title: Closing the social-class achievement gap: a difference-education intervention improves first-generation students' academic performance and all students' college transition.
abstract: College students who do not have parents with 4-year degrees (first-generation students) earn lower grades and encounter more obstacles to success than do students who have at least one parent with a 4-year degree (continuing-generation students). In the study reported here, we tested a novel intervention designed to reduce this social-class achievement gap with a randomized controlled trial (N = 168). Using senior college students' real-life stories, we conducted a difference-education intervention with incoming students about how their diverse backgrounds can shape what they experience in college. Compared with a standard intervention that provided similar stories of college adjustment without highlighting students' different backgrounds, the difference-education intervention eliminated the social-class achievement gap by increasing first-generation students' tendency to seek out college resources (e.g., meeting with professors) and, in turn, improving their end-of-year grade point averages. The difference-education intervention also improved the college transition for all students on numerous psychosocial outcomes (e.g., mental health and engagement).
authors.affiliation: 1Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University.
authors.forename: Nicole M
authors.initials: NM
authors.lastname: Stephens
authors.forename: MarYam G
authors.initials: MG
authors.lastname: Hamedani
authors.forename: Mesmin
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Destin
mesh_terms: D000124:Achievement; D000293:Adolescent; D004493:Education / Q000379:methods*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D012917:Social Adjustment; D012923:Social Class; D012937:Social Mobility; D012959:Socioeconomic Factors; D013334:Students; D014495:Universities
keywords: culture; higher education; intervention; social class; sociocultural factors