This study investigated whether first-year Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) majors within Community Colleges exhibit characteristics of Learned Helplessness and whether or not this leads to STEM attrition. This study seeks to help struggling students gain academic success before they surrender their major to a non-STEM field or worse, drop out. The National Center for Education Statistics reported that nationally, STEM majors accounted for 20% of incoming freshmen at the Associate's Degree level.  Yet, the field experienced a 69% attrition rate, simply put, 7 out of 10 STEM majors either switched their major or dropped out of college within the first year (Chen, 2013). This study employed a mixed methods approach that included pre-& post-test surveys on coping skills, the measurement of salivary cortisol for stress levels during STEM instruction, midterms and final exams accompanied by journal entries capturing emotions at the time of collection, also, interviews with students and STEM educators. This study is significant to the field as it will provide knowledge of what is happening in the classroom from the learned helplessness perspective, how students’ perceptions may alter their outcomes and how faculty instruction may contribute to and help students overcome learned helplessness and STEM attrition.