A Summer Bridge Program for Underprepared First-Year Students: Confidence, Community, and Re-enrollment

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Author(s): Suzuki, A., Amrein-Beardsley, A., & Perry N. J.

Citation: Suzuki, A., Amrein-Beardsley, A., & Perry N. J. (2012). A Summer Bridge Program for Underprepared First-Year Students: Confidence, Community, and Re-enrollment. Journal of The First-Year Experience & Students in Transition, 24(2), 85-106.

 

Abstract

This quasi-experimental, action-research study explored a five-week pre-enrollment initiative called the Pathways Summer Bridge (PSB) Program in the New College of Interdisciplinary Arts and Sciences at Arizona State University (ASU). Theoretically framed and developed using the six components of Tinto’s (1993) longitudinal model of institutional departure, the PSB Program had as its ultimate goal to improve the re-enrollment and retention rates of academically underprepared first-year students who were predominately from first-generation and underrepresented populations. Results indicate that participants’ confidence about college expectations and their sense of belonging were higher than a control group of traditional first-year students, and their re-enrollment rates were higher than campus and university averages.

 

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