ArticlePublisher preview available

Comparing First-Generation Students to Continuing-Generation Students and the Impact of a First-Generation Learning Community

Authors:
Gail Markle
Gail Markle
Gail Markle
  • This person is not on ResearchGate, or hasn't claimed this research yet.
Danelle Dyckhoff Stelzriede
Danelle Dyckhoff Stelzriede
Danelle Dyckhoff Stelzriede
  • This person is not on ResearchGate, or hasn't claimed this research yet.
Read publisher preview
Download citation
To read the full-text of this research, you can request a copy directly from the authors.

Abstract

This study examined how factors associated with student development and persistence differ between first-generation and continuing-generation students and how participation in a learning community influences development and persistence. The findings show that first-generation students were less involved in academics and had lower gains in intellectual development and engagement with diverse perspectives than did continuing-generation students. There was no significant difference between the two groups on first-to-second year persistence rates. First-generation students who participated in the learning community outperformed continuing-generation students in gains in intellectual development, interpersonal development, and engagement with diverse perspectives. There was no significant difference in persistence between first-generation students who were in the learning community and those who were not.
A preview of this full-text is provided by Springer Nature.
Learn more
Content available from Innovative Higher Education
This content is subject to copyright. Terms and conditions apply.
Comparing First-Generation Students
to Continuing-Generation Students and the Impact
of a First-Generation Learning Community
Gail Markle
1
&Danelle Dyckhoff Stelzriede
2
Published online: 27 February 2020
#Springer Nature B.V. 2020
Abstract
This study examined how factors associated with student development and persistence
differ between first-generation and continuing-generation students and how participation
in a learning community influences development and persistence. The findings show that
first-generation students were less involved in academics and had lower gains in intel-
lectual development and engagement with diverse perspectives than did continuing-
generation students. There was no significant difference between the two groups on
first-to-second year persistence rates. First-generation students who participated in the
learning community outperformed continuing-generation students in gains in intellectual
development, interpersonal development, and engagement with diverse perspectives.
There was no significant difference in persistence between first-generation students
who were in the learning community and those who were not.
Keywords First-generation students .Student development .Student involvement .Learning
communities .Persistence
Innovative Higher Education (2020) 45:285–298
https://doi.org/10.1007/s10755-020-09502-0
Gail Markle is Associate Professor of Sociology at Kennesaw State University. She has a B.S. in Business
Administration from East Carolina University, an M.S. in Interdisciplinary Studies from the University of North
Texas, and a Ph.D. in Sociology from Georgia State University. Her research interests include nontraditional
students, student loan debt, and persistence. Email: gmarkle@kennesaw.edu.
Danelle Dyckhoff Stelzriede is the Interim Director of First-Year Writing and Visiting Faculty in English at
California State University, Los Angeles. She earned her B.A. in English from California State University,
Sacramento; her M.A. in English from Loyola Marymount University; and her Ph.D. in English with an
emphasis on twentieth Century American Literature and U.S. Empire Studies at Claremont Graduate University.
Her current research interests include translingual approaches to teaching first-year writing and high-impact
academic practices for first-year, first-generation college students. Email: ddyckho@calstatela.edu
*Gail Markle
gmarkle@kennesaw.edu
Danelle Dyckhoff Stelzriede
ddyckho@calstatela.edu
Extended author information available on the last page of the article
Content courtesy of Springer Nature, terms of use apply. Rights reserved.
... It has also been shown that a lower proportion of first-generation students live on campus (in dormitories), and are thereby being left out of the fabric of academic social relationships, along with its benefits. (Markle-Stelzriede 2020, Chickering 1974, Terenzini et al. 1996. This is because a kind of 'propinquity principle' prevails in the dormitories; students live in 'forced communities', encountering ideas and opinions that differ from their own becomes an everyday experience, and this can even have a positive effect on professional-academic performance (Newcomb 1962, Chickering 1974). ...
