Academic and Student Affairs Professionals as Mentors: Benefits for Working-Class First-Generation Students

Abstract

The purpose of this article was to examine the effects of having an academic or student affairs professional mentor on working-class first-generation students’ sense of belonging and resilience. The authors used propensity score matching techniques to develop matched pairs of working-class first-generation students who did and did not have a mentor. The results suggest that working-class first-generation students who had an academic or student affairs professional mentor had a significantly higher sense of belonging and resilience.