Date of Award
2001
Document Type
Dissertation
Degree Name
Doctor of Education (EdD)
Department
Educational Leadership
First Advisor
Patricia A. Somers, Ph.D.
Abstract
This study explores what influences year-to-year persistence of students and provides decision-makers at Metropolitan University and similar institutions with information on students who attend nonresidential campuses. In particular, this study investigates how the quality of the student experience, including student/institutional fit, impression of environment, social interaction, faculty/student interaction, prior perception of their fit with the institution, as well as background, college experiences, and financial aid affect student persistence at a metropolitan university in the southeastern part of the United States. In a descriptive, qualitative study, information was gathered from writing assignments, focus group sessions, and individual photo-elicitation interviews. In addition, extant institutional data was collected. Fifteen of the students from whom I gathered the most information are persisters, or those who continued at Metropolitan University from the fall 1999 semester through the fall 2000 semester. The remaining 13 from whom I gathered much information but who failed to enroll through the fall 2000 semesters are nonpersisters. This study took place over time and was conducted not to arrive at a set of predetermined ideas but rather to explore new and alternate ways of seeing and understanding first-year experiences at a metropolitan university.
Recommended Citation
Austin, Jan Linda, "Picture This: Images of First-Year Experience at a Metropolitan University" (2001). Theses and Dissertations. 114.
https://research.ualr.edu/etd/114
