Promoting Emotional Well-Being While Learning through Online Mentoring in a Hispanic Female Pre-Service Teacher Population.

Introduction and Review of Literature In a university whose population is predominately Hispanic and predominately female, with a majority consisting of many first-generation students, support and scaffolding systems must be utilized for student success. Therefore, it makes sense to investigate mentoring and perceptions of emotional well-being for the population. Research in this area has been ongoing for many years, however, it has never been as important as the present, as current enrollment in universities in the area and nationwide declines. Much has been written and said about the current and projected growth of the Mexican American population. One particular area of interest is the impact of population growth on the demographics of postsecondary education in the United States (Quintana, Vogel, & Ybarra, 1991). For Mexican Americans, who constitute the majority of the U.S. Hispanic population, a postsecondary degree is a critical route to achieving parity, which in turn facilitates inclusion into positions of social, economic, and political power in the broader U.S. society (Apple, 1990). Well-being is defined as a person's welfare, happiness, advantages, interests, utility, and quality of life. (Burris, et. al. 2009) College years (the beginning of college and the transition from childhood to adulthood) are often one of the most stressful periods of life. The stressors of the first-time college experience can cause a decrease in psychological and/or emotional well-being, (Chao, 2012). Non-traditional students do not see themselves as traditional and do not expect to fit into college life. Many Hispanic female students are in this situation. The need to balance work and family as well as school was documented by non-traditional students (Christie, Cree, Hounsell, McCune, & Tett, 2008.) Studies found that positive social support is crucial to manage stress, (Chao, 2012). To ensure the best outcome while enrolled in college, support is necessary to enable students to complete college successfully, as well as the transition from college life to the workforce (Bewick, Koutsopoulou, Miles, Slaa, & Barkmam, 2010). The support of family, and especially their mothers, allows Hispanic women to feel somewhat as ease with actions that a Hispanic woman from a more traditional family would usually not have taken. (Okagaki, Frensch, and Gordon 1995) Online learning requires more from students in terms of self-discipline and self-regulation. Williams and Heilman (2004) found that self-regulation is generally accepted as an important construct in student success within environments that allow learner choice, such as online courses. They investigated differences between first- and second-generation college students' ability to self-regulate their online learning and found that first-generation students report significantly lower levels of self-regulation for online learning than their second-generation counterparts. Purpose of Study This study is needed to contribute to and scaffold the success of female Hispanic students at the undergraduate level. The purpose of this study is to examine emotional well-being along with mentoring and perceptions about mentoring influencing Hispanic female academic achievement. Fewer course drops and university withdrawals have been indicated when a support system is in place for this population. Currently the southwest border region of the United States is primarily responsible for the education of this population, therefore mentoring systems and factors that lead to emotional well-being should be researched and disseminated. Hispanic students enrolled in undergraduate online classes of future teachers at the University of Texas at El Paso, a border university located within two blocks of Mexico, continue to request help while enrolled in the pre-service classes. Online learners continue to participate in mentoring. …