... It can also be deduced from American examples that first-generation students belonging to an ethnic-minority group are even more exposed to risks that hinder learning 5 (Markle-Stelzriede, 2020), and these challenges persist even after higher education. According to Phinney and Haas, minority first-generation students are forced to take up work for financial reasons to compensate for their disadvantage, so their time is split between employment and university attendance, and they do not always manage to find a balance between the two spheres. ...
Educational mobility of Hungarian firstand multi-generational young intellectuals in four countries
Article
Full-text available
  • Jan 2021
The study examines the characteristics of intergenerational educational mobility among minority Hungarian youth living in Slovakia (Felvidék), Ukraine (Transcarpathia), Romania (Transylvania), Serbia (Vojvodina). The topic is important because in Hungary there is a paucity of studies that systematically analyse the challenges and coping strategies of first-generation students in general, or which go beyond minority aspects within social structures. The paper seeks to fill this gap by exploring first-generation intellectuals’ social structure and specific attitudes, based on real life Hungarian-minority experience. Based on a literature review, the authors set up four hypotheses: hypotheses related to social and cultural reproduction, a hypothesis concerning the political consequences of mobility, and assumptions related to minority identity. After testing the hypotheses and comparing the first- generation and multigenerational students’ characteristics, the authors conclude that in the minority context there took place a social and status culture reproduction, and mobility increases the likelihood of conservative political attitudes. The immobile stratum of minority multigenerational intellectuals tends to be much more liberal and transnational, using Hungarian citizenship as a new pragmatic opportunity.
View
... Sin embargo, una gama limitada de estudios llevados a cabo en la región ha tendido a ser coherente con los resultados encontrados en otras investigaciones con respecto a la naturaleza del acceso, persistencia y retención de EPG (Flanagan-Bórquez, 2017;Guzmán-Valenzuela et al., 2022;Jarpa-Arriagada & Rodríguez-Garcés, 2017;Linne, 2018;López Cárdenas et al., 2018;Markle & Stelzriede, 2020;Pataro, 2019;Segovia González & Flanagan-Bórquez, 2019;Soto, 2016;Webb, 2018). ...
Capital aspiracional académico-familiar:experiencias de estudiantes universitarios chilenos de primera generación (Aspirational Academic-Family Capital: Experiences of First-Generation Chilean University Students)
Article
Full-text available
  • Mar 2024
Este estudio analiza las experiencias de estudiantes de primera generación (EPG). Para ello, se llevaron a cabo 29 entrevistas con EPG de distintas universidades en Chile. Los resultados revelan que cada trayectoria es el resultado de la interacción de múltiples catalizadores entrelazados: (i) aspiraciones, temores y niveles de apoyo familiar, (ii) contextos facilitadores u obstaculizadores de las experiencias; y (iii) características de la universidad. De este análisis emerge lo que denominamos capital aspiracional académico-familiar, que apunta a las capacidades de resistencia y navegación de los EPG para escoger y transitar por la universidad. This study analyzes the experiences of first generation students. To carry it out, 29 interviews were held with first generation students in different universities in Chile. The results show that the experience of each student is the result of multiple, interlinked catalysts: (i) aspirations, fears and levels of family support, (ii) contexts which facilitate or hinder the experiences; and (iii) the characteristics of the university. From this analysis there emerges what we call the academic-family aspirational capital, which points to the first generation students' abilities to choose a university, deal with the challenges of higher education and navigate their way through the university.
