The first step to addressing equity gaps is to identify them. How can community colleges determine, with some degree of certainty, whether one or more student groups on a campus is in need of assistance in order to succeed? This paper tackles this question by delving into the three methods typically used to identify equity gaps, comparing and…

It is becoming ever more challenging to address the changing landscape faced by California Community Colleges. Change agents strive to implement needed interventions but are often disappointed in the outcomes. However, the literature shows that the odds of successful change increase when interventions align with the organization's culture. The…

While data on enrollment, performance, persistence, and completion can offer directional information about access and success for different student groups, they do not provide the "why" behind these measures. Asking students directly about their experiences at the institution can help with a more comprehensive understanding of how to…

With the quick rise of social media's popularity among the young, colleges and universities have found ways to use social media to recruit prospective students, engage current students, and connect with former ones. The purpose of this study was to investigate the role of social media use for varied purposes among a student population often…

The purpose of this guide is to illuminate best practices for meaningful engagement of youth in Community Schools and to recognize youth voice as a community asset that can help advance more equitable school systems. Youth voice plays an important role in redesigning how public education functions. The COVID-19 pandemic has disrupted education and…

Meta-majors refer to the creation of broad program pathways or areas of interest, such as "Allied Health or Business." They are key components of the Guided Pathways efforts that provide students with a more structured and integrated academic experience. There are several different approaches (e.g., sorting exercises) colleges can use to…

The primary purpose of this paper is to emphasize and reiterate the centrality of the faculty role in tutoring and learning centers, where peer-to-peer, discipline-specific collaborative learning is the primary objective. This paper provides a breadth of content for practitioners in the field and also assists those seeking to understand the unique…

All youth need the support of parents, family members, and other caring adults. Parents and families are children's first teachers and, in many respects, their most influential role models and motivators. Among the varied efforts to ensure that children succeed and thrive, there is growing acknowledgement of how critically important it is to…

In educational contexts where many domains subject to improvement are interdependent and causal evidence is frequently lacking it is difficult, if not impossible, for policymakers and educational practitioners to decide which domain should be invested in. This paper proposes a new method that uses Conditional Mean Independent Correlations (CMIC)…

In a spring 2021 survey of California Community College students exploring the impact of COVID-19 on their transfer journey, the RP Group identified colleges where students felt highly satisfied with the transfer support and communication they were receiving during the pandemic. To better understand what these community colleges were doing to…

Part of the Stanford Center for Opportunity Policy in Education (SCOPE) research series titled "Time Matters: Teacher Collaboration for Learning and Leading," this cross-case study and accompanying research brief were gathered as part of a larger study of four public schools across the United States that organized teacher time and work…

Test-only placement systems are associated with inaccurate placement determinations that can perpetuate college achievement gaps by race/ethnicity and socioeconomic status (SES). In response to the pitfalls of traditional, test-only placement systems, colleges across the country are increasingly experimenting with and adopting alternative…

California has embraced transfer between the state's community colleges and universities as a key mechanism for ensuring a diverse and qualified workforce while simultaneously closing equity gaps and promoting economic mobility for its residents. Yet the RP Group's "Through the Gate" transfer study finds that each year, nearly 60,000…

High-quality early childhood education (ECE) begins with well-prepared, highly qualified educators. This brief offers practitioners and policymakers an opportunity to learn from promising programs that recruit and prepare racially, ethnically, culturally, and linguistically diverse cohorts of educators to teach in programs serving children birth…

High-quality early childhood education (ECE) begins with well-prepared, highly qualified educators. This brief offers practitioners and policymakers an opportunity to learn from promising programs that recruit and prepare racially, ethnically, culturally, and linguistically diverse cohorts of educators to teach in programs serving children birth…