Retention Of Minority Students Research Articles

The Underrepresentation of Minority Students in Gifted Education

Concerns over recruiting and retaining minority students in gifted education programs have persisted for several decades, and, although many educators, policymakers, and researchers have deliberated about the underrepresentation of minority students in gifted education, few articles, reports, or studies exist on this topic. This article seeks to fill this void, describing factors that inhibit the recruitment and retention of minority students in gifted education programs. These factors include screening and identification issues (e.g., definitions and instrumentation); educational issues (e.g., quality of students' education); and personnel issues (e.g., lack of teacher training in gifted and urban education, low teacher referral). Also discussed are retention issues, namely, factors that may affect the decision of minority students to remain in gifted education programs. Finally, recommendations for recruiting and retaining minority students are offered.

Book Review: Leveling the Playing Field: Promoting Academic Success for Students of Color

The most significant contribution this sourcebook makes to the existing literature is its focus on an underserved segment of the minority student population, those who have been regularly admitted. Although historically the vast majority of research concerning minority students focuses on the academically underprepared, more recently there has been a call for research that examines the full range of the community of minority students (Allen, 1992), including those with high ability. The disproportionate focus on underachievement in the literature helps create a distorted image of the community of minority students, and, perhaps unitentionally, tends to lower expectations for minority student achievement. Johnson and Ottens should be commended for their effort to expand the discussion of minority student retention. Their introductory comments capture well the importance of this topic.

Correlates of the SAT in Minority Engineering Students

Project Preserve is a program designed to retain minority engineering students who have experienced academic difficulty (Morning & Fleming, 1994). The NASA-funded effort channeled African American and Latino engineering students who had failed their freshman year in predominantly White institutions into three schools noted for their support services for minorities, for their willingness to restructure those services, and for variation among institutional variables: Xavier University of Louisiana, California State University at Northridge, and City College of the City University of New York. The principal investigator (CM) coordinated efforts to find students in academic difficulty and to monitor their progress in the new environments where faculty mentors served as project directors providing support and guidance. The project demonstrated that by the conclusion of a 5-year program, 64% of over 100 would-be dropouts were still retained in engineering. Furthermore, there was evidence of cognitive development, bonding to faculty, and institutional bonding, as well as institutional variations in these outcomes. At a time when 67% of minority engineering students drop out (ABET, 1991; Landis, 1991), the question is, how does Project Preserve work? In a review of support programs in engineering Morning (1988) found that parity in majority and minority student retention was achieved when three program features were present: (1) attention to cognitive development, (2) close relationships with faculty and staff, and (3) a sense of community and bonding to the institution. In practice, Project Preserve attended to cognitive development by offering faculty workshops in critical thinking concepts (Whimbey & Lochhead, 1986; Resnick, 1987; Sevenair et al., 1987; Heiman & Slomianko, 1988) and providing students with Efficacy Training workshops (Howard & Hammond, 1985). Close relationships to faculty were achieved by requiring weekly faculty meetings, although there were institutional differences in the success of the bonding (see Morning & Fleming, 1994). A sense of community and bonding to the institution was fostered by requiring students to work on campus. This approach is consistent with major theories of retention that emphasize a sense of membership in the academic community, the quality of student-faculty interactions, and a student-centered campus culture (Tinto, 1975, 1987; Pascarella & Terenzini, 1977; Pantages & Creedon, 1978; Beal & Noel, 1980; Forest, 1987; Noel, 1987; Kalsner, 1991), as well as approaches to the retention of minority students in science emphasizing academic acceleration and the application of cognitive theory (Lincoln, 1979; Fullilove & Treisman, 1990; Gordon, 1986; Sims, 1992). The lingering question for Project Preserve as well as the retention literature is, to what extent is persistence due to institutional factors and to what extent to student factors? The evaluation of Project Preserve found that both student and institutional factors appear to be at work. Students were selected for the program if their test scores, academic records, and high-school courses were indicative of success in engineering. Indeed, Morning & Fleming (1994) found that Project Preserve students at entry were, compared to norms for other minority students, bright, motivated, and scientific in inclination. However, they were also test anxious, lacking in study discipline, and had been preoccupied with social life in their previous engineering schools. Institutional differences in the retention rates after two years of the program - varying from 36% to 79% to 80% - were attributed to degree of faculty involvement, with the least involvement at CCNY and the most at CSUN and Xavier University. Thus, student and institutional factors appear to interact to produce retention outcomes. The project also undertook a correlational analysis of major performance measures among students at entry with evaluation measures of academic and social adjustment further to understand the factors affecting retention. …

