Who Uses and Benefits from Post-Secondary Academic Advising

Socio-demographic gaps in college attainment and completion are troubling, as postsecondary education improves labor market outcomes and facilitates upward socioeconomic mobility. It is important, then, to identify the credible interventions available to policymakers and college and university administrators that might close socio-demographic gaps in postsecondary educational success, particularly once students have matriculated. Academic advising constitutes one class of potentially beneficial interventions; as such programs provide information, guidance, and general support to students who lack these resources in their familial and social networks. This dissertation contains three empirical studies examining the factors important to whether students participate in academic advising, and what effects, if any, this participation has on their educational outcomes.