups. This paper presents data related to a less researched effect of widening participation: the experiences of and impact on academic staff and those providing support services to students. We focus particularly on students from LSES backgrounds. Qualitative data were collected through focus groups with academic and student support staff in a large regional Australian university, with several themes emerging. In this paper, we investigate staff experiences related to diversity in student cohorts, drawing on Bourdieu’s concept of capital. Results show that the academics are supportive of LSES students and sensitive to the range of student backgrounds in their courses, including differences in cultural capital and students experiencing extreme hardship, but the support provided is affected by staff gender. It is evident that staff endeavour pedagogically and pastorally to support students, often at personal cost. There are workload and welfare implications evident for staff, institutions and funding.

The Perceptions and Experiences of Nontraditional Students in Teacher Licensure Programs

Nontraditional students seeking a teaching license are tasked with managing coursework and other responsibilities associated with teacher preparation programs; however, they are also likely navigating family dynamics, financial struggles, and other obligations that traditional undergraduate students do not face. We interviewed 19 preservice teacher candidates and report on their experiences when selecting their university of choice, the barriers they faced, and the supports they received. Participants reported coming to their university because of cost, location, and reputation. They reported common barriers such as inability to work, caring for children, and lack of support or access to other resources. However, participants reported professors and external funding as the major factors that had helped them succeed. Implications about this diverse group of students are discussed.

Pathway to Transfer: Validating the Lived Experiences of Nontraditional Students in an Early Childhood Program

ABSTRACT This qualitative study explored how the life experiences of nontraditional Latina students influenced their decision to transfer from a community college to a state university as early childhood majors. Guided by Validation Theory, the researchers share the participants’ stories in the areas of early schooling, language, and familial influences in order to analyze how this has affected their pursuit of higher education. The findings present multiple factors that are significant in improving the transfer process. The study provides recommendations such as developing relationships, hosting validating events, and increasing collaboration between the community college and state university as instrumental in creating a supportive transfer system.

Understanding the coaching experiences of non-traditional students in Higher Education in the UK

Understanding the coaching experiences of non-traditional students in Higher Education in the UK

Experiences of Nontraditional Students and Academics of the Recognition of Prior Learning Process for Admission to Graduate Studies: A South African Case Study in Open Distance Learning

The purpose of this study is to report on the recognition of prior learning (RPL) experiences of students and academics in a graduate context at an open distance learning (ODL) institution. Although students and academics are the key participants in the RPL process for access to graduate studies, their experiences regarding the process, specifically in an ODL context, appear to be under-investigated, given the limited number of studies conducted at distance learning institutions. Within an interpretative paradigm, the study followed a qualitative approach. A case study design was used to collect data employing open-ended questionnaires for students and academics involved in reviewing the RPL application students. The study involved research participants who were directly involved in the RPL process. The findings revealed that, apart from granting them admission to graduate studies, RPL candidates benefited from the process on a personal and academic level. The key aspects of RPL, such as preparation of evidence for assessment, which is similar to those of sustainable assessment, contribute to students becoming aware of their learning potential. This research contributes in a manner that provides more insight into this important academic experience of nontraditional students. This study recommends that an RPL process be an empowering and quality student experience that aims not only to prepare them for RPL assessment but also for the context after access to graduate studies.

From Deficit Thinking to Counter Storying: A Narrative Inquiry of Nontraditional Student Experience within Undergraduate Engineering Education

This paper reports on narrative inquiry research conducted with nontraditional undergraduates as they pursued a common goal of becoming engineers. Participants were enrolled in a two-year engineering transfer program offered in the evenings, via synchronous broadcast distance instruction, by a public, land-grant university situated in the western United States. The purpose of the research was to understand the experiences of nontraditional students during the two-year program, which they accessed at regional campuses within or near their local communities, and later as they transitioned to the four-year university campus located in another city away from these communities. In this paper, personal, social, and institutional tensions, arising from instances of deficit thinking and emerging from within the participants’ lived and told stories, are identified and examined. Despite deep, personal reactions to the bias they experienced, participants overcame perceptions of personal deficiency to pursue and achieve their goal of becoming engineers. Participant counter stories further revealed ways in which their unique life experiences alternately served to enhance and deepen their engineering education.

