Abstract
Purpose of the study. This study was designed to: (1) measure the extent to which college students perceive orientation, assessment, and advisement/counseling activities as important; (2) determine if college students have significant differences in perceived importance of orientation, assessment, and advisement/counseling based on ethnicity, age, gender, grade point average; (3) identify additional student-identified needs in the orientation, assessment, and advisement/counseling process; and (4) determine if there are differences in the additional student-identified needs in orientation, assessment, and advisement/counseling activities. Methodology. A matriculation activities survey to measure the perceived importance of orientation, assessment, and advisement/counseling activities was administered to 1,800 students at five California community colleges. A descriptive research design consisting of quantitative and qualitative analysis was utilized to document and describe the perceptions of students participating in the study. The statistical treatment to analyze the data was: (1) analysis of variance (ANOVA); (2) comparisons of sample means, (3) analysis of frequency distributions, and (4) analysis of student self-reported qualitative information. Findings. The findings from the study were: (1) African-American, Asian-American, and Latino community college students perceive that orientation, assessment, and advisement/counseling activities were significantly more important than do White students; (2) the majority of community college students perceive orientation, assessment, and advisement/counseling activities as critically or highly important; (3) African-American and Latino students perceive that providing specialized or alternative services for ethnic minority or Latino students is significantly more important than do White students.