Guest Editor's Comments: The Full Circle: TRIO Programs, Higher Education, and the American Future-Toward a New Vision of Democracy

This issue of the Journal of Negro Education is both informed and motivated by recent pronouncements about the challenges facing higher education and its responsibility to ensure that all Americans have equal opportunity to learn. These pronouncements include those of Garibaldi (1997) and Astin (1998), whose analyses provide sweeping critiques of the American educational terrain. For his part, Garibaldi reviewed African American educational progress in the four decades since the 1954 Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas Supreme Court ruling. Although his review concludes that notable improvements in the educational achievement of African American students have been realized, it also points out the persistence of many negative signs. These declining indexes indicate that educational parity for African Americans remains a distant goal. Astin, addressing a related topic, asserted the following in his analysis of the civic responsibility of higher education: The education of the remedial student is the most important educational problem in America today, more important than educational funding, affirmative action, vouchers, merit pay, teacher education, financial aid, curriculum reform and the rest. Providing effective remedial education would do more to alleviate our most serious social and economic problems than almost any other action we could take. (pp. 12-13) Both scholars speak to one of the most daunting challenges facing higher education in the United States. That challenge: to ensure higher levels of academic achievement for the rapidly growing population of students from low-income and racial/ethnic minority backgrounds who are destined to become the majority of the future U.S. college applicant pool. The nation's historically Black colleges and universities (HBCUs) have successfully met this challenge for well over a century. In recent years, they have been joined by an increasing number of Hispanic-serving institutions (HACUs) and American Indian-- serving tribal colleges. However, if, as Astin asserts, U.S. higher education is to fulfill its civic responsibilities, a substantial number of predominantly White colleges and universities will have to make significant improvements in their rates of enrollment, retention, and graduation of minority and low-income students. TRIO programs-the focus of this issue-have much to offer institutions of higher learning that seek to improve the educational outcomes of such students. In one generation, these programs have implemented numerous successful strategies that have been shown to work effectively with first-generation-college, minority, and low-income students. When the first TRIO programs were established, however, few would have predicted their remarkable growth or significance in a rapidly changing society. The TRIO approach to expanding educational opportunity has thrived in the last third of the 20th century, and the growth of TRIO programs has been paralleled by a dramatic transformation in U.S. society. Americans are rapidly becoming more racially and ethnically diverse-a trend that demographers predict will continue into the new century. By the year 2000, 28% of all Americans will be people of color and / or Hispanic ancestry; this proportion is estimated to reach 32% by 2010 and 36% by 2020 (Bureau of the Census, 1996). By mid-century, Census projections indicate that minorities will make up 47% of the national population. These changes underscore the continuing need for the TRIO programs. They further highlight the importance of providing access to educational opportunity to all citizens and maintaining a reasonable level of social cohesion and harmony in a racially, ethnically, and culturally diverse society. This latter task may be as challenging as the task of achieving parity in educational opportunity itself. When Congress passed the Economic Opportunity Act in 1964, it authorized the launching of 18 pilot Upward Bound programs. …

Responding to diversity in organizational life: the case of a Faculty of Social Work

Increasing diversity of populations in many countries places demands on institutional structures to be responsive to the needs of minority communities. Universities, and especially schools of social work, are expected to be open to these new challenges of diversity. It is argued that inclusiveness should be integrated into the overall strategic responses of institutions. This paper describes the attempts by a Faculty of Social Work to become more inclusive by introducing initiatives in minority student recruitment and retention, faculty development, curriculum development, community outreach and research. The paper also raises critical issues involved in the process and discusses the lessons learned.

