Doctoral Dissertation Research: How Congregational Participation Shapes Higher Education Pathways in a Subpopulation

该项目提供了关于来自不断增长的亚群体的学生及其父母如何理解宗教信仰与高等教育成就之间联系的信息。 这是一个宗教信仰程度高、高等教育程度低的亚群体。 本研究利用现有的国家和地方行政数据，进一步进行半结构化访谈，调查这些学生的教育行为和态度、宗教信仰与大学升学途径之间的关系，以及宗教信仰与大学升学途径之间的关系。以及宗教领袖的影响力 这些行政数据将用于研究宗教信仰与高级课程学习模式、大学申请、入学和大学选择之间的关系。 采访，与神职人员，家长和年轻人从三个教会，将探讨在何种程度上教会动态对青年人的大学决定的影响。这个奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并已被认为是值得通过使用基金会的智力价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估的支持。

This project provides information on how students from a growing subpopulation and their parents understand the connection between religiosity and higher education attainment. This is a subpopulation with high levels of religious adherence and low levels of higher education attainment. The role of these students’ religious perspectives in influencing their higher education achievement has been largely overlooked yet may be a vitally important piece of understanding educational stratification in this subpopulation.This project uses existing national and local administrative data and further conducts semi-structured interviews to investigate behaviors and attitudes toward education, the relationship between religious affiliation and college pathways, and the influence of faith leaders. The administrative data will be used to examine the association between religious affiliation and advanced course-taking patterns, college applications, enrollment and college choice. The interviews, with clergy, parents and young adults from three congregations, will explore the extent to which congregational dynamics have an impact on youths’ decisions about college.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.