View
... Research focused on the experiences of FGS in Latin American higher education is a relatively recent development, having received considerably less attention than in North American contexts. However, the limited range of studies emerging from the region has tended to be broadly consistent with research outcomes elsewhere: confirming that Latin American FGS generally experience greater barriers in accessing and persisting in higher education compared to their peers (Flanagan Borquez 2017;Jarpa-Arriagada and Rodríguez-Garcés 2017;Linne 2018;López Cárdenas, Mella Luna, and Cáceres Valenzuela 2018;Markle and Stelzriede 2020). Specifically, research conducted across the region has suggested that FGS generally possess lower levels of cultural-academic and social capital (López Cárdenas, Mella Luna, and Cáceres Valenzuela 2018; Webb 2019), economic capital (Jarpa-Arriagada and Rodríguez-Garcés 2017; Pataro Fernandes 2019) and literacy capital (Trigos-Carrillo 2020), inferior levels of academic preparation in high school (Flanagan Borquez 2017) and lower levels of family resource support (Flanagan Borquez 2017;Soto Hernández 2016). ...
(Un)Limited choice: analysing the strategic choices of first-in-generation students in neoliberal higher education (https://doi.org/10.1080/01425692.2022.2080045)
Article
  • Jun 2022
  • BRIT J SOCIOL EDUC
In highly marketised higher education systems, massification has afforded greater access, particularly for first-in-generation students. Generally, this expansion has been fuelled by neoliberal ideologies that valorise the notion of choice and promise of social mobility. In this study, using interviews with 25 first-generation students, the issue of choice is critically examined in one of the earliest arenas of neoliberal experimentation: the Chilean higher education system. The study found that these first-in-generation students encountered complex and multi-levelled challenges in making higher education choices. Such choices were firmly anchored in differing levels of aspiration, and were strongly mediated by both family and school social capital. As a result, we propose an addition to traditional conceptions of choice: students (and their families) who act as strategic choosers. This outcome challenges the notion that first-in-generation students encounter unitary trajectories or equitable choices in encountering higher education.
View
... Research focused on the experiences of FGS in Latin American higher education is a relatively recent development, having received considerably less attention than in North American contexts. However, the limited range of studies emerging from the region has tended to be broadly consistent with research outcomes elsewhere: confirming that Latin American FGS generally experience greater barriers in accessing and persisting in higher education compared to their peers (Flanagan Borquez 2017;Jarpa-Arriagada and Rodríguez-Garcés 2017;Linne 2018;López Cárdenas, Mella Luna, and Cáceres Valenzuela 2018;Markle and Stelzriede 2020). Specifically, research conducted across the region has suggested that FGS generally possess lower levels of cultural-academic and social capital (López Cárdenas, Mella Luna, and Cáceres Valenzuela 2018; Webb 2019), economic capital (Jarpa-Arriagada and Rodríguez-Garcés 2017; Pataro Fernandes 2019) and literacy capital (Trigos-Carrillo 2020), inferior levels of academic preparation in high school (Flanagan Borquez 2017) and lower levels of family resource support (Flanagan Borquez 2017;Soto Hernández 2016). ...
(Un)Limited choice: analysing the strategic choices of first-in-generation students in neoliberal higher education
Article
  • Jun 2022
  • BRIT J SOCIOL EDUC
In highly marketised higher education systems, massification has afforded greater access, particularly for first-in-generation students. Generally, this expansion has been fuelled by neoliberal ideologies that valorise the notion of choice and promise of social mobility. In this study, using interviews with 25 first-generation students, the issue of choice is critically examined in one of the earliest arenas of neoliberal experimentation: the Chilean higher education system. The study found that these first-in-generation students encountered complex and multi-levelled challenges in making higher education choices. Such choices were firmly anchored in differing levels of aspiration, and were strongly mediated by both family and school social capital. As a result, we propose an addition to traditional conceptions of choice: students (and their families) who act as strategic choosers. This outcome challenges the notion that first-in-generation students encounter unitary trajectories or equitable choices in encountering higher education.
View
View
View
View
View
“Don’t Be Shy to Ask for Help”: Group Work With Urban, Black, First-Generation College Students
Article
  • Dec 2022
An urban, Black high school population share their experiences of a college preparatory counseling group specific to prospective first-generation college students (PFGCS). The salience of help seeking, as a major theme in this study, is highlighted and explored according to Black, first-generation college going students. Participant experiences include aspects of limited knowledge in regard to preparing for, and navigating, college, as well barriers to help-seeking influenced by gender socialization and racism. Participant experiences suggest affinity group work as a means for addressing such barriers.
