Perceived Factors Facilitating Students’ Transition from High School to College

Parents, friends, high school teachers and guidance counselors, college professors, academic advisors, and college orientation programs/first-year seminars play a role in facilitating students' transition from high school to college. This paper assesses the perceived helpfulness of these variables in the transition experience of college students at a medium-sized state university in the Southeast. There were significant gender differences in the reported helpfulness of parents, friends, high school counselors, high school teachers, and the first-year seminar. There were also significant differences by race in the perceived helpfulness of parents, friends, high school counselors, and SOAR (an orientation program). Students' perceptions of their parents' and friends' level of helpfulness may be exaggerated.