Validation and Its Role in Encouraging Persistence for Immigrant-Origin Students at Community Colleges

• In Event: 52.048 - Latina/o and Immigrant Student Educational Pathways and the Factors That Shape Their Journey Through the Educational Pipeline

Abstract

Purpose of Study
The purpose of this qualitative study is to explore the validating experiences that occur between immigrant-origin students and faculty at community colleges and its impact on student persistence. Today, immigrant origin students enroll more in community colleges than any other type of post-secondary institution (Teranishi, Suarez-Orozco & Suárez-Orozco, 2011). Community colleges offer potential avenues for access to educational attainment, productivity, and civic engagement for immigrant origin students, with their open enrollment and affordability (Baily, 2009; Teranishi, et al., 2011). However, very limited research has been written on immigrant origin students in community colleges, which is important due to this diverse growing population (Teranishi et al. 2011).

Community college students are more likely to work full-time, less likely to live on-campus, attend college part-time, work off-campus, and have limited opportunities to engage in social activities and form significant support systems with peers and faculty (Bensimon, 2007; Crisp, 2010). Community colleges are more likely to hire part-time instructors, which limits the opportunity for relational engagement outside of the classroom (Bensimon, 2007). Therefore, this study seeks to explore the student-faculty relationships and its impact on student persistence and is guided by these research questions: 1) what are immigrant-origin student’s perceptions about their relationships with faculty, 2) do validating experiences between immigrant-origin students and faculty influence student’s persistence, and, 3) in what spaces (in-or out-of-classroom) are student-faculty relationships built.

Theoretical Framework
Validation theory framework will be used to examine student-faculty relationships and its impact on student persistence. Rendon (1994) defines validation as “an enabling, confirming, and supportive process initiated by in-and out-of-class agents that foster academic and interpersonal development” (p.44). Rendon’s (1994) findings demonstrate that students begin to feel empowered and capable of success in college when an external agent takes the initiative to validate them, academically and/or interpersonally. Research has shown that validation has a positive correlation to postsecondary success of historically underrepresented racial/ethnic groups and community colleges (Rendon, 2002; Barnett, 2011; Hurtado et al., 2011).

Methods
This qualitative study consist of 60 first-and second-generation immigrant students from 3 urban community colleges in a large urban city. This study originated from a larger research project, Research on Immigrants in College (RIC), which was a multiphase embedded mixed-methods study (Creswell & Plano Clark, 2011). We systematically examined: classrooms as well as settings outside of the classroom that have implications for: 1) fostering relational engagement; 2) accessing relevant information/social capital; and 3) fostering academic engagement.

Findings and Significance
This study is significant because there is not much understood about the learning contexts of immigrant origin students in community colleges (Teranishi et al. 2011), therefore this research will contribute to the literature by utilizing validation theory as an alternative way to better understand the relationships with faculty in-and-out the classroom and its impact on student persistence. Additionally, understanding the validating experiences of students can assist practitioners, policy makers and administrators in community colleges to develop systems and policies to aid the overall achievement of this growing population.

Author

• Edwin Hernandez, University of California - Los Angeles