Policies Affecting Post-Traditional Students and Students Facing Economic Instability at the Community College

The following dissertation in practice researches policies from the Colorado Community College System (CCCS) that relate to Post-Traditional students and students experiencing economic instability. Using a conceptual framework of Motivational Theory (Maslow, 1943; Harrigan & Lamport-Commons, 2015; Herzberg, 1959) and the Principal-Agent theory (Jensen, & Meckling, 1976), this dissertation focuses on how one community college (CC) within the CCCS system interprets and implements those policies both college and campus wide, as well as departmentally. Although many studies exist pertaining to community college students, literature pertaining to Post-Traditional students in a community college setting has not been fully explored. This will be accomplished in this study through the experiences of employees at CC that work directly with this population. This study seeks to make recommendations at the system level regarding policies and at the college wide regarding implementation of those policies to increase graduation rates for Post-Traditional students experiencing economic instability