The author of the best-selling What the Best College Teachers Do is back with more humane, doable, and inspiring help, this time for students who want to get the most out of college—and every other educational enterprise, too. The first thing they should do? Think beyond the transcript. The creative, successful people profiled in this book—college graduates who went on to change the world we live in—aimed higher than straight A’s. They used their four years to cultivate habits of thought that would enable them to grow and adapt throughout their lives. Combining academic research on learning and motivation with insights drawn from interviews with people who have won Nobel Prizes, Emmys, fame, or the admiration of people in their field, Ken Bain identifies the key attitudes that distinguished the best college students from their peers. These individuals started out with the belief that intelligence and ability are expandable, not fixed. This led them to make connections across disciplines, to develop a “meta-cognitive” understanding of their own ways of thinking, and to find ways to negotiate ill-structured problems rather than simply looking for right answers. Intrinsically motivated by their own sense of purpose, they were not demoralized by failure nor overly impressed with conventional notions of success. These movers and shakers didn’t achieve success by making success their goal. For them, it was a byproduct of following their intellectual curiosity, solving useful problems, and taking risks in order to learn and grow.

Why do some students make the most of college, while others struggle and look back on years of missed deadlines and missed opportunities? What choices can students make, and what can teachers and university leaders do, to improve more students’ experiences and help them achieve the most from their time and money? Most important, how is the increasing diversity on campus—cultural, racial, and religious—affecting education? What can students and faculty do to benefit from differences, and even learn from the inevitable moments of misunderstanding and awkwardness? From his ten years of interviews with Harvard seniors, Richard Light distills encouraging—and surprisingly practical—answers to fundamental questions. How can you choose classes wisely? What’s the best way to study? Why do some professors inspire and others leave you cold? How can you connect what you discover in class to all you’re learning in the rest of life? Light suggests, for instance: studying in pairs or groups can be more productive than studying alone; the first and most important skill to learn is time management; supervised independent research projects and working internships offer the most learning and the greatest challenges; and encounters with students of different religions can be simultaneously the most taxing and most illuminating of all the experiences with a diverse student body. Filled with practical advice, illuminated with stories of real students’ self-doubts, failures, discoveries, and hopes, Making the Most of College is a handbook for academic and personal success.

Belonging - with peers, in the classroom, or on campus - is a crucial part of the college experience. This title addresses these student sub-populations and campus environments. It offers readers practical guidelines, underpinned by theory and research, for helping students belong and thrive.

Identity Development of College Students Building off the foundational work of Erik Erikson and Arthur Chickering, Identity Development of College Students adds broad and innovative research to describe contemporary perspectives of identity development at the intersection of context, personal characteristics, and social identities. The authors employ different theoretical perspectives to explore the nature of context—how it both influences and is influenced by multiple social identities. Each chapter includes discussion and reflection questions and activities for individual or small group work. Praise for Identity Development of College Students "Susan R. Jones and Elisa S. Abes have provided us with a comprehensive and beautifully written overview of the evolution of identity development theory. This book reads like a novel while at the same time conveying important ideas, critical analysis, and cutting-edge research that will enhance student affairs practice." —NANCY J. EVANS, professor, Student Affairs Program, School of Education, Iowa State University "The authors masterfully present a holistic, integrative, and multi-dimensional approach to the identity development of today's college student. This text should be required reading for those engaged in research and practice in the areas of student affairs, counseling, higher education, and cultural studies." —SHARON KIRKLAND-GORDON, director, Counseling Center, University of Maryland, College Park "Susan R. Jones and Elisa S. Abes's work is ground-breaking—charting new scholarly territory and making one of the most significant contributions to identity literature in many years. Building on contemporary and traditional theoretical foundations, Jones and Abes offer new models of identity development essential for understanding a diversity of college students." —MARYLU K. MCEWEN, associate professor emerita, University of Maryland, College Park

College Students in the United States accounts for contemporary and anticipated student demographics and enrollment patterns, a wide variety of campus environments and a range of outcomes including learning, development, and achievement. Throughout the book, the differing experiences, needs, and outcome of students across the range of “traditional” (18-24 years old, full-time students) and non-traditional (for example, adult and returning learners, veterans, recent immigrants) are highlighted. The book is organized, for use as a stand-alone resource, around Alexander Astin’s Inputs-Environment-Outputs (I-E-O) framework.

Practical suggestions and tips for college students diagnosed with attention deficit disorder or learning disabilities.

FIRST-GENERATION COLLEGE STUDENTS "…a concise, manageable, lucid summary of the best scholarship, practices, and future-oriented thinking about how to effectively recruit, educate, develop, retain, and ultimately graduate first-generation students." —from the foreword by JOHN N. GARDNER First-generation students are frequently marginalized on their campuses, treated with benign disregard, and placed at a competitive disadvantage because of their invisibility. While they include 51% of all undergraduates, or approximately 9.3 million students, they are less likely than their peers to earn degrees. Among students enrolled in two-year institutions, they are significantly less likely to persist into a second year. First-Generation College Students offers academic leaders and student affairs professionals a guide for understanding the special challenges and common barriers these students face and provides the necessary strategies for helping them transition through and graduate from their chosen institutions. Based in solid research, the authors describe best practices and include suggestions and techniques that can help leaders design and implement effective curricula, out-of-class learning experiences, and student support services, as well as develop strategic plans that address issues sure to arise in the future. The authors offer an analysis of first-generation student expectations for college life and academics and examine the powerful role cultural capital plays in shaping their experiences and socialization. Providing a template for other campuses, the book highlights programmatic initiatives at colleges around the county that effectively serve first-generation students and create a powerful learning environment for their success. First-Generation College Students provides a much-needed portrait of the cognitive, developmental, and social factors that affect the college-going experiences and retention rates of this growing population of college students.