Community College Sector Research Articles

Readability and Higher Education Access: Exploring Community College Admissions Information on Websites

ABSTRACT Although United States community college enrollment rose in Fall 2023, the community college sector as a whole has contracted by 37% since 2010, representing over 2.6 million students. As a result, community college practitioners, specifically, those working in admissions and enrollment management should ensure that admissions instructions are simple enough so that students can read and comprehend how to apply for admission to community college. However, research at the four-year institutional level has found that admission information for prospective students is complex, often written above the 14th-grade English reading comprehension level. Here, this study gathered admissions application instructions from 949 community colleges in the United States to evaluate the grade-level readability of these instructions. The results suggest that the average readability level of community college admission information is near the 14th-grade level, with negligible differences between institutional sectors. Implications for practice and community college student access are addressed.

Do Transfers into the Community College Sector Graduate at the Same Rate? Evidence from Ontario, Canada

ABSTRACT The overwhelming majority of studies on transfer students have compared the outcomes of vertical transfer students (college-to-university) relative to “native” counterparts, referring to those that directly enter universities from high school and remain within them throughout the course of their studies. In turn, scholars have devoted only minimal attention to the outcomes of students that travel variable pathways into the community college sector (e.g. university to college). Through this study we attempt to correct such imbalance in the existing literature, leveraging various administrative files in Statistics Canada’s Education and Labour Market Linkage Platform (ELMLP) to analyze the pathway-based disparities in graduation rates among those students traveling various routes into the Ontario community college sector. Our logistic regression models reveal that students who transfer into the community college graduate at a rate that is 22 to 27% points lower than direct entries, and that these differences persist even after we control for student traits (e.g. age, sex), field of study, parental income, and familial characteristics (e.g. size, structure). Based on the observed findings, we theorize plausible mechanisms that could be suppressing the success of transfers into the community college sector and identify a series of potential strategies to ameliorate this situation.

Adaptive leadership in urban community colleges: Meeting new challenges through new ways of thinking

AbstractThe COVID‐19 pandemic illuminated the need for urban community colleges to utilize an adaptive leadership approach to thrive during times of uncertainty. Adaptive leaders encourage team members to address problems through new ways of thinking to meet organizational goals. The community college sector, especially institutions in urban environments, has utilized adaptive leadership throughout its history to best meet the needs of its students. It is against this background that urban community colleges adapted to the COVID‐19 pandemic by reconceptualizing career programs to be completed in virtual spaces, hosting COVID‐19 testing and vaccination centers on campus, and ensuring that students had access to faculty and staff in a digital learning environment. In this chapter, we highlight the importance of adaptive leadership in urban community colleges and provide examples from urban community college leaders on how they utilize adaptive leadership to meet new challenges.

Impact of Place/Space on Rural Community College Human Resource Management: A Systematic Review

In the following systematic review, the author examines how rural community college leaders address the unique challenges and strengths of working in a rural environment as they strive to retain, support, develop, compensate, and invest in their employees. Factors such as geographic isolation, small population sizes, and close-knit social networks require the rural leader to rely more heavily on locally available resources and existing infrastructure to support leadership decisions. Using the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses alongside Flora and Flora’s 2008 Community Capital Framework, this systematic review synthesizes research that addresses human resource issues and explores human capital investment strategies employed by rural community college leadership. This article has important implications for future leadership development and training strategies across the community college sector, making clear the need for contextualized, strengths-based research that utilizes the experiences of rural community college leaders.

Thriving and Striving: The Paradox of Leading and Following for Women Mid-level Administrators in the Community College

In this qualitative study, I explored the meaning that ten mid-level women administrators ascribe to the experience of being both a leader and a follower within the community college sector. Previous research indicates that mid-level women administrators are under-valued as leaders and followers despite their capacity and influential connectivity up, down, and across the organizational chart. Participants discussed their experiences through in-depth, semi-structured interviews and described the perceived effects of those experiences on their leadership and followership practices. Three overarching themes emerged from the transcript analysis of the narratives: leading with purpose; complications of following; and navigating an adverse work environment. Implications from the findings suggest that community college leaders at all levels will benefit from shared leadership professional development, interrogation of implicit gender bias embedded with the institution, and the reduction and removal of race-based microaggressions among faculty, staff, and administrators. By understanding the leading and following experiences of women in mid-level administrative positions in the community college, this study contributes to a broader inclusion of leadership beyond the privileging of senior-level positions.

