Student Stop Out and Retention at a Hispanic-Serving Institution in Southern California: The Role of Background, Academic, and Environmental Factors

Abstract

This study explores the demographic/background, academic, and environmental factors that predicted student retention after stopping out at a large Hispanic-serving institution in Southern California. The results show that (a) gender, (b) academic background, experience, readiness, and performance, and (c) personal and financial issues predicted retention. We interpret these findings in the context of existing literature and provide suggestions to help institutions develop intervention strategies to promote student retention and “servingness” at HSIs.

“I’ve Lived Everything They Are Trying to Teach Me”: Latinx Immigrant Youth’s Ambivalent Educational Mobility in White Evangelical Universities

“…However, HSIs were not always Latinx-serving and thus may still have hostile racial and immigration climates (Garcia et al 2019). Moreover, recent research suggests that HSIs and MSIs may not be entirely "empowering," as they may both circumscribe certain parts of minoritized students' intersectional identities and do not seem to lead to greater retention and achievement for these learners (Cuellar and Johnson-Ahorlu 2016;Serrano 2020;Montanari et al 2022). 9 At fundamentalist schools, however, "the prevailing opinion is that Blacks are the sons of Ham [Noah's son] .…”