A CRITIQUE OF RESEARCH ON WOMEN PUBLISHED IN THE COMMUNITY COLLEGE JOURNAL OF RESEARCH AND PRACTICE: 1990-2000

An examination of titles and abstracts of the 491 articles published in the Community College Journal of Research and Practice (CCJRP) between 1990 to 2000 resulted in a collection of 26 articles to base a systematic review of the literature regarding women in two-year colleges. Several themes emerged concerning women's participation and uniqueness in the community college, services designed to meet the needs of women, and ways in which the community college can grow to more fully represent and support women. Basic suggestions for improving research designs, methodologies, and reporting of studies on women are included.     

MATHEMATICS IN COMMUNITY COLLEGES

The research reported in this article used regression analyses to examine the factors explaining the variation in instructional costs per full‐time equivalent (FTE) student at 592 public community colleges during the 1991‐92 academic year. The results suggests that instructional costs per FTE student tend to increase with the full‐time faculty‐to‐FTE student ratio, the part‐time faculty‐to‐FTE student ratio, faculty salaries, and the ratio of degree completions to total FTE enrollment in agricultural, skilled trade, and health‐related programs. Community colleges with total FTE enrollments between 1,000 and 1,499, between 2,000 and 2,499, and between 4,000 and 4,499 students tend to have lower instructional costs per FTE student than community colleges having total FTE enrollment less than 500 students.     

IMPLICATIONS OF SOCIAL ROLE RESEARCH FOR COMMUNITY COLLEGES

The authors present a rationale for using social roles as the basis for improving the community college institution through curriculum development, faculty and student services improvement, and institutional enhancement. The construct social role is defined as a pattern of behaviors and attitudes related to a specific function or position as expected by society. Havighurst's original social role concept provides background information for the current research project. This research attempted to revitalize Havighurst's social role theory within a contemporary context. Toward this end, data were collected from 300 adults. The data collection methods controlled for an equal number of respondents grouped by age, gender, and SES level. The implications for the community college and its primary mission were presented in the areas of curriculum development, and faculty and student services, as well as implications for the community college as an institution.     

STRATEGIES FOR COPING WITH JOB CHALLENGES IN THE COMMUNITY COLLEGE DEPARTMENT: A COMPARISON OF CHAIR PERCEPTIONS BY WORK EXPERIENCE

Department chairs in community colleges face a number of job‐related challenges that have been well documented by practitioners and scholars. Despite the identification of these challenges, few efforts have been undertaken to develop a battery of coping strategies for them. This study sought to identify and prioritize coping strategies related to the challenges of chairing a department in the community college. In addition, the work experience background of practicing chairs was selected to determine differences in the use of the various coping strategies.     

APPLICATIONS OF TECHNOLOGY IN COMMUNITY COLLEGES

This article discusses community college involvement in a key welfare-to-work training program, the Jobs Opportunities and Basic Skills Training Program (JOBS), as a mirror to reflect on the larger issue of how federal and state workforce policy impacts publicly-controlled institutions of higher education. A qualitative assessment of JOBS programs at community colleges framed discussion regarding the challenges community colleges face as they attempt to preserve these programs within an era of devolved responsibility for welfare-to-work funding from the federal government to the states.     

THE STATUS OF FACULTY SENATES IN COMMUNITY COLLEGES

Shared governance plays an important role in institutional decision making. The extent to which faculty are involved in governance, though, has largely been ignored within community colleges. The current study was designed to profile faculty governance units, such as senates, in community, junior, and technical colleges in order to initiate a constructive dialogue about how best to build structures that allow faculty input into decision making. An exploratory survey of faculty governance in community colleges was mailed to a apurposive national sample of community colleges to provide geographic representation. Findings reveal that governance bodies are less common that perhaps previously thought, and that these structures tend to be more informal than in their 4-year college counterparts.     

