A qualitative single case study exploring student persistence and family re-enrollment decisions at an independent day and boarding school in the Southeastern United States.

Boarding student retention continues to be a major concern for independent day and boarding schools in the United States. Boarding student retention is negatively impacted by the low enrollment of students in United States boarding schools and concerns about the decreasing size of the larger independent school market (National Association of Independent Schools, 2021). Boarding school administrators must find ways to mitigate this problem by maximizing student retention efforts so that their schools remain in operation. Further, school closure negatively impacts a wide range of decision makers, including parents, teachers, and the larger communities the schools serve. The purpose of this qualitative single-case study was to explore student persistence and family re-enrollment decisions at a Southeastern U.S. independent day and boarding school. Tinto’s (1998) theory of student persistence provided the theoretical framework used to execute the study. More specifically, I focused on the four categorical themes from Tinto’s framework (1998) (formal academic influences, formal social influences, informal academic influences, and informal social influences) and how these themes contributed to participants’ re-enrollment decisions at an independent day and boarding school in the Southeastern United States. The findings of this study indicate that families' student integration experiences contributed to their decisions to re-enroll at an independent day and boarding school located in the Southeastern United States. In fact, the majority of student participants revealed that formal social influences (e.g., sports) contributed to their re-enrollment decisions. The parent participants disclosed that revealed that formal academic influences (e.g., school’s academic program) contributed to their decisions to re-enroll their children in the school. This research study highlights the individual nature of the re-enrollment process for both students and their parents. Additional research findings indicated that some participants changed the degree of importance they attributed to academic and social influences that contributed to their respective re-enrollment decisions after one academic year. This finding provides evidence of the fluid nature of re-enrollment decisions for both students and their parents.

Name thesis:degree_name

Ed.D.

Level thesis:degree_level

Doctoral

Grantor

Baylor University.

Year dc:date.issued

2025

Author dc:creator

• Upchurch, Drew S., 1983-

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Vaughn, Shelby Duncan.

• Qualitative.
• Single case study.
• Retention.
• Student integration.
• Boarding school.
• Student persistence.

Statement dc:rights

• Baylor University works are protected by copyright. They may be viewed from this source for any purpose, but reproduction or distribution in any format is prohibited without written permission. Contact libraryquestions@baylor.edu for inquiries about permission.

Language dc:language.iso

en

Handle dc:identifier.uri

https://hdl.handle.net/2104/13858

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:baylor-ir.tdl.org:2104/13858