Examining the relationship between career college students' readiness for self-directed learning and academic persistence

This research study focused on career college students---a group that has had little research conducted upon them---and looked for a potential relationship between their level of self-directed learning readiness and their ability to persist and complete their program of study. Two things drove the need for this study: (a) a steady increase in enrollments in the career college sector over the past few years, and (b) a lack of research that specifically focuses on retention issues in career colleges. Participants in this study produced a mean SDLRS score 13 points higher than the adult national average. Yet, from an overall standpoint, the results of this study indicated SDLRS scores, even those higher than the national average, are not a significant predictor for academic persistence. In sum, scores from the Self-Directed Learning Readiness Scale were found to have relative little to no significance in all of the research questions, with the possible exception of a participant's age. Given the limitations of the study, it cannot be conclusively determined that levels of readiness for self-directed learning are completely irrelevant to academic persistence. The obligations outside of school such as the need to provide an income for a family, difficulty in obtaining reliable transportation and/or childcare have been consistently strong predictors in a career college student's ability to persist, much more than academic challenges.