PROFESSORS OF COMMUNITY COLLEGE EDUCATION: CHANGES IN THEORETICAL AND PROFESSIONAL ORIENTATIONS

More than 80% of professors associated with the American Association of Community and Junior Colleges responded to a survey by the authors in 1980. The questionnaire was based on and the findings were compared with a 1972 study by Campbell and Newell. Trends in demographic data, career patterns, and professional orientations are documented and analyzed. University professors of community college education were 7.7 years older as a group in 1980 than they were in 1972; many other changes appear related to this trend. Fewer than 3% of faculty in this field remain at the level of assistant professor, while 61% have already achieved the rank of professor. As a whole, the group is more productive and somewhat more conservative. Some gains have been made in the representation of women (from 0 to 14%) and minorities (from 3 to 6%). With the maturing of this professional group has come related developments in professional orientations. Time invested in research and writing nearly doubled, and professors would like to do still more. Although they still wish to be remembered for having trained outstanding administrators, their desire to be remembered for writing a significant book has increased significantly. As the academic field of community education matures, its professorial members have turned increasingly to scholarly values.     

A FEMINIST CRITIQUE OF ARTICLES ABOUT WOMEN PUBLISHED IN THE COMMUNITY COLLEGE JOURNAL OF RESEARCH AND PRACTICE : 1990-2000

This feminist critique of articles published about women in the Journal of Community College Research and Practice from 1990 to 2000 considers the extent to which they use feminist literature, frameworks, and methodology. The authors interrogate these articles' findings and the implications drawn from them asking whether they serve feminist goals of social change, women's emancipation, and institutional transformation. The critique examined 15 women-centered articles and 11 articles that treated gender as a variable. The analysis illustrated how the application of feminist tools of inquiry can generate further insights about women's participation in the community college and calls for the empowerment of women as participants and researchers through more extensive integration of women's studies in graduate programs.     

CARPE DIEM: OVERCOME MISCONCEPTIONS IN COMMUNITY COLLEGE DISTANCE LEARNING

ABSTRACT

This paper makes note of the vast opportunities for growth and expansion available to community colleges through online distance education. While many community colleges have taken advantage of these opportunities, continued success may be in jeopardy because of the high drop-out rates in online courses of study relative to courses offered as traditional, face-to-face classroom instruction. The reason for this may be that the “digital divide” still exists between students of the 21st century and faculty who were educated long ago in the 20th century, including even those faculty who have stepped forward to offer online courses. Perception of up-to-date concepts of distance learning is a major issue, and only when the gap is bridged between distance learner and instructor will online learning reach its potential. The literature available on distance learning has numerous suggestions for bridging this gap between students and faculty. The authors of this article recommend that community colleges make the institutional commitment to equip and train Internet-ready faculty to appropriately advise and teach 21st-century students. However, taking such a step may have significant implications for the immediate future in the allocation of financial resources.     

STATE OF PART‐TIME FACULTY SERVICES AT COMMUNITY COLLEGES IN A NINETEEN‐STATE REGION

The use of part‐time faculty by community colleges continues to grow. A study of 283 community colleges in the Midwestern states found a number of practices being used to assist part‐time faculty to become proficient teachers. Evaluation of these faculty revealed that there was much to be desired by over 40% of the colleges. Few merit recognition programs were found to exist. Most of the colleges in the study were planning to increase support services to their part‐time faculty in the future.     

IIMNOVATIVENESS AND RELATED FACTORS IN CANADA'S COMMUNITY COLLEGES

This study was designed to determine the extent to which innovative activities vary among Canada's community colleges and to what degree specific organizational characteristics correlate with institutional innovativeness. The hypotheses were derived from an extensive literature on innovation theory, largely centered in the private sector. The research methodology was modelled after organizational innovation studies in the structural‐functional paradigm.

Data on specific innovations, both initiated and implemented, together with a number of organizational variables, were gathered from a sample of fifteen community colleges across Canada. The results confirmed that innovativeness does vary among institutions and also correlates positively with concentrations of support function specialist positions and with levels of macro‐environmental funding for innovative activity. The study also confirmed that an inverse relationship exists between innovative activity and measures of centralization of authority.

In general, it was found that findings reached in studies of innovation involving private sector organizations were applicable to the community college sector.     

