Background/Context: As students increasingly enroll in online postsecondary courses, instructors and students need new strategies to maintain engagement, motivation, and sense of belonging to have academic success, particularly for historically disadvantaged students. This study focuses on improving student success in online postsecondary STEM…

This article explores the planning and implementation process for a community partnership school for a historically low-performing elementary school using an asset-based community development approach. We offer insights into the community needs assessment process that enabled four key community partners to identify needs and projects for the…

This research brief highlights throughput rates for students enrolled in Disabled Students Programs and Services (DSPS) by disability type. Findings show that throughput rates increased for every disability type from 2015-16 to 2019-20 in both English and mathematics. Evidence supports that AB 705 has resulted in improved outcomes for students…

The transfer pathway from community college to university holds promise for advancing equity in STEM because it is followed by disproportionately high numbers of underrepresented students. Among the challenges these students face is cultivating belonging in multiple institutional settings. By combining belonging and validation theories, this…

This study developed an equity-minded and trauma-informed model for improving community college student success rates. Since up to 94% of community college students have experienced trauma, it was imperative to establish a comprehensive approach to overcoming the resulting non-academic barriers and low completion rates. Since there is no existing…

This dissertation research focuses on Open Educational Resources (OER) and OER-based courses as a solution to the rising cost of textbooks. This study focuses on the impact of OER-based courses on student success metrics and examines student and faculty attitudes towards OER-based courses. The study takes place at a medium-sized, rural community…

In this article, I highlight some of the narratives that I collected from tutor-mentors and students about their experience as Spanish or Portuguese-speaking youth in the Toronto public education system and within a community-led academic success program (Our Youth Success program). I use "testimonio," a method from Latina feminism, to…

The burden of childhood visual impairment and disparities in access to pediatric vision care remain pressing issues in the United States. School-based vision programs (SBVPs) serve as one approach to advancing health equity. Operating at the intersection of schools and healthcare, SBVPs can increase access to pediatric vision services, improve…

The demand for colleges across the world to convert their courses to an online format has increased with the number of learners enrolled in at least one online course increasing each year (Seaman et al., 2018). Unfortunately, a study by Garris & Fleck (2020) found that many students complained that when their courses transitioned to an online…

This study addressed low graduation rates at Midwest Community College (MCC; a pseudonym) and explored factors affecting student success. The purpose of this basic qualitative study was to delve into nontraditional students' perceptions of the influence of compressed courses and the effect the courses had on their academic success at MCC. Over the…

In the United States truancy prevention is lacking two key elements to success; research that explains the causes of truancy and empirical evidence for best practices of truancy prevention. Truancy has been a problem in academics since the early 1900's, when truancy became illegal. Since then, truancy rates have continued to see a steady increase,…

As a result of systemic barriers, undocumented immigrants are more likely to enroll in community colleges and to enter these institutions with higher prior academic achievement than their peers. I explore the potential spillover benefits of this hyperselection on other students using data from a large community college system and two…

This dissertation examines parents and teachers' perceptions of effective parental involvement in education, situated within Epstein et al.'s (2009) framework of six typologies of parental participation. The study, through a comprehensive comparative analysis, reveals critical insights into the disparities and commonalities in how parents and…

To understand how to best support Latino male community college students, we used the Socio-Ecological Outcomes (SEO) model to examine factors associated with their achievement and college satisfaction. Specifically, we leveraged data from the Community College Survey of Student Engagement (CCSSE) and situated our study in developmental…

The quality of support provided to students in higher education can have a powerful impact on the student's experience, their perceptions of challenges, and their overall academic success, particularly retaining in and completing their degree. Though many universities create robust services to support undergraduate students, existing literature…