Igniting statewide mathematics re‐design: A cross‐sector, grassroots approach

AbstractMathematics continues to be one of the most significant barriers to student success, particularly in the community college sector. Many students are placed into the algebra‐based track, which is often viewed as the “safe” or most desirable option, when they likely would have been better served in an alternative mathematics pathway more closely aligned to their academic and career goals. However, transformative mathematics re‐design that moves away from the default algebra pathway and traditional content and delivery of instruction is best facilitated by a cross‐sector, faculty‐driven approach to create scalable change to increase student success in mathematics. This chapter highlights the efforts of the Florida Student Success Center in driving statewide mathematics reform and creating distinct statewide mathematics pathways using a grassroots approach driven by experts in the K‐12, college, and university sectors. Practical insight and guidance are provided using Loverme and Kotter's (2019) 8‐Step change process framework.

The Impact of Offering Baccalaureate Degrees on Institutional Enrollment in Community Colleges

Objective:The community college sector plays a vital role in broadening access to education and helping states meet their workforce needs. An emerging trend and potential lever to better achieve these goals is the community college baccalaureate or CCB. Yet, opponents wonder whether CCBs may lead community colleges to abandon their traditional logics. This study attempts to help address this question.Methods:Using institution-level panel data, I employ various difference-in-difference approaches to estimate the impact of CCB adoption on overall enrollment levels, as well as the enrollment of historically underrepresented student populations.Results:I find that CCB adoption leads to significant increases in overall student enrollment; these results are robust to alternative specifications and control groups. Yet, enrollment-related impacts vary by selected student populations. I find no consistent evidence that CCB adoption shifts community colleges away from their commitment to underrepresented students, though there may be a tipping point not yet reached by current levels of CCB adoption.Contributions:These findings have important implications for policy and practice as institutional leaders and policy makers continue to debate, adopt, and implement baccalaureate programing at the community college level.

Operationalizing “Internationalization” in the Community College Sector: Textual Analysis of Institutional Internationalization Plans

How do US community colleges define and operationalize internationalization? Using quantitative textual analysis and grounding our discussion in the extant literature addressing institutional internationalization in the two and four-year sectors, this piece dissects the internationalization plans of community colleges representing three state contexts.

Remembering New Vocationalism: Reinforcing the Future of Workforce and Professional Development in the Community College

ABSTRACT The concept of new vocationalism reached its height in the 1990s and 2000s as views evolved regarding how community colleges should provide relevant vocational education for students. The concept of new vocationalism is here brought into the present moment by mapping theoretical lineages and emphasizing the current and future practical implications at the nexus of the community college sector and a post-COVID-19 economy. Reforms centered around the principles of new vocationalism have led to more inclusive opportunities for learners from varied diverse and marginalized backgrounds, though the influence within career development and community colleges often goes unrecognized. Implications for educational leaders are discussed, including refocusing outcomes on the needs of diverse learners and bridging the gap between students’ academic and vocational educations. Specific considerations are also provided to further solidify new vocationalism principles in workforce and professional development programs within community college and career development contexts. Consideration first needs to be given to building programming that develops students’ professional identity with a willingness (from both student and educator) to push back against exclusionary ideas of professional, professionalism, and industry practices that are not focused on employee inclusion. Further, equity and access should remain foundational to all programs if these structures are to remain relevant. Specific recommendations are given for incorporating the equity-mindedness approach when developing workforce and professional development programs and curriculum, with increased consideration being given regarding the reality of how well workforce and professional development programs are currently preparing students for life-long career success, growth, and adaptability.

A Textual Analysis of Community College Internationalization Plans in the U.S. and Canada

Internationalization in the community college sector serves many purposes that align with the local and national contexts in which an institution is situated. One method of assessing how international efforts have become institutionalized is through the analysis of internationalization plans. Prior research examining internationalization plans and agendas is centered on the four-year sector, and studies on the two-year sector and comparative studies are scarce. This article addresses that gap by analyzing four community college internationalization plans in the U.S. and Canada. We use the textual analysis tool, Voyant, to examine how internationalization is operationalized in these two national contexts. Our findings indicate that there is little emphasis on mobility and language programs, despite the presence of these internationalization strategies in institutional or national policies. The documents also show greater quantification of goals related to internationalization and lesser specificity regarding intercultural activities. Implications and recommendations for future research are offered.

