Abstract
This qualitative, grounded theory study examined two-year college students’ perceptions of academic advising approaches that positively impacted persistence from their first to second year in higher education. Individual interview participants included 12 students who completed their first year at six different public two-year institutions in 2022, 2023, and 2024. Focus group participants included a new group of seven students who completed their first year at five different public two-year institutions in 2022, 2023, 2024, and 2025. I used theoretical sampling (Charmaz, 2014) by leveraging a thematic analysis to build an emerging theory through individual interviews. Then, I presented this emerging theory to focus group participants before refining it toward a final theoretical model. This final theoretical model culminated in the Relational Advising for Student Agency (RASA) model, an academic advising approach for two-year college students during their first year. I interpreted the findings using Bandura’s (1977a) Theory of Self-Efficacy and Bloom et al.’s (2008) Appreciative Advising framework. This study provides recommendations for higher education professionals—specifically academic advisors, faculty, and staff—as well as external partner organizations.