New findings from the
Center for Community College Student Engagement(CCCSE) indicate that mindset may play an
important role in student engagement. Students who have more productive
mindsets are more engaged and have higher GPAs. Thus, understanding mindset—and
helping students improve their academic mindsets—may open new avenues for
improving student success.
While
there is a great deal of research about mindset and its impact on the way
people learn, little work has been done on mindset in community colleges. Yet
mindset is beginning to get traction in the field, primarily at colleges that
are implementing guided pathways. This report provides results from the first
large set of data on mindset in community colleges. These data suggest that
understanding the relationship between mindset and success can give colleges
new tools to help students meet their academic goals.
The Center presents these
findings in the hope that they provide insights at this emergent time of
mindset work.
What
Is Academic Mindset?
Academic
mindset encompasses individuals’ beliefs about the ways learning and
intelligence work. These beliefs frame students’ thinking, influence how they interpret
events, and ultimately affect their success. Students with productive academic
mindsets believe, for example, that they can change their intelligence, and they
have confidence in their ability to learn challenging material and accomplish
difficult tasks. “When students believe they can get smarter, they understand
that effort makes them stronger. Therefore they put in extra time and effort,
and that leads to higher achievement.”
By
contrast, students with nonproductive academic mindsets are more likely to
“stop trying when confronted with a challenge because they’ve convinced themselves
that they’re not good at math or writing or whatever the subject is.” 2 Based on research developed around these concepts, a growing
number of colleges are incorporating mindset—in particular, exploring ways to
help students move toward a more productive academic mindset— into their
efforts to improve student success.
Components
of Academic Mindset
The Center identified
four components of academic mindset and surveyed students about each of them. Based
on their responses, students were placed along a scale from a nonproductive to a
productive mindset. For example, agreeing or strongly agreeing with statements such
as “I can become more intelligent by working hard on my studies” indicates a
productive mindset. The four components of academic mindset explored in this
report are:
- 1. Growth vs. fixed mindset: students’ perceptions of the potential for change in their intelligence.
- 2. Self-efficacy: students’ confidence in their ability to be successful in their coursework.
- 3. Relevance of academic experience: students’ views of whether their college work is preparing them for future success.
- 4. Sense of belonging: students’ perceptions of whether they are accepted members of their college community.
These four components are
interconnected, so colleges’ efforts to influence one component may have an
impact on another. Even with the overlapping nature of these components,
however, there is value in exploring each one individually. Most community
colleges have not implemented direct efforts to influence the first two
components, growth vs. fixed mindset and self-efficacy, so the steepest
learning
ACADEMIC MINDSET
Growth vs. Fixed Mindset Self- Efficacy
Sense of Belonging Relevance of Academic Experience curve may be in these areas. However,
existing efforts at many colleges already address the third and fourth components.
Making sure students’ academic experiences are relevant is central to guided
pathways, and maximizing students’ sense of belonging is a key part of
engagement efforts. In fact, more than 15 years of Center data show that building
relationships is central to student success, in part because relationships
foster students’ sense of belonging at college. But even with a strong head
start in these areas, looking at these components through a mindset lens may
help colleges better serve their students.
Contradictory Beliefs Point to Opportunities for Improvement
Center findings
indicate that few students have fully productive or fully nonproductive
mindsets. Most students have at least partially productive or mixed mindsets;
their responses fall toward the productive end of the scale for at least some
components of mindset.
It is noteworthy that student responses that indicate a
nonproductive mindset tend to cluster in two areas: testing and math. Students
report that in general they believe they can learn new things, but their
responses consistently indicate a less productive mindset when responding to
survey items specifically about test-taking and math. These data mirror
statements such as “I don’t test well” and “I’m not a math person” that are
often heard in student focus groups. These findings indicate that colleges have
an opportunity to reframe students’ perspectives on learning and that the
greatest dividends may come from focusing on mindsets related to testing and
performance in math.
Having a productive
mindset correlates with higher levels of engagement, and this finding holds
true across all CCSSE benchmarks. The closer students are to a productive
mindset, the more likely they are to be highly engaged and, thus, more
successful.
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