Unpacking Program Enrollments and Completions With Equity in Mind (2020)

This report by John Fink and Davis Jenkins from the Community College Research Center (CCRC) provides a comprehensive analysis and guideline on how to examine and improve equity in program enrollments and completions in community colleges. It emphasizes the use of data to understand how different student groups are represented in various programs and the opportunities those programs lead to, particularly in terms of labor market outcomes and transfer potential.

Main Takeaways:

• Guided Pathways and Equity: The report advocates for whole-college guided pathways reforms aimed at creating clearer paths to college and career success, ensuring that programs lead to valuable educational and career outcomes, and checking if student representation across programs is equitable.
• Program Enrollments and Economic Returns: The analysis stresses that community college programs lead to different economic returns and that these are often stratified along racial, ethnic, gender, and socioeconomic lines. The study highlights the importance of directing students into programs that lead to higher economic returns.
• Analytical Framework: The report outlines a methodology for colleges to analyze their program enrollments and completions with equity in mind, focusing on identifying which programs students are enrolled in, the opportunities these programs lead to, and whether representation in these programs is equitable.
• Practical Implementation: Examples and instructions are provided for conducting data analyses to help colleges understand disparities and inequities in program enrollments and completions. This includes recommendations for discussions that could lead to actionable changes in policy and practice.