Students' Perceptions and Experiences with Key Factors during the Transition from High School to College

Parents, friends, high school teachers and guidance counselors, college professors and academic advisors, college orientation programs, and first-year seminars play a role in facilitating students' transition from high school to college. This paper assesses the frequency of activities linked to the transition process and how helpful these behaviors are for students at a medium-sized state university in the Southeast. Mothers provide the greatest number of helping behaviors and are the most helpful resource in the transition process. There are extensive gender and racial differences in the students' perception of helpfulness and the reported number of times students receive help. Even though students believe they receive a lot of help from or rate helpful certain factors, the perceived degree of helpfulness may not be reflected in their GPAs. (Contains 3 tables.)