Research conducted by The RP Group's Multiple Measures Assessment Project (MMAP) and summarized in "Preparatory Pathways and STEM Calculus Completion: Implications of the AB 1705 Standards" found high rates of attrition along the path to calculus for students pursuing programs in Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM). In this…

This study presents a comparative analysis of student outcomes between online and face-to-face learning modalities at an urban community college in the Midwest, with a focus on retention and academic success. The college serves an average of 14,000 students annually across more than seventy career programs. Utilizing a quantitative approach, the…

Centered in critical race theory (Latcrit) and conceptualization of community cultural wealth, this study explores first-generation Latina/o/x students' motivations to attend college and persist to degree completion. Additionally, this study examines the overlapping forms of cultural wealth that participants access throughout their educational…

Background: Upon returning to in-person teaching at Kingsborough Community College after the pandemic, I realized something profound had shifted in my students. The well-documented drop in community college enrollment attributed to the pandemic seemed to reflect deeper disjunctures that had led students to an existential questioning of the purpose…

Advocates for marginalized students have worked to understand the equity implications of public policy and its application on educational performance gaps. This study investigated equity policies in a southern California community college intervention program: the Extended Opportunity Programs and Services (EOPS). EOPS is an equity program created…

Mathematical problem posing, or authoring mathematical tasks, can allow students to integrate their interests and experiences into the classroom. Little research has explored different designs for scaffolding or facets of posed problem quality, particularly when problem posing is based on students' interests. We created an environment that enabled…

The purpose of this article is to provide a blueprint to conduct equity case studies in rural community colleges. Informed by our field work experiences applying case study design and equity-minded frameworks, this blueprint involves four distinct steps: (1) identifying rural community colleges in North Carolina; (2) operationalizing equity in…

Objective: This study aims to understand how Southeast Asian American (SEAA) community college students experience community college stigma. Methods: This phenomenological study employs AsianCrit as a framework to examine the realities of SEAA students in community college. Ten SEAA community college students underscore how racialization and…

Mental health is on the decline. At a community college in Southern California, 55% of students admit to suffering from anxiety, 42% have depression, and 16% have seriously considered or attempted suicide. However, less than a quarter have sought treatment due to the barriers of stigma, mental health literacy, and limited access to resources.…

Given the rising number of refugees in the United States, it is becoming increasingly important for individuals to understand the lived experience of refugees and foster their inclusion. World Relief refugee simulations were designed to raise awareness about the refugees' rehoming process, and these immersion activities may be powerful experiences…

Most Black males envision community colleges as a gateway to higher education and upward mobility. Unfortunately, success metrics from across the United States reveal that community colleges fail to facilitate equitable outcomes for these students. A combination of factors creates campus climates that are not conducive to Black male student sense…

Drawing on qualitative data collected in a sample of colleges as part of a larger study on the implementation and impact of Assembly Bill 705 in California, this paper explores the rollout of corequisite reforms, focusing on the use of embedded tutors in introductory math and English courses as a strategy to meet to the needs of students. This…

Community Colleges have an open-door policy that publicly states all are welcome but after acceptance, the student encounters the hidden locked door of placement testing. For some students, placement testing is the key that unlocks the door and provides them access to their path toward their academic journey. But for most students, placement…

Many public workforce training programs lead to industry-recognized, third-party awarded credentials, but little research has been conducted on the economic benefits of these credentials in the labor market. This paper provides quasi-experimental evidence on the labor market returns to industry-recognized credentials connected to community college…

Community colleges across the United States are increasingly linguistically diverse, with populations that often include immigrant students who have grown up with a language other than English but have spent a significant part of their childhood in the U.S. and as such received a substantial part of their -K-12 education there. In this paper, we…