Relatedness Needs and Employee Engagement in College Remediation

• In Event: Moscone Center West Roundtable Session 7
  In Roundtable Session: Exploring Multiple Pathways to Teaching in Diverse Contexts

Abstract

Though students in the City University of New York’s SEEK program do not meet traditional admissions requirements for admission to the University’s four-year colleges, recent research demonstrates that SEEK students earn more as adults than their peers from higher-income families and about the same as their low-income peers who do not require remedial education in college (Chetty et al., 2017). Analyzing 21 semi-structured interviews on the “service climate” (Schneider, 1980) construct with SEEK staff from a service operations management perspective, I found: (1) that service climate within this context is closely linked to employees’ intrinsic motivation (Deci and Ryan, 1964), and that (2) relatedness needs (Alderfer, 1972) matter for employees’ sustained work engagement in this high-needs educational context over time.

Author

• Tiffany Brown, University of Connecticut - Storrs