The Private University Faculty Perspective Of Community College Transfer Students: An Ethnographic Interview Study

Faculty/student relationships have a significant impact on student retention and success (Tinto, 1975, 1993). However, little is known about how faculty perceive community college transfer students and how they make meaning of their interactions with these students. This qualitative, descriptive, ethnographic interview study describes faculty/student interaction and the ways in which community college transfer students are perceived by the faculty at one small, private, nonprofit, masters-level university. The research questions used for this study were designed to investigate the faculty’s perception of community college students, the students’ academic experiences and the faculty/student relationship. The researcher gathered data during 12 in-depth interviews. The site was selected because of the limited research available on community college transfer students at small private colleges. An ethnographic design captured the distinct cultural influences of the study site and helped to answer to the study’s overarching research question: how do faculty perceive community college transfer students and the institution from which the student transferred? The findings from this study can guide meaningful conversations on private, four-year campuses directed toward improving how faculty/student relationships, systematic transfer processes, transfer programs and campus culture influence community college transfer student success. A thematic analysis of the interview data revealed four themes. The first, Student/Faculty Relationship: A Two-Way Street of Hesitation and Reluctance, describes how both community college transfer students, and the faculty that teach them, are hesitant and reluctant to work with one another. The second, A Balancing Act: Aligning Faculty and Student Expectations, relates to the fact that what a faculty member expects of a student, and what students perceive to be expected of them, should align for the student to be successful. The third, A Second Class Institution: The Community College as a Stepping Stone describes how faculty perceive attending a community college as a stepping stone towards more prestigious goal of attending a four year institution. Finally, the fourth theme, Isolation: A Community College Transfer Experience, details the ways community college transfer students are perceived as intentionally, and unintentionally, given a separate university experience, and the ways in which this Isolation disadvantages these students. These findings are significant for both universities similar to the study site and for those that wish to understand the community college transfer student experience across institutional types

Western Water Rights: May They Be Taken without Compensation?

Western Water Rights: May They Be Taken Without Compensation

Orion MPCV Continuum RCS Heating Augmentation Model Development

The reaction control system jets of the Orion Multi Purpose Crew Vehicle can have a significant impact on the magnitude and distribution of the surface heat flux on the leeside of the aft-body, when they are fired. Changes in surface heating are expressed in terms of augmentation factor over the baseline smooth body heating. Wind tunnel tests revealed heating augmentation factors as high as 13.0, 7.6, 2.8, and 5.8 for the roll, pitch down, pitch up, and yaw jets respectively. Heating augmentation factor models, based almost exclusively on data from a series of wind tunnel tests have been developed, for the purposes of thermal protection system design. The wind tunnel tests investigated several potential jet-to-freestream similarity parameters, and heating augmentation factors derived from the data showed correlation with the jet-to-freestream momentum ratio. However, this correlation was not utilized in the developed models. Instead augmentation factors were held constant throughout the potential trajectory space. This simplification was driven by the fact that ground to flight traceability and sting effects are not well understood. Given the sensitivity of the reaction control system jet heating augmentation to configuration, geometry, and orientation the focus in the present paper is on the methodology used to develop the models and the lessons learned from the data. The models that are outlined in the present work are specific to the aerothermal database used to design the thermal protection system for the Exploration Flight Test 1 vehicle