Impressions: African American First-Year Students' Perceptions of a Predominantly White University

This article describes a study of African American first-year students' impressions of a predominantly White public university. Participants (N = 10) were asked to take photographs illustrative of their perceptions of the campus environment and to discuss their photographs in individual and small group interviews. Six themes emerged from these data: the physical beauty of the campus, the immensity of the campus, participants' consciousness of being Black on campus, the influence of Greek-letter organizations, the prevalence of voluntary racial/ethnic separation, and participants' concerns about preparing for their futures. Implications of these findings for collegiate policies and practices are discussed. Recommendations include continuing support for initiatives such as TRIO's Student Support Services program, which promote minority student recruitment and retention. INTRODUCTION Historically, African Americans have been underrepresented as a proportion of the total enrollment of students at institutions of higher education in the United States. Prior to the 1960s, African Americans participated in higher education primarily at institutions known as HBCUs (historically Black colleges and universities) (Blackburn, Gamson, & Peterson, 1978; Fleming, 1984; Willie & Cunnigen, 1981). By the close of the 1960s, the majority of African American students enrolled at institutions of higher education were attending predominantly White colleges and universities (PWCUs) (Fleming, 1984; Willie & Cunnigen, 1981). Today, most African American students continue to attend institutions of higher education where the racial/ ethnic composition of the students, faculty, and staff is predominantly White. Also, most U.S. college and university students, including African Americans, are enrolled at public institutions, or those that are controlled at some level by the government of the state or municipality in which they are located and that receive some financial assistance from that governmental body (Carter & Wilson, 1997; National Center for Education Statistics, 1995). graduation rates of African American students at public PWCUs historically have been and continue to be low when compared to those of White American students (Allen, 1991; Astone & Nunez-Wormack, 1990; Carter & Wilson, 1996,1997; Fleming, 1984; Gose, 1997; Mow & Nettles, 1990; Willie & Cunnigen, 1981). Carter and Wilson (1996) contend that a more than 20% gap in overall college graduation rates exists between Blacks and Whites. Fisk-Skinner and Gaither (1992) report a dropout rate for White undergraduates of 55% compared to 71% for Black undergraduates. majority of U.S. students who leave institutions of higher education have been found to do so during or immediately after their first year of study (Feldman & Newcomb, 1969/1994; Levitz & Noel, 1989; Tinto, 1993). As Tinto notes, The character of one's experience in that [first] year does much to shape subsequent (p. 14). In addition to the underrepresentation of African American students in persistence and graduation at PWCUs, many Black students have reported perceiving the environments of these campuses as unwelcoming, if not hostile or even threatening (Allen, 1991, 1996; Astone & Nunez-Wormack, 1990; Clay & Sherrill, 1991; Crosson, 1988; Dalton, 1991; D'Souza, 1992; Ehrlich, 1990; Fleming, 1984; Green, 1989; Hurtado, 1992; Malaney & Shively, 1995; Mow & Nettles, 1990). Near the end of the 1980s, incidents of campus ethnoviolence, or physically or psychologically harmful acts targeting persons because of characteristics related to their ethnicity or race, began to appear more often in the media (Ehrlich, 1990). Between fall 1986 and the end of 1989, the National Institute Against Prejudice and Violence noted that approximately 250 publicly reported incidents of ethnoviolence took place on U.S. college campuses, with the majority of these incidents involving Black students as their victims (Ehrlich, 1990). …

Book Review: Leveling the Playing Field: Promoting Academic Success for Students of Color

The most significant contribution this sourcebook makes to the existing literature is its focus on an underserved segment of the minority student population, those who have been regularly admitted. Although historically the vast majority of research concerning minority students focuses on the academically underprepared, more recently there has been a call for research that examines the full range of the community of minority students (Allen, 1992), including those with high ability. The disproportionate focus on underachievement in the literature helps create a distorted image of the community of minority students, and, perhaps unitentionally, tends to lower expectations for minority student achievement. Johnson and Ottens should be commended for their effort to expand the discussion of minority student retention. Their introductory comments capture well the importance of this topic.

