Date of Award
2001
Document Type
Practicum
Degree Name
Doctor of Education
Department
Programs for Higher Education
Advisor
Dr. Anita Barrett
Keywords
academic performance, Adult Nursing Course, administration, age, at-risk students, attrition, attrition rate, bivariate frequency distribution, college, dissemination, Fisher's Exact test, guidelines, nursing courses, nursing department, nursing program, participation, peer tutoring, program evaluation, replication, research question, student success, strategy, TCC, tutee, tutor, tutoring role, two by two frequency distribution, variables
Abstract
The problem of this study was the high attrition rate in the Adult Nursing Course. Peer tutoring was a strategy implemented to decrease the attrition rate. The purpose of this study was to determine the relationship between academic performance and participation in a peer-tutoring program. There was one research question, "Is there a relationship between academic performance and participation in a peer-tutoring program?"
A two by two bivariate frequency distribution was constructed with the variables academic success and participation in the peer-tutoring program. The relationship between the two variables was determined through the use of the Fisher's Exact test. The results clearly indicated that there was a significant relationship between the academic performance and participation in the peer-tutoring program.
The conclusion was that peer-tutoring was an effective strategy in decreasing attrition in the Adult Nursing course. It was recommended that TCC continue the use of the peer tutoring program and that other nursing courses duplicate the process for students "at-risk". It was recommended that guidelines for the peer-tutoring process be documented for ease of replication within the nursing program. It was recommended that the results be disseminated to members of the nursing department, including students, and to college administration. It was recommended that additional research be conducted such as, did peer-tutoring in this course predict success in future nursing courses; did the age of the tutee/tutor make a difference in the success rate; and was the tutor's grade affected by the tutoring role.