Cheshire, T: Barriers & Bridges: American Indian Community C

The book was written to provide academic professionals with further insight into the American Indian community college student experience to create an avenue for sustained institutional change and positively impact Native student success rates in higher education. Tribal Critical Race Theory and Reziliency Theory were combined to create a comprehensive theoretical framework to understand the experiences of American Indian community college students. For this mixed methods research, success is defined as meeting the needs, eliminating the barriers, and reinforcing resiliency characteristics of American Indian students working toward the completion of a desired academic goal. Quantitative data was collected from student surveys with questions focusing on needs, barriers, and resiliency characteristics. Qualitative data was obtained from follow-up focus groups to obtain deeper insight. A Student Success Equation was created. When the equation was applied, a Student Success Model was produced. Conclusions drawn from this research provide an applied context by which community colleges can enact transformative and transformational change to increase Native student success.