an examination of recruitment factors on the decision-making process of students attending a college freshmen orientation program

Identifying the knowledge, attitudes, beliefs, and perceptions of freshmen toward the Red Raider Orientation (RRO) efforts is important for the College of Agricultural Sciences and Natural Resources (CASNR) at Texas Tech University and the future of college orientations. This study sought to determine if CASNR presented students with an effective freshmen college orientation workshop experience by providing freshmen with information to increase their knowledge and prepare them for their first year on-campus. The orientation workshops were conducted over three months during the summer with 226 freshmen participating. Personal and educational demographics were collected and results pertaining to the individual students’ knowledge, attitudes, beliefs, and perceptions prior to and after attending the RRO were also analyzed. Utilizing the five different stages of Rogers’ Innovation Decision-Making Process model, it was concluded that the CASNR RRO was an effective method for advancing student knowledge and decision making related processes. Rogers’ model correlated to the individual students’ results after attending the orientation workshop with an increase of confidence also found. It is recommended that a true pre-then-post test be conducted to reduce potential measurement error. Also, continued recruitment and effective advising efforts such as orientation is important for student retention within the college. Finally, the creation of an orientation workshop model to statistically address multicollinearity within the data is recommended for future research efforts.

Author dc:creator

• Oates, Rachel D.

• Recruitment
• Agricultural Communications
• Orientations

Language dc:language.iso

en

Handle dc:identifier.uri

https://hdl.handle.net/2346/108242

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:ttu-ir.tdl.org:2346/108242