8: Students’ Views of Tertiary Education as ‘Access to Success’: A Case Study of a Multicultural College in Israel

This study examines students’ views of the institutional learning environments, which add to their academic and social success, in a multicultural college. The relationships between the students’ background characteristics and their academic skills, self-efficacy and interactions with the academic and administrative staff are analysed utilising quantitative and qualitative methods. The findings indicate that the students encounter difficulties in their academic studies because of low attainment in academic literacy. However, students with higher self-efficacy actively seek assistance to advance their academic skills, whilst students with lower self-efficacy circumvent academic-assistance resources available on campus. Nonetheless, most students are motivated to succeed in their academic studies and continue them further.

The study concludes with recommendations for future measures to enhance students’ self-efficacy and the specific needs of students of diverse ethnic and national origin.