South Africa’s adult educators in the community college sector: Who they are and how they view their training, their work and their position

This article examines the work context of South Africa’s state-employed adult educators. It is based largely on a recent cross-sectional study of adult educators commissioned by the Department of Higher Education and Training (DHET), which draws on the DHET’s database of adult educators and qualitative information gained from visits to adult education and training centres in all nine provinces. The study enquired into adult educators’ working lives, their qualifications, their sense of whether their training was adequate, the issue of further training, their understanding of their work, their conditions of service and the support they believe they need. The study showed that the number of adult educators employed by the DHET is declining steadily and that the working conditions of adult educators are uneven: a few work in fairly well-resourced urban centres, but many work in poor conditions, with little support. Nevertheless, the study indicated that almost all the adult educators view their role in a positive light. Confident of support from one another, they have a definite shared identity as a social group and express a strong commitment to their learners and the communities in which they work. Overall, they constitute a group with strong, yet poorly tapped, potential to contribute to positive community development.

One College Program, Seventy Different Campuses: Dual Enrollment, Community Colleges, and the Unique Challenges Faced during the COVID-19 Pandemic

ABSTRACT This manuscript discusses those challenges unique to community college dual-enrollment programs during the COVID-19 pandemic by highlighting the experiences of the senior leadership team of the College Credit Plus (CCP) program at Sinclair Community College in Dayton, Ohio. With 69 different high schools offering Sinclair courses, the CCP office at Sinclair was required to balance the concerns of their internal staff and departments while simultaneously meeting their secondary partners’ needs. This practitioner-focused manuscript provides stories, insights, and reflections on how the CCP office responded to the COVID-19 pandemic, highlighting interventions that worked well and others that did not. By sharing and reflecting on these experiences, we add to the growing literature on COVID-19 responses to build a more equitable community college sector in the future.

The Persistence and Success of Latino Men in Community College

Guided by a phenomenological approach, this qualitative study examines the resilience and cultural wealth of Latino men as they navigate the transfer process at a two-year community college. This study conducted four semi-structured interviews to highlight how, despite facing difficult circumstances, individual factors along with their aspirational and navigational capital positively impact Latino men in higher education. Ultimately, this study aims for four things (a) to add to the limited amount of research of Latino men in community college (b) to display the success of Latino men in higher education (c) to challenge deficit notions of Latino men in higher education and (d) to provide findings that will inform the community college sector of the Latino men transfer experience.

Connecting community college economics faculty with the American Economic Association and the Federal Reserve System

AbstractThis chapter explores the relationship between the American Economic Association and community college economics faculty, as well as the Federal Reserve System's education outreach efforts to the community college sector.

Immigrant-Origin Students in Community College: How Do They Use Their Time on Campus?

BackgroundImmigrant-origin students are the fastest growing new population in community colleges, making up nearly a third of the community college population. To date, little is known about how immigrant-origin students make use of their time on community college campuses.PurposeThis study sought to understand in what ways and to what extent immigrant-origin students—defined as first-generation (foreign-born) or second-generation (born in the United States to immigrant parents)—used their out-of-class campus time at three urban community colleges. We examined the following quantitative questions: How much time do students report spending on campus doing what activities? What is the demographic variation in these patterns (according to immigrant generation, ethnicity/race, and gender)? What factors predict how much overall time immigrant-origin students spend on campus? What is the effect of academically productive time spent on campus on grade point average for immigrant-origin students? We also explored the following qualitative questions: What do immigrant-origin community college students say about the time they spend on campus? What insights do they have as to what impedes or facilitates their spending (or not spending) time on campus?Research DesignThe study proposed a new conceptual framework and employed an embedded sequential explanatory mixed-methods design approach. As part of a survey, participants (N = 644, 54.6% women; M age = 20.2 years; first-generation immigrant n = 213, 33%; second-generation immigrant n = 275, 43%) completed a series of items about the time that they spent on campus and their relationships with their instructors and peers. Qualitative response data were derived from an embedded interview subsample of participants (n = 58).ResultsImmigrant-origin students reported spending a considerable amount of out-of-class time—an average of 9.2 hours—on campus. Hierarchical regression analyses demonstrated that peer relationships and time spent helping parents or commuting positively predicted the amount of time students spent on campus. Qualitative responses provided further insights into immigrant-origin community college student experiences and provided perspectives on issues contributing to their spending out-of-class time on campus.ConclusionsThis study has implications for research, practice, and policy, given that immigrant-origin students make considerable use of their campus spaces. Community colleges should strive to nurture positive spaces and design the kind of on-campus programming that will enhance the success of immigrant-origin students. Collectively, these services will not only enhance the experience of immigrant-origin students but also be beneficial to the larger campus community that uses the community college sector as a stepping-stone toward upward social and economic mobility.