BOUNDARIES OF AN ADMINISTRATIVE LABOR MARKET: THE CHIEF ACADEMIC OFFICER IN PUBLIC COMMUNITY COLLEGES

A number of studies have shown that 2-year colleges comprise a labor market for administrators. This study extended the work of two previous studies on organizational and membership boundaries to this labor market. Twombly (1986) identified employment in a postsecondary (2- or 4-year) institution in the immediately previous position as a membership boundary to the administrative labor market of 2-year colleges. B. C. Clark, Twombly, and Moore (1990) found state lines to be organizational boundaries that affected movement from one position to another in the labor market. This study examined the organizational and membership boundaries relatedto the chiefacademic officer position inpublic community colleges. It expanded the membership boundary to include 2-year, 4-year, and K-12 educational organizations and investigated organizational boundaries for up to four position moves. Findings indicate that membership in the labor market becomes increasingly closed to those employed by 2-year institutions as an individual moves closer to the chief academic position. The state line was found to be an organizational boundary, and there was also a strong within-institution influence affecting position-to-position mobility.     

COMMUNITY COLLEGE TELEPHONE SURVEY RESEARCH: AN OVERVIEW OF METHODOLOGY AND UTILITY

The rise to prominence of surveys by telephone has been attributed to advances in telephone technology, improvement of telephone research procedures, near complete accessibility of any population via the telephone, expansion of a survey industry that requires quality data generated in an efficient and timely manner for eager clients, and availability of considerable information, based on experiment and experience, on what techniques work or do not work when doing telephone surveys. This article details 10 years of experience with telephone survey methodology utilized at Johnson County Community College (JCCC) to collect data from business and industry, former students, and individuals residing in JCCC's service area. Of particular interest to community college researchers are the results of comparisons between mail survey respondents and nonrespondents who were later telephoned for an interview. These comparisons were conducted on results of annual studies of JCCC's career program completers. Although nonrespondents tended to be younger and more often male than female, there were no notable differences in the level of success and satisfaction reported.     

INCEPTION,GROWTH, AND DEVELOPMENT OF A COMMUNITY COLLEGE FOUNDATION: LESSONS TO BE LEARNED

Community colleges, increasingly, are having to look for funding sources other than state revenues, local taxation, and student fees and tuition. More and more community colleges are recognizing fund raising as an alternative funding source. Because community college fund raising is in an embryonic stage, research addressing community college foundations has been limited. This research project involved a case study of one community college foundation. The project looked at why the foundation was established, what factors influenced the development of the foundation, and the way it evolved to the present day. The findings are suggestive to other community colleges seeking to begin a foundation or to strengthen the existing one.     

ACADEMIC STANDARDS IN THE CALIFORNIA COMMUNITY COLLEGES: A STUDY OF FACULTY PERCEPTIONS

This study assessed the opinions of faculty concerning academic standards in the classroom. It compared the responses of faculty with experience in the academic senates in 23 community colleges with faculty who had no senate experience. Differences of opinion also were examined based on the demographic variables of gender, age, ethnicity, level of education, years of teaching experience, and subject area taught. While faculty generally agreed with the importance of academic standards and with important considerations for establishing academic standards in the classroom, there were significant differences based on senate membership, gender, ethnicity, age, and subject area taught. Gender and ethnicity displayed the greatest number of differences. Campus‐wide discussions of academic standards, regional subject matter articulation conferences with nearby universities, and explicitly stated goals and objectives in all course syllabi were implications for practice emanating from this study.     

IMPORTANCE OF PLANNING INSTITUTIONAL GOALS IN THE COMMUNITY COLLEGE AND EXTENT OF THEIR CONGRUENCE AMONG CONSTITUENTS

This research study emphasizes the importance of participative goal setting efforts in the community college. Early goal setting in the colleges involved an elite group of administrators who seemed to rely primarily upon subjective planning procedures. In this era of accountability with a more vocal public, the chief executive finds it extremely important to involve key people early in the planning process. Benefits from using a participative system may include not only additional data upon which to base decisions, but more importantly a sense of involvement in the future of the college. Findings from this study which included five key groups using the Community College Goals Inventory instrument concur with those of other community college studies in the goal choices selected. Some of the implications derived from this study on eight community college goals are cited along with recommendations which can be applied to community colleges in general.     

