‘Welcome to Wonderland’. Integration rituals and ceremonies for higher education first-year students, and lessons for institutions

ABSTRACT

Students' integration into the environment of the higher education institution (HEIs) is a shared concern found in the literature. This notion of integration is particularly relevant in the first year in higher education, when students face increased difficulties of adapting to a new environment, being the year when a higher number of students drop out. Thus, the main purpose of the study is to grasp students' perceptions of the measures put in place to ease their integration into the academic and social environment of the HEI. This study used a qualitative methodology, and data collection instruments used are twofold: semi-structured interviews with students and document analysis. In Portugal, the welcome to students who enrol in higher education is made in two ways: through a ceremonial proposed by peers and through the institutional welcome promoted by the HEI. The results reveal the relevance students ascribe to strategies for welcoming newcomers in the HEI, promoted both by peers and by the institution itself. Thus, having identified this pivotal dimension of the students' experience, namely in their likelihood of remaining in the institution, HEIs should endeavour to make students feel comfortable in this new environment and perceive the institution as their ‘second home’.

KEYWORDS:

• Integration
• hazing
• first-year students
• management of higher education institutions
• student experience

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 40% of the participating students come from households with a monthly income between € 1,000 and € 2,000.

2 35% of students’ fathers and 27.5% of students’ mothers hold just four years of schooling, i.e., the 4th grade of elementary school.

3 The students interviewed are from all grades of the 1st and 2nd study cycles, as described in the Methodology section regarding the sample definition. However, regardless of the grade interviewees were enrolled in, they were asked to recall the first-year integration experiences.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Foundation for Science and Technology under Grant Ref. SFRH/BD/45571/2008.

Notes on contributors

Maria José Sampaio de Sá

Maria José Sampaio de Sá holds a Bachelor’s in Education and a PhD in Studies in Higher Education. She is a researcher at CIPES – Centre for Research in Higher Education Policies. Her research areas include, among others: student satisfaction; student success; institutional actors; student experience; gender studies; and higher education in developing countries. She has participated in several funded research projects in the areas of Marketing, Teachers’ training and Student satisfaction. She has also worked in the field of higher education institutions’ assurance of learning (AOL) and international accreditation. She has nearly 100 published works in international scientific journals, books, book chapters, conference proceedings and other scientific outlets. She is a member of the Editorial Board of several international scientific journals, acts as a reviewer to several international scientific journals and regularly carries out functions in international conferences, such as international track chair, scientific committee member and reviewer.