Language Minority Students in Community Colleges: An SEM Model Exploring Socio-Academic Variables Related to Persisitence Pertaining to Re-Enrollment

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

3-14-2019

Publication Title

Community College Journal of Research and Practice

Volume

43

Issue

3

First page number:

173

Last page number:

185

Abstract

Community colleges are increasingly important places for language minority students to access higher education. Unfortunately, this group of students is the least likely to persist in terms of re-enrollment, degree completion, or transfer to four-year institutions. In this study, we used structured equation modeling with a sample of 10,637 language minority students’ responses from the Community College Survey of Student Engagement to build a persistence model based on theoretical and empirically based variables. We found students’ perceived relationships with others on the community college campus to be critical to their intent to re-enroll in the community college (i.e., persistence pertaining to re-enrollment). Moreover, students’ involvement in learning communities had a direct, significant, and positive effect on language minority students’ persistence as well as on their perceived relationships. ESL and developmental English courses, on the other hand, did not have a significant effect on language minority students’ persistence. We explore our findings with respect to previous research and discuss implications for future research and practice.

Disciplines

Bilingual, Multilingual, and Multicultural Education | Community College Education Administration

Language

English

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