COMMUNITY COLLEGE STUDENT ATTRACTION TO AN ENGLISH COURSE: THE ASSOCIATIONS AMONG STUDENT GENDER,THE GENDER OF THE AUTHOR OF ASSIGNED READING,AND THE STYLE OF READING

This article reports the results of a factorial experiment that investigated the reactions of male and female students to a hypothetical English course offered at the community college level. The participants (N = 136) consisted of students enrolled in English 101 courses at four community colleges in a southeastern state. The independent variables were gender of the student, gender of the author assigned, and the type of reading assigned (narrative, expository). The dependent variable was a composite rating of student attraction to the English course. Females rated the course more favorably than males, and testing detected an interaction effect between gender of the student and the gender of the writer. Females preferred female authors, and males were attracted to male authors. There also was an interaction effect between gender of the author and style of writing. Participants preferred female authors and expository style. The findings have practical implications for educational programs, English instructors, and future research.     

COMMUNITY COLLEGE ADMINISTRATORS AND FACULTY OPINIONS OF TECH PREP

According to D. Hull and D. Parnell (1991), technical preparation, commonly referred to as Tech Prep, is essentially an innovative approach to vocational education. It is designed to integrate academic subjects (i.e., mathematics and science) with vocational-technical education subjects (i.e., engineering technology, applied science) and mechanical, industrial, or vocational subjects (i.e., agriculture, health, and business). This study focused on community college presidents' knowledge of attitudes toward Tech Prep in the North Carolina Community College System (NCCCS). Four research questions were addressed in the research that are essential to the success of Tech Prep initiatives in the NCCCS. These questions were (1) to what extent are the 58 community colleges in North Carolina actively engaged in Tech Prep programs?; (2) how many of the colleges have been actively involved in Tech Prep programs for four or more years?; (3) to what extent do senior administrators, faculty, and administrative support staff differ in their opinions of Tech Prep programs in their respective colleges?; and (4) what are the differences in opinions of Tech Prep among community college presidents, faculty, and administrative support staff on issues such as recruiting better-prepared students, retention, and graduation rates?     

AN ATTITUDE STUDY OF STUDENTS IN A COMMUNITY COLLEGE,A STATE UNIVERSITY,AND A TECHNICAL INSTITUTE

The purpose of this study in college student culture was to determine whether students entering different types of postsecondary institutions have value systems and/or personality characteristics which differ according to the type of institution they select An assessment of the attitudes and traits students bring with them to college was made at a comprehensive state university, a technical institute, and a community college.

The 16 Personality Factors Test of the Institute for Personality and Ability Testing (16 PF of the IPAT) was administered to 269 students in selected freshman level mathematics classes at the three schools. Individual factor scores were used to compute group means for each type of school on the 16 personality factors. The t test applied to differences in group means revealed significant differences (p < 0.05) among groups on several factors. The results support the hypothesis that student personality factors are related to the type of college selected.

If further research as recommended by the authors reinforces these findings, there are implications for many areas of the educational experience; e.g., college selection, programming activities, choosing instructional methods, counseling.     

STAFF DEVELOPMENT GOALS AND PRACTICES IN U.S. COMMUNITY COLLEGES

The staff development goals and activities of United States community colleges were studied. A total of 1,315 questionnaires were mailed to community college academic deans in the spring of 1979. Of the 687 colleges responding, 413 indicated that their college had an organized staff development program or set of activities, and another 241 colleges indicated no such program at this time.

The results showed that the most frequently mentioned staff development goals of the 31 goals studied related to the improvement of the full‐time teaching faculty as opposed to part‐time faculty and other academic and non‐academic support personnel. Second, the most highly rated and used practices were travel and grants programs for faculty. Some of the least effective of 48 practices investigated were programs for the “faculty evaluation of college administrators” and “lighter than normal teaching loads for first‐year faculty.”

It is recommended that colleges offer a variety of staff development programs for each of their staff development groups and that research be conducted to determine participant perceptions of the usefulness of various staff development practices.