This issue of SEM Quarterly provides four unique perspectives on higher education and SEM today.  Dr. Karen Miller of Cuyahoga Community College, an innovative institution demonstrating great success in student achievement and completion, offers insights into the initiatives that have helped Tri-C, as it is known, achieve these outcomes.   Dr. Miller is a member of AACRAO’s Community College Advisory Group and shares her leadership experience and expertise with AACRAO in this article and in very tangible ways through service to the Group and the Association.

A second article focused on community college outcomes is offered by Drs. Bhavesh Bamphrolia (Temple University) and Steven E. Phelan (Fayetteville State University, North Carolina).  They examine the relationships between entrepreneurship orientation, SEM orientation and institutional performance.  This is a baseline study that fills a research gap in how these organizational dynamics may relate to one another.  We value the groundbreaking work in this area and look forward to its repetition across the years.

Much ado is made in higher education and mainstream press and media about the rising costs of higher education.  Dr. Marie Gioiosa (Iona College) examines the relationship between educational costs at private nonprofit American colleges and universities and the specific expenses of instruction and academic support.  She confirms some notions and disproved others in a very interesting and insightful study of these relationships, which is based upon a broad sample of this highest-cost sector of American higher education.

Our fourth article is a stellar piece by Dr. Braxton and Ph.D. candidate Clay Francis of Vanderbilt’s Peabody School of Education.  This work builds upon much of the student success literature of Braxton and others, focusing on two factors and their relationship to student outcomes.  In this examination of the commitment of the institution to student welfare and institutional integrity (evidence of espoused mission and goals), the authors provide new insights into the linkages between institutional disposition and student retention outcomes across multiple institutional types in American higher education.  It is a well-written and concise view of these important and sometimes neglected aspects of how institutional values impact student success.

Enjoy this issue’s research and insights and best wishes for success in all your enrollment endeavors.