| Training naval combat pilots is expensive and time consuming, it follows that attrition from flight training is costly to the government and traumatic for the individual. Flight training is considered high-risk training, and therefore strictly voluntary. Voluntary withdrawal from naval flight training is the largest unexplained reason for Student Naval Aviator (SNA) attrition. Social integration has been demonstrated to have an effect on student persistence in academic studies (Tinto, 2005). Study group participation may facilitate social integration and affect quality of faculty contact, commitment to the institution, and ultimately the decision to persist in flight training. A collective-case study approach was used to examine study group participation and persistence of SNAs in naval flight training. In this approach, a qualitative analysis of six students was conducted to identify how study group participation affects faculty contact, social integration, commitment to the institution, and persistence. A cross-case thematic analysis of the results was conducted, to gain a better understanding of the effect of study group participation on the Student Naval Aviator. |
