Hardiness Training for High-Risk Undergraduates

Abstract

We evaluated the effectiveness of hardiness training in improving the retention rates and grade-point averages offirst-semester high-risk undergraduates. Undergraduates in the experimental group underwent hardiness training as a regular semester course. The control group consisted of demographically comparable undergraduates who underwent either a traditional student-enrichment or a leadership-training class. These control-group courses were taught by the instructors of the hardiness-training classes. At the end of the year following training, the experimental group showed a significantly higher increase in grade-point average and a trend toward greater retention than did the control group.