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Institutionally offered student services (e.g., academic advising, career counseling, personal counseling, and educational planning) are available in community colleges to help students with the transition into postsecondary education, obtain success while in college, and transition to the next phase of their educational, career, and life journeys (Nevarez & Wood, 2010). Access to, efficacy regarding, and use of these services are necessary to consume all of the benefits of these services (Wood, Harris, & Xiong, 2014). Although nontraditional students (e.g., first-generation college students, students of color, low-income students) tend to have the highest need for these services, they often do not to take full advantage of the services available to them (Atherton, 2014). This utilization gap can be examined to inform institutional practices aimed at improving student success for first-generation college students (FGCS) at the college level.
Community colleges have historically served nontraditional students, including first-generation college students (FGCS). The operational definition for FGCS is a college student whose parents did not graduate from college with at least a bachelor's degree (Byrd, 2005). Large portions of FGCS have more limited preparation for college (Byrd, 2005) than traditional students. This fact only widens the achievement gap between FGCS and their peers. A student's ability to navigate the college culture has been closely tied to exposure to college-going culture, including parents who are college graduates. Furthermore, the navigation of this culture has also proven to contribute to academic success (Byrd, 2005). FGCS students often have more limited social and cultural capital, which can impede their success in college (Atherton, 2014). Because of this, many FGCS tend to become isolated while experiencing frustrations with the educational system, creating difficulties with transitioning from high school into postsecondary education (Atherton, 2014). This circumstance calls for further investigation into how FGCS experience services at their college. Additionally, it is imperative to explore how FGCS use institutionally offered services as well as uncover their feelings regarding the use of the services. This analysis focused on whether or not there were differences in service access, service efficacy, and service use for respondents based on their generational status of first-generation college student or non-first-generation college student (non-FGCS).
Because of the achievement gap that has been identified within the FGCS population, coupled with the budding population...