Community College Students Who Attained a 4-Year Degree Accrued Lower Student Loan Debt than 4-Year Entrants Over 2 Decades: Is a 10 Percent Debt Accumulation Reduction Worth the Added “Risk”? If So, for Whom?

The study of student loan debt remains a timely and relevant higher education finance research and policy-oriented topic, especially when considering the alarming growth rates of student loan debt balances. The Quarterly Report on Household Debt and Credit released in May of 2018 shows that among all debt balances, student loans remain the only form of debt that virtually sextupled over the last 15-years, and this trend is not slowing down. Although aggregated trends are important, by definition they are limited in their capabilities to providing researchers, policy- and decision-makers with insights related to individual debt accumulation and, perhaps more importantly, with knowledge about the factors associated with variation of individual debt burden. Accordingly, the overarching goal of this study is to ameliorate this limitation in three meaningful ways. First, this is the first study that offers inferential estimates of the magnitude of student debt accumulation increase across two different decades (1991–2013) and institutional sectors (public 2- and 4-year colleges). Second, these estimates are based on student level undergraduate non-self-reported longitudinal loan debt disbursements. Third, the estimates not only account for individuals’ baseline differences at the moment of college entry, but also account for institution- and state-level indicators that took place during college enrollment and that may be related to the variation of student loan debt reliance. Two nationally representative samples (NELS and ELS) complemented with other institution- and state-level data were analyzed using doubly robust estimators build from propensity score weights and entropy balancing approaches that were robust to unobservable selection issues using Oster’s approach (J Bus Econ Stat 37(2):1–18, 2017). The results consistently indicated that, among all participants, student borrowing participation increased by 15 percentage points in the 2000s, compared to the 1990s, and individual debt accumulation at least doubled across decades. Notably, among 4-year degree holders, the 2-year path toward a 4-year degree consistently resulted in about 10% lower debt accumulation compared to the 4-year path toward a 4-year degree. Students who did not attain a 4-year degree were better served by having started college in the 2-year sector. In terms of overall debt increase, 4-year degree holders accrued about $8000 more on average than their counterparts did during the 1990s, however, the recent cohort also repaid about $11,000 more, on average (or three times as much), than participants did in the 1990s. These higher repayment behaviors observed among 4-year degree holders, resulted in similar amounts of their respective debt balances across decades. The implications are clear: students with higher propensities toward a 4-year degree attainment are likely to incur lower debt if they start college in the community college sector. However, before fully recommending this pathway, 2- and 4-year colleges’ articulation agreements should be strengthened to ease transfer and eventual degree completion. Without recommending consolidation or merger between 2- and 4-year institutions, researchers and policy makers can learn from the strategies implemented by successful cases such as Perimeter College and Georgia State. Finally, 4-year entrants with lower likelihood to attain a 4-year degree may be better served by beginning college in the 2-year sector instead. Predictive analytics and machine learning techniques can be used to identify these cases, as depicted in the discussion section of the study.

