2016 Annual Conference

Educational attainment is a key measurement of student success. This study uses Educational Longitudinal Study (2002/2012) data and investigates the predicted value of social capital, cultural capital and psychological outcomes of degree completion for students in community colleges. This session will present findings and address implications for practice and policy.

This presentation is appropriate for adult education scholars, school and college administrators, policy makers, and higher education faculty who are interested in understanding the impact of a variety of factors that affect degree completion for community college students.

Two-year institutions play an important role for minority and underrepresented students in higher education. However, many students who attend community college never earn an associate’s degree or transfer to a four-year institution. National research indicates that about 40% of two-year college students expect to complete an associate’s degree, and about 36% plan to transfer to a four-year institution (Provasnik & Planty, 2008). However, the degree completion rate at community colleges is only 28% (Snyder & Dillow, 2011). Therefore, to help students succeed in higher education, it is important to determine which factors significantly influence student degree attainment. This study integrates Bean & Metzner’s (1985) student attrition model with social and cultural capital theories. In this quantitative study, we use the National Center for Education Statistics’ Educational Longitudinal Study of 2002/2012, a national representative sample, to investigate the influence of student demographic variables (e.g. gender, race), social capital (e.g. student perceptions of social environment), cultural capital (e.g. student academic performance) and psychological outcomes (e.g. utility, satisfaction) on their degree attainments.