View
Social Class Identity Integration and Success for First-Generation College Students: Antecedents, Mechanisms, and Generalizability
Article
  • Jun 2021
Social class bicultural identity integration research demonstrates that integrated social class identities are linked with better health, well-being, and academic performance among first-generation students. Here, we demonstrate that exposure to college graduates in students’ home neighborhoods before college is positively related to higher social class bicultural identity integration (Study 1), that the effect of identity integration on academic performance is mediated by academic self-efficacy (Study 2), and that the effects of identity integration on acculturative stress, life satisfaction, and overall health outcomes observed at a large, public university replicated at selective, private universities (Study 3). This suggests that the identity integration framework is a useful theoretical lens to conceptualize and predict health and performance outcomes for first-generation students.
View
View
The Activities, Roles, and Relationships of Successful First-Generation College Students
Article
Full-text available
  • Jan 2017
  • J COLL STUDENT DEV
This qualitative study describes the experiences of 16 successful first-generation college students (FGCS) utilizing a theoretical lens, informed significantly by bioecological systems theory (Bronfenbrenner, 1979), which guided our qualitative analyses of interview transcripts to examine the activities, roles, and relationships of these students as they approached the finish line of college graduation. We responded to an omission in the literature on FGCS experiences: although researchers have examined the struggles of first-generation and low-income students, few studies have focused on the experiences of successful students. We offer a developmental paradigm for appreciating undergraduate retention. Recommendations from this investigation support the development and implementation of proactive retention and degree-completion strategies from a strengths-based perspective.
View
A modified model of college student persistence: Exploring the relationship between Astin's theory of involvement and Tinto's theory of student departure
Article
Full-text available
  • Jul 1997
This study provides insight into Ist-year undergraduate persistence by using behavioral measures, based on Astin's theory of involvement, to further our understanding of Tinto's theory of student departure. The findings from this study support using an integrated model in which student behaviors and perceptions interact to influence the development of academic and social integration.
View
View
Promoting First-Generation College Students’ Mental Well-Being: Student Perceptions of an Academic Enrichment Program
Article
  • Nov 2017
  • J COLL STUDENT DEV
Academic enrichment programs seek to address the challenges first-generation students face, but research tends to focus on academic outcomes. In this study we investigated first-generation students’ perceptions of how a program addresses their mental well-being. A total of 25 undergraduate students who were enrolled in an academic enrichment program participated in focus groups and interviews. A thematic analysis of the focus groups and interviews revealed that students reported the program promoted their mental wellbeing by helping them to feel cared for, cultivating a sense of belonging, preventing and remediating distress, and helping them become resilient.
View
View
View
View
View
Academic Literacy Perceptions and Performance: Comparing First-Generation and Continuing-Generation College Students
Article
  • May 2002
Motivated by case study reports of first-generation students' discomfort in the academic community, this quantitative descriptive study examines first-generation students' perceptions of their academic literacy skills and their performance and persistence in college. These analyses are situated in a review of the quantitative research base in higher education, which provides substantial grounding for case study reports of first-generation students' weaker academic preparation, tenuous social support, and high risk of attrition, but challenges the common characterization of these students as less confident or less likely to succeed academically. In the current study first-generation and continuing-generation students were compared on measures of high school preparation (SATV, SATM, HSGPA) and college performance (grades in freshman composition, GPA upon graduation, attrition rates). Self-assessment items on college orientation surveys were used as a measure of students' perceptions of their verbal and mathematical abilities. First-generation students were found to differ from their continuing generation peers in general academic preparedness, in retention rates, and in their perceptions of their academic literacy skills, but not in college performance. Results indicate that first generation students' self-perceptions represent critical factors in the college experience, underscoring the importance of helping students forge identities as members of academic communities.
View