College Failure/ Success and Student EmploymentRacial Religious ToleranceCollege Failure/ Success and Binge Drinking/ PartyingCollege Failure/ Success and Social Emotional ProblemsJourney towards the Bachelor’s Degree:Smooth Sailing or Choppy Waters? Andrew GombergCarol BustamanteEGL 102/ 008May 1, 2007AbstractOur class decided to undertake a journey that would benefit us and our fellow students. We wanted to know what factors were involved in smoothly sailing towards the bachelor’s degree and what factors were involved in not attaining the bachelor’s degree. We hypothesized on 8 factors and broke up into 8 research teams. We searched for the best studies and included them in our Literature Review. We learned that, blah, blah, blah, and blah, blah, blah were key to successfully completing the bachelor’s degree. We included those key factors from the Literature Review in a 4 hour seminar we designed for Oakton students. Through this seminar we hope to educate our fellow students so that as many Oakton students are successful in their academic journeys as possible.Defining the problemAnytime an Oakton students drops out before attaining the bachelor’s degree, that is a problem. Etc. Etc. Etc. (you fill in the rest)Some college students make major mistakes in their educational and social choices. Because of these choices they don’t progress properly to succeed in developing a career that leads to a rewarding job. These students can make mistakes as early as high school if they don’t take the proper preparatory course for a technical career, or once in college by not managing their time properly and fail to do all required reading and turn in assignments timely. Another mistake that a student can make is to not focus their energies on class material and become a social butterfly, drink excessively and party. The affect of this behavior is to just get by and not really learn what is needed to succeed. This type of behavior is the downfall of a great many freshman students. Explaining the goalOur class’s goal was to find out what factors are involved when a student fails to get a bachelor’s degree and what factors are involved thatease the way towards the bachelor’s degree. We broke up into 8 research teams and researched the following possibilities:1) academic readiness2) fraternities/sororities3) etc4)5)6)7)8)Our goal was to use the knowledge to design a four hour seminar so that we could share what we learned with our fellow students.This paper’s goal is to point out the issues, which may hinder a student’s progress towards earninga college degree, and in turn to become successful in their career of choice. The paper will bestructured so the reader will learn from the studies conducted by these professionals, and therefore, the reader would have the ability to avoid these issues. In turn these students will develop strategies to become successful and allow them to finish their college education and career development on a positive footing.A Review of the Literature1. College Failure/ Success and Academic Readiness To be ready and successful in a college setting a freshman entering college must have acquired certain basic skills in reading, writing and mathematics. Many high schools have failed to teach these skills to their graduates. Also many students have desired to earn a degree in a scientific or technical field, however they have not taken the proper preparatory course in high school and cannot succeed at the college level. These are but a few reasons why some freshmen students are not successful at the college level. Other professionals have studied this issue.Paul E. Pitre (2006) studied the transition that white and African American students make from ninth grade until they possibly reach college. Pitre wanted to know if African American students wanted to go to college as much as whites did. He formed two groups from four high schools inMaryland and studied whether or not both groups wanted to go to college. He used the Hossler and Gallagher college choice model as a “conceptual framework.” The results of Pitre’s study indicated that African American students wanted to go to college just as much as their white counterparts. If however, both groups did not think their high school was preparing them, they were less likely to want to attend college. African American students were not equal academically to white students, which may also affect whether or not they get to college. The significance of these findings show African Americans students as wanting to go to college, but not going because they know they are academically unprepared. Similarly, Richard J. Noeth (2005) reported findings that the focus group were having discussions about the middle and early high school students, that demonstrate how students and school-based factors, including extracurricular activities and pre-college programs, help these student’s form educational goals, select classes, and explore post secondary education. Noeth learned that the survey findings show that as early as eight-grade, nearly all students planned to pursue postsecondary education or training. The majority of 77% or three quarters of these students surveyed said that they would plan to attend a four- year college or university. Many students viewed college as their postsecondary education and aspired to pursue graduate and professional study. Students from the study stated that they wanted to major in careers relating tomedicine, law, teaching, and computer technology. The results of Noeth’s study indicated that only two-thirds of the students taking part in the study think that high school program will prepare them for college. These findings disclose that there may be misalignment between postsecondary plans and high school program of study. The problem is that many high school students are not taking a proper preparatory curriculum that would be necessary to develop theproper skills necessary to be successful in college and graduate school which can have an effect during ones professional life. In addition, Byrd Macdonald (2005) provided a study that attempts to determine the college readiness of a student through their academic skills as well as though other non-academicand cultural characteristics. A study conducted by Napoli and Wortman (1996) does acknowledgethere is a positive correlation of student success with a student’s academic and social integration. In his study
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