Operationalizing “Internationalization” in the Community College Sector: Textual Analysis of Institutional Internationalization Plans

Aim/Purpose: This paper evaluates three community college internationalization plans using quantitative textual analysis to explore the different foci of institutions across three U.S. states. Background: One of the purposes of community college internationalization is to equip future generations with the skills and dispositions necessary to be successful in an increasingly globalized workforce. The extent to which international efforts have become institutionalized on a given campus may be assessed through the analysis of internationalization plans. Methodology: We use the textual analysis tool Voyant, which has rarely been employed in educational research, being more frequently applied in the humanities and under the broad heading of “digital scholarship”. Contribution: Extant literature examining internationalization plans focuses on the four-year sector, but studies centered on the two-year sector are scarce. This study addresses that gap and seeks to answer the research questions: How do community colleges operationalize internationalization in their strategic plans? What terms and/or concepts are used to indicate international efforts? Findings: Key findings of this study include an emphasis on optimization of existing resources (human, cultural, community, and financial); the need for a typology of open access institution internationalization plans; and the fragmentation of international efforts at the community college level. Impact on Society: It is clear that internationalization at community colleges may take shape based on optimization of resources, which begs the question, how can education sector actors best support open access institutions in developing plans tailored to the local context and resources at hand? Future Research: We recommend additional use of quantitative textual analysis to parse internationalization plans, and imagine that both a larger sample size and cross-national sample might yield interesting results. How do these institutional groupings operationalize internationalization in the corpus of their plans?

On-Campus Housing’s Impact on Degree Completion and Upward Transfer in the Community College Sector: A Comprehensive Quasi-Experimental Analysis

ABSTRACTThe college student persistence literature has indicated that on-campus housing positively affects student persistence. This evidence, however, has largely been based on the experiences of students at 4-year institutions—not community colleges. This study aimed to address this gap in the literature by comprehensively evaluating the impact of both living at and simply attending a community college that offers on-campus housing options on (a) associate degree completion, (b) transfer to a 4-year institution, and (c) bachelor’s degree completion. Drawing data from the Education Longitudinal Study of 2002 and the accompanying Postsecondary Education Transcript Study and using propensity score analysis with doubly robust estimation techniques, we found living in on-campus housing significantly increased the probability of both upward transfer and bachelor’s degree completion with no effects on associate degree completion. Despite these findings, we refrain from suggesting that all community colleges use limited financial resources to construct new or additional on-campus housing options, especially when considering the heterogeneity of their student bodies. Rather we recommend that community colleges with on-campus housing strive to identify direct-from-high school students who intend to transfer and incentivize them to live on campus while offering additional opportunities to promote social integration beyond on-campus housing for all students.

SPARC3: The future of Associate of Science

ABSTRACTEmployment within STEM fields has been escalating at a greater rate than employment in other fields (National Science Foundation, 2010). Unfortunately, the number of college students moving into STEM fields of study are substantially low (Lowell & Regets, 2006). The first two years of STEM education for many students take place at the often-overlooked community college level. The purpose of this case study is to evaluate the innovative curriculum redesign of the Associate of Science (A.S.) degree program within the community college sector. Gaston College developed a program that includes inquiry-based instruction, authentic undergraduate research experiences, learning communities, and the inclusion of holistic student services for A.S. students. The goal of the SPARC3 (STEM Persistence and Retention via C3 i.e., curricula, cohorts, centralization) initiative was to increase persistence and retention among STEM students by transforming the traditional curriculum in the A.S. degree program, centralizing student support services, and increasing student engagement. This study uses the lens of transformational leadership to guide the evaluation of the data and to contextualize the constructs developed throughout the initiative. The findings reveal how SPARC3 has redesigned the way in which community colleges tackle their science curriculum and bring STEM curriculum back to the forefront. Further discussion of implications and concluding thoughts are included.

The Convergence of Institutional Logics on the Community College Sector and the Normalization of Emotional Labor: A New Theoretical Approach for Considering the Community College Faculty Labor Expectations

Little empirical research has systematically focused on, or interrogated, the labor expectations set forth for community college faculty. Thus, in this paper, we present a theoretical argument, which we formed by (re) reading several community college focused studies through various theoretical lenses. Ultimately, we merged two theories—institutional logics and emotional labor—and argue that multiple institutional logics converge within the community college sector in ways that normalize the expectation of emotional labor from community college faculty. Unlike corporate entities that tap into emotional labor for profit, community colleges rely upon faculty members' emotions to compensate for insufficient public investments.