Mission Impossible? Improving Retention of Science Majors among Minorities and Women

The Merit Workshop is intended to increase the retention of minority students and women in the sciences/math/ engineering programs, and to encourage students to consider graduate study. Since its i...

The UWM Health Careers Bridge Program: an innovative approach for improving the recruitment, retention and graduation of minority students in nursing and health careers.

The UWM Health Careers Bridge Program: an innovative approach for improving the recruitment, retention and graduation of minority students in nursing and health careers.

Factors Contributing to the Retention of Minority Students: Implications for Incorporating Diversity

Views Icon Views Article contents Figures & tables Video Audio Supplementary Data Peer Review Share Icon Share MailTo Twitter LinkedIn Tools Icon Tools Get Permissions Cite Icon Cite Search Site Citation Wanda D. Bracy, Mary Cunningham; Factors Contributing to the Retention of Minority Students: Implications for Incorporating Diversity. Journal of Baccalaureate Social Work 1 October 1995; 1 (1): 85–95. doi: https://doi.org/10.18084/1084-7219.1.1.85 Download citation file: Ris (Zotero) Reference Manager EasyBib Bookends Mendeley Papers EndNote RefWorks BibTex toolbar search Search Dropdown Menu toolbar search search input Search input auto suggest Search

A survey of minority student recruitment and retention efforts in dental schools

What I have tried to do is to provide a way that we can look at overall recruitment and retention of our minority students. As you can see from the results of the survey, some of us are doing a lot, some not so much. About 10% of the colleges have many of the components of retention suggested within this schema. Some of us are seeing results of our efforts--with many of us reporting that the attrition of minority students is equal to less than that of majority students--yet many of us feel that much more can be done to improve the total environment for our minority students. You will recall the word used the most in your responses, "more", more of nearly everything. I am sure you join with me in looking forward to the presentations during our conference so that we may find ways to increase our efforts. We do not want in the future for either us or our students to again sound like Oliver Twist when he pleaded "Please Sir, I want some more".

Facilitators and barriers for minority students in master's nursing programs.

The purpose of this exploratory qualitative study was to identify facilitators and barriers to admission to and successful completion of a master's of science in nursing program as perceived by minority students in that program. Students currently registered in the master's of science in nursing program of a large midwestern private university who were classified as minority according to federal classification were interviewed using an interview guide of 10 open-ended questions. Data analysis identified emergent themes in the transcribed interviews. Major areas drawn from the data included personal factors, undergraduate education, support systems/family and friends, support systems/employment, graduate program/university, and graduate faculty. In each area, respondents identified both facilitators and barriers to their success in graduate education. In addition, respondents suggested several specific strategies for recruitment and retention of minority students in graduate nursing programs.

Enhancing the Minority Presence in Graduate Education IV: Models and Resources for Minority Student Recruitment and Retention by Jacqueline Looney.

<i>Enhancing the Minority Presence in Graduate Education IV: Models and Resources for Minority Student Recruitment and Retention</i> by Jacqueline Looney.

Minority Student Recruitment and Retention Strategies in Physical Therapy Education

Minority Student Recruitment and Retention Strategies in Physical Therapy Education

Faculty Diversity—A Crucial Link to the Successful Recruitment and Retention of Minority Students

(1993). Faculty Diversity—A Crucial Link to the Successful Recruitment and Retention of Minority Students. Journal of Physical Education, Recreation & Dance: Vol. 64, No. 3, pp. 74-80.

Minority student recruitment and retention practices among schools of professional psychology: A national survey and analysis.

Minority student recruitment and retention practices among schools of professional psychology: A national survey and analysis.

Minority student recruitment and retention practices among schools of professional psychology: A national survey and analysis.

Minority student recruitment and retention practices among schools of professional psychology: A national survey and analysis.

Minority student retention: ENLACE

AbstractENLACE has gained a national reputation for developing a model Hispanic community mentor program.

Minority student retention

AbstractAlthough there have been numerous publications centered on the Hispanic and black student and a recent increase in articles concerning the Asian student, there is relatively little research focusing specifically on retention of the Native American student.

Minority student retention: The Prince George's community college program

AbstractEffective retention programs must be designed to overcome minority attrition.