Academic and Social Transitions in the Second Year Experience

This past week, second-year students from across campus marked a major academic milestone with the “Halfway There” celebration on Abele Quad. Students were officially welcomed into their major department and affirmed their connection to their residential quads. At Duke, the second year is marked by increasing familiarity with the rhythms of campus life and increased ownership of one’s education through formal declaration of a major field of study, coupled with major social and academic transitions, including the move from East to West Campus and major contemplation and declaration.

Data we have collected over the years paint a complex picture of how these academic and social transitions are connected to student adjustment and well-being. During the second year, students are actively engaged in questioning and clarifying their academic path, values, and broader sense of meaning and purpose in life. In previous research with colleagues in Student Affairs, we have found that uncertainty about major declaration in the second year is associated with belonging, such that students who report higher levels of uncertainty about their major also report lower levels of belonging, and students who feel more prepared to declare their major report higher levels of belonging. In more recent research, we find that second-year students endorse statements indicating that they are searching for a sense of meaning and purpose in their lives.

At the same time, our data indicate that, following their first year, students may be grappling with their connection to Duke as an institution. For example, compared to first-year students, upper class students (including second years) report lower levels of institutional trust and identify less with what they perceive to be Duke’s institutional values. Unfortunately, upper class students also report stronger concerns that they’ll be judged negatively based on their identities, and less strongly agree that faculty and staff care about and want to get to know students.

Turning to peer relationships and social connection on campus, ourdata indicate that second-year students, as compared to their first-year peers, feel more comfortable and connected in their campus community. For example, second-year students report less uncertainty about their belonging, more strongly agree that they’ve met other students that they really connect with at Duke, and have more “really good friends” at Duke. At the same time, they also report having somewhat fewer really good friends outside of Duke. Second-year students are more likely to report having made friends at Duke who they consider “life-long friends,” and report higher levels of satisfaction with their closest Duke friendship. Second-year students, on average, also more strongly agree that they have someone at Duke to talk to about personal and private things.

Together, findings about the second-year experience point to the importance of facilitating opportunities for contemplation and discernment of academic paths, opportunities to wrestle with big questions that engage meaning and purpose, and high-quality advising and mentorship relationships in which students feel comfortable bringing their whole selves to the conversation. A significant bright spot of the second year is the deepening of friendships developed at Duke, including the development of life-long friendships.