Abstract
The purpose of this study is to examine the effectiveness of the learning community program in its initial stage at a local community college. Effectiveness is defined by the researcher as the level of satisfaction experienced by the learning community students based on the factors such as improvement in their ability to interact with others, successfully contributing to group discussions in academic and social settings, increase in persistence towards education continuance, fulfillment that educational goals are being met, and feeling of academic, personal, and societal growth and progress. An effective learning community along with other factors (committed instructors, institutional support, and adequate academic/student services) can make learning communities successful. Success is defined by the researcher as increase in student retention rates, increase in student completion rates, positive student learning outcomes, and overall student success. Specific questions addressed in this research are: 1. Why do students enroll in the learning communities? 2. How to determine the effectiveness of a learning community? 3. What factors make the learning communities successful? The sources of data were student survey questionnaire and semi-structured interviews with administrators and faculty members actively involved with the learning communities. The student questionnaire utilized both the quantitative method and the qualitative method. Likert-scale surveys with a few open-ended questions were used in the student questionnaire. The student questionnaire consisted of 20 questions. Semi-structured interviews were designed for administrators and faculty members. The interviews were comprised solely of open-ended questions – eight questions each for administrators and for the faculty members. It is evident that the learning communities surveyed in this study are effective and successful to a major extent. Students enroll in learning communities for a variety of reasons. The major reason is to find the community support and structure which the learning communities promise them. For the learning communities to be effective, students need to feel satisfied with the quality of education they are receiving. The data suggests that the majority of the students were indeed satisfied with their education experience. For the learning communities to be successful several factors need to be present and the most important factor is the instructor commitment, involvement, and motivation. Other important factors revealed for the learning communities to be successful in this study are thorough and proper planning of curriculum and academic instructions, college support, smooth registration process, and student orientation.