Community College and Community Leader Expectations of the “Village”

A level of consistency between community college leaders and community leaders is necessary to demonstrate behaviors, actions, and beliefs that shape, represent, and support expected community values. Likewise, communities, which are collectives of suborganizations, play an important role in aiding individual development, especially related to educational attainment. This study sought to understand ways in which community college leaders and community leaders demonstrate behaviors, actions, and beliefs that shape, represent, and support community values, particularly the influence on an individual's acceptance of formalized education and continued education beyond compulsory schooling. Data were collected from 113 mayors and community college presidents/deans around the United States. Analysis of the data indicated five types of actions consistent among the two groups including the promotion of civic involvement, community growth and development, economic development, well-being of citizens, and value of education.     

THE COLLABORATIVE COURSE: INNOVATIVE TEACHING AND LEARNING

Advances in information technology provide an opportunity for academic librarians and professors to offer innovative collaborative courses. The purpose of collaboration between a faculty member and a professional librarian is to integrate instruction in the course subject matter with bibliographic instruction. This integration promotes learning information acquisition skills and critical thinking, as well as the use of library resources. Research skills that students need in order to use contemporary information technology are included. The integration of those skills with the subject material of the course is described.

Two applications of freshman/sophomore level courses are discussed in the paper. Course rationale, topics, and course assignments are illustrated. It is argued that students must learn modern methods of acquiring information in order to make informed independent judgments and in order to achieve understanding in any particular discipline. Providing students with the skills required to achieve access to the ever‐widening body of available information is an essential requirement of contemporary liberal education. These skills are transferable to subsequent course work and will provide the basis for life‐long learning habits. The paper presents the argument that students' achievement of “library literacy” can be promoted by effective course collaboration between faculty members and professional librarians. Benefits and problems of such collaborative courses are also discussed.     

A multivariate latent growth curve analysis of adolescent substance use

This article demonstrates a multivariate latent growth curve methodology (LGM) for analyzing longitudinal adolescent substance use data. Hypotheses concerning the form of growth in substance use, individual differences in the common trajectory over time, and covariates influencing growth were tested. Significant linear increases existed for alcohol, cigarette, and marijuana use. Second‐order multivariate extensions of LGM indicated that associations among the individual differences parameters of the various substances could be adequately modeled by a higher order substance use construct. Family status, parent‐child conflict, peer encouragement for substance use, parent substance use, and age significantly influenced initial levels of use. Peer encouragement, change in peer encouragement, change in parent‐child conflict, age, and gender significantly influenced development of use. These findings support the influence of families and peers on the development of adolescent substance use and demonstrate the utility of multivariate extensions of LGM in the analysis of longitudinal data.     

Effectiveness of Summer Bridge Programs in Enhancing College Readiness

An alarmingly high percentage of recent high school graduates are not prepared to succeed in college-level courses, and the impact of this educational shortcoming is substantial. Underprepared college students incur a monetary cost of enrolling in remedial courses, and states and taxpayers subsidize much of the overall cost of developmental education. In addition, underprepared students are less likely to graduate from college, thus impacting their earning potential and the nation's economic need for a more highly educated workforce. One approach to reducing the need for developmental education is high school bridge programs. These programs, which usually take place on a college campus, provide interventions that help targeted students aspire to, prepare for, and achieve college enrollment. This article reports on the effectiveness of bridge programs at Texas colleges in the summer of 2007; it covers two community college programs that demonstrated the highest pre- to postprogram student achievement gains of the participating institutions. Findings from this study and previous research suggest that effective bridge programs (a) have very strong relationships with their partner school districts; (b) provide professional development to all program staff; (c) conduct preprogram orientation sessions and closing ceremonies; (d) provide bus transportation; (e) involve parents in the program; (f) provide students with labs to support classroom instruction; (g) provide academic advising and other support services; and (h) implement both formative and summative evaluation methods.     

Culturally Responsive Pedagogy and Online Learning: Implications for the Globalized Community College

Implicit in the open-door mission of the community college is the mandate that every learning experience should offer full equity and inclusion for all learners, including those of diverse cultural backgrounds. This mission is paramount, given the cultural diversity represented among learners served by the globalized community college. This paper presents a cross-section of research, practice, and discourse focused on expanding our knowledge and understanding of the diverse learning needs of community college learners. The relevance of the literature to the planning, design, and implementation of distance-learning is discussed. In the end, the authors offer distance-learning instructional strategies that may accommodate the unique needs of Hispanic/Latino learners. Implications for community college educators are discussed.     

Learning Together: A Family-Centered Literacy Program

ABSTRACT

Blue Ridge Community College in Flat Rock, North Carolina serves a rapidly growing Hispanic population through its Family-Centered Literacy Program. The Hispanic population in the region has been increasing at a staggering rate of 50% per year, most of which is in-migration. These newcomers frequently face challenges adjusting to their jobs, schools, and living environment. The Family-Centered Literacy Program is teaching new skills to new residents to minimize the “culture shock”, and to make community immersion a less difficult process. The program offers evening classes 2 nights a week for parents and their children. Parents attend classes in basic and conversational English and General Education Development (GED) preparation; school-age children receive tutoring and help with homework; and preschool children learn from fluency-building games and activities. The college also provides Spanish instruction for school personnel who want to better communicate with Hispanic students and their parents. The program