What community college students value: delineating a normative structure for community college students

This manuscript delineates a normative structure for community college students, outlines how this structure varies by student characteristics, and compares this structure to that of a previously established normative structure identified at a 4-year institution. A total of 512 student survey responses on the College Student Behaviors Inventory were collected at a comprehensive community college in the rural Southeast. A series of factor analyses using varimax rotation was applied to identify 23 inviolable norms, 20 admonitory norms, and four laudatory norms, with little variation across student characteristics. Specifically, gender is the only characteristic that yields a significant difference across all patterns of student behavior. We also find the normative structure at a community college to have many similarities to that of a 4-year institution, yet also some differences. The strong number of similarities, however, appears to dispel the suggestion that the diversity in mission and student body characteristics between 2- and 4-year colleges and universities would result in significantly different peer environments. Implications are offered as to how knowledge of such a normative structure may influence policymaking on community college campuses.