We Can Do This Thing Together: Intergenerational Learning and Academic Motivation among Community College Students

Abstract

This qualitative study examines how intergenerational learning contributed to academic motivation among students of different ages in the Florida College System, the state’s community college system. The data for this study included 166 semi-structured focus groups with 375 students collected during site visits to 21 state colleges over a five-year period. This study considers both familial intergenerational learning, in which members of different generations in the same family learn from one another, and extrafamilial intergenerational learning, in which members of different generations not in the same family learn from one another. Overall, familial intergenerational learning was a more prominent theme than extrafamilial intergenerational learning. Both familial and extrafamilial intergenerational learning included three similar patterns: 1) older to younger learning, 2) younger to older learning, and 3) reciprocal learning, but familial intergenerational learning also included a fourth pattern of indirect intergenerational learning that is not reflected in extrafamilial intergenerational learning. Recommendations for practice are also provided including formalizing some of the informal forms of intergenerational learning that we highlight in our data.