Several studies have investigated community college transfer students and their bachelor’s degree attainment; however, less is known about nontraditional community college transfer students and their efforts to graduate from four-year institutions.
A recent study by Terry Ishitiani, Associate Professor at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, investigated the likelihood of nontraditional community college transfer
students to attain bachelor’s degrees. His findings, published in the Fall 2023 issue
of College & University, suggested there was no significant difference in the odds of earning bachelor’s degrees between nontraditional transfer students and their counterparts.
The pathway to bachelor’s degree attainment through two-year institutions remains a valid option for adult students, Ishitani wrote.
The study was based on data from NCES’s Beginning Postsecondary Students Longitudinal Study: 2012-17, which began collecting data in 2011-12 and followed survey participants through 2016-17.
Of the 22,500 first-time students in the original BPS:12/17 data, 8,548 students initially enrolled in two-year community colleges, Ishitani wrote. Of these 8,548 first-time students, 2,022 (24%) transferred to four-year institutions
before the end of the survey period in 2017, which served as the study data herein.
Ishitiani found the following factors positively impacted non-traditional community college students’ bachelor's degree attainment:
A larger amount of cumulative loans
Transferring during the third or second years
Higher first-year GPA at community colleges
Enrolling full-time at four-year schools
Being female
Factors that negatively impacted degree attainment of this population included:
Being from low-income families as well as lower-income and high-middle-income families
Transferring during the fifth or sixth years
Enrolling in private, for-profit two-year institutions
Ishitani found that transfer students who had children were 73 percent less likely than transfer students without any children to graduate with four-year degrees.
A post-hoc crosstab analysis revealed that about 28 percent of nontraditional students
had children, Ishitani wrote. Thus, these nontraditional transfer students with children were less likely to attain bachelor’s degrees than transfer students without children.
But overall, the findings showed “no difference in the likelihood of graduating from four-year institutions between nontraditional-aged or first-generation community college transfer students and their counterparts.”
Other articles in the Fall 2023 issue of College & University include:
Features
Examining College Choice Factors for NCAA Division III Student-Athletes by Matt Gionta
(Literally) Translating the Admissions Process: An Interview with Brent Gage and Katelyn Peters by Zachary Taylor
An Interview with Zachary A. Pardos by Tiffani Robertson
Research in Brief
An Update on the Biden Administration’s Higher Education Agenda by Michelle Mott
Commentary
Enrollment Services Partnerships with Academic Affairs Are Necessary to Help Community College Adult Student Recruitment by Michael Sparrow
Use Your Expertise to Write a Bill! by Carl Einhaus
The Pell Act – Is it Needed? by Kenneth McGhee
Campus Viewpoint
Designing and Developing Rubrics for Holistic Decision-Making in Graduate Management Education by Stephen Jenkins and Camila de Wit Giesemann
The AACRAO Review
The Real World of College reviewed by Stephen Handel
Examining Student Retention and Engagement Strategies at Historically Black Colleges and Universities reviewed by Harrison Johnson
Yale Needs Women; How the First Group of Girls Rewrote the Rules of an Ivy League Giant reviewed by Kimberley Buster-Williams
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