The Experiences of Nontraditional Students: A Qualitative Inquiry

The number of nontraditional students enrolled in higher education is rising, but retention of these students is a challenge. This study used a qualitative framework to examine the experiences of nontraditional undergraduate students in a university setting. Nine participants completed open-ended questionnaires, and we transcribed and coded the responses for themes. When discussing their experiences, participants spoke of five overarching themes: motivations to return, academic challenges, generation gap, support systems, and benefits of being a nontraditional student. This study contributes to the literature, providing insight to the overall collegiate experience of degree-seeking, nontraditional students.

The first-year experience of non-traditional students in Danish science and engineering university programmes

To understand student drop-out from university, research must explore students’ first-year experiences and the challenges they encounter. This article analyses the first-year experiences of non-traditional students in Danish science and engineering university programmes. Focusing on identity theory and the framework of integration processes provided by Tinto, the article presents the challenges experienced by students from non-academic backgrounds and by students with ethnic minority backgrounds. The analysis presents four themes that are experienced as particularly challenging for the students: (1) a strong career focus which is hard for the students to maintain in their transition into university; (2) how the students from some non-academic backgrounds encounter the challenges they meet with limited resources; (3) how they spend time and resources on their family and how this affects their integration in the programme; and (4) the process of academic and social integration are particularly challenging as they require students to submit themselves to the cultural expectations of their studies, which can be hard to understand for students from families with no prior experiences of academia. The article discusses how these experiences can be understood within an identity framework.

Older, Wiser, Novice: Nontraditional Students and Collegiate Forensics

There is a growing trend in nontraditional college student enrollments in the United States. Due to the constraints on nontraditional students’ time, they are often unable to spend as much time on campus as traditional students and to fully partake in campus life. Co-curricular activities, such as forensics, can be time consuming activities which may seem like an impossible fit for their already busy schedules. Because there are a growing number of nontraditional students, it is worth researching how much of what we do in the forensic community assumes that our students are only part of a traditional student body. This study uses ethnography and participant interviews to explore the experiences of nontraditional students in forensics.

Motives, commitment and student identity in higher education—experiences of non-traditional students in Sweden

Changes in higher education (HE) in Sweden, from elite to mass education, with an increased number of students and institutions, has raised questions about the role of HE in society. Relating to conflicts between discourses of employability, democracy, traditional academic norms and experiences of non-traditional students, the aim of this article is to explore and discuss non-traditional students' motives for studying as part of the process of the formation of student identities. In this article motives and commitment to HE are two aspects of student identity apparent in student narratives. The material is based on 48 biographical interviews with non-traditional students at three HE institutions. The result shows different motives for entering, dropping out and continuing to study. From these motives, we have identified eight student identity types that are analysed in relation to commitment to HE, and to being a ‘continuer’ versus a ‘drop out’: the altruistic student, the ambivalent student, the car-park student, the life-long learner, the at-risk-of-failing student, the instrumental student, the one-track student and the self-realiser. These identity types are further discussed in relation to conflicting discourses of HE in society.

How students ‘stay the course’: Retention practices in higher education

The article is based on the results of research carried out under the RANLHE project in several Polish academic institutions. Applying the biographical research approach, the project aimed to explore and understand the access and retention-related experiences of non-traditional students. In a study of non-traditional students, three distinct patterns of retention practices have been identified. These have been investigated and discussed against the background of the students' habitus and institutional academic culture. In the article, we focus primarily on the key factors that influence retention and dropout rates in higher education.

Life history approaches to access and retention of nontraditional students in higher education: A cross-European approach

Higher education participation has become an important focus for policy debate as well as for scholarly research. Partly this results from ongoing attempts to expand the higher education system in line with wider policies promoting a 'knowledge economy'; and partly it results from widespread policy concerns for equity and inclusion. In both cases, researchers and policymakers alike have tended to focus on access and entry to the system, with much less attention being paid to the distribution of outcomes from the system. This paper reports on a multi-country study that was aimed at critically understanding the experiences of non-traditional students in higher education, and in particular on the factors that helped promote retention. In doing so, the study straddles the sociology of social reproduction and the psychosociology of learner transformations.

Persistence of Adult Undergraduates on a Traditionally-Oriented University Campus: Does Donaldson and Graham's Model of College Outcomes for Adult Students Still Apply?

The purpose of this study was to explore the social and academic experiences of non-traditional students pursuing a bachelor's degree at a traditionally-oriented residential university and how these experiences promote or impede their persistence to graduation. The study explored components of Donaldson and Graham's Model of College Outcomes for Adult Students and confirmed their proposed influences, including prior experience and personal biographies, adult cognition, psycho-social and value orientation, life-world environment, and the connecting classroom. Three additional specific findings focused on a strong personal striving characteristic among students, the motivation to attend and stay in college to be role models for their children, and gender difference regarding the use of and expectation for faculty support.

Transitioning Non-Traditional Students To An Undergraduate Business Program

This paper reports experiences of non-traditional students in a specially designed section of seminar course which was primarily designed for first-year traditional business students. The College of Business’s BSN101, Foundations of Business Administration (FBA), is designed to serves as a course to assist the students with transitioning into the business program. Typical traditional classes have enrollments of about 80 students. The special section for non-traditional students had seven students, 24 years of age or older, who were returning to undergraduate business school. This paper reports results of the implementation of the new program design in the FBA classes. Results are important not only to the College of Business, but also to the other Colleges as interest in first-year seminar courses and better serving the needs of non-traditional student increases. Currently, the University Retention Committee and the First-Year Seminar Sub-Committee are exploring the possibility of implementing a first-year seminar courses in the College of Arts and Sciences and the College of Education and Human Services to be recommended to the Provost. Data collected for the experimental section in the study reported here will support decision-making regarding new seminar courses.

Gauging the attitudes of non-traditional students at a new campus: an Australian case study

Of the challenges facing universities, the need to attract and accommodate students of increasingly varied demographic backgrounds is perhaps one of the most pressing. This study was conducted to profile the first-year student cohort at a new university campus characterised by the non-traditional students typical of a rapidly changing tertiary sector. The project was designed to follow on from the findings of a recent nation-wide review of first-year students in Australia, which provided a robust point of comparison. The cohort in this context differed from those of previous studies—over half were first-generation tertiary students; less than one-third were from a high socioeconomic status background; and just under half were mature-aged students. Overall, results indicated that students at this university, despite their backgrounds, were remarkably positive about their university experience and well-equipped to achieve at university study. These findings are highly relevant in terms of understanding the transitional experiences of non-traditional stud ents.

Transforming the Learning Experiences of Non-traditional Students: A perspective from higher education

This paper presents a contextualised model of internal and external factors affecting student learning. It suggests that a two-way process of change and development is required if non-traditional entrants are to enjoy a successful experience of higher education. This process involves students, for whom HE is an alien environment, in negotiating a series of stages, or "transformations" regarding: their entitlement to participate in HE; their disposition towards the course; their approach to theory-practice; and their attitude to becoming a "professional". For its part the university must accept that the implications of offering access to non-traditional students does not end, but rather begins, at the point of entry. This means providing sustained support to students throughout the course in relation to the external and internal factors that affect the learning process. It is suggested that our findings will provide some useful insights for an international audience in HE, and other formal learning situations, wishing to adopt more inclusive policies and will alert them to the problems and possibilities that this raises.

Using the Experiences of Nontraditional Students in the Classroom

It is not uncommon for older, “nontraditional” students to enroll in the management principles course either as a requirement for an undergraduate degree or as a prerequisite for the MBAdegree. Yet many of these nontraditional students arrive in the classroom with significant levels of work experience. As a result, it becomes difficult to simultaneously engage both traditional and nontraditional students. This article will describe a semester-long exercise that was developed to more fully use students' experience base in the learning experience. Very positive reactions from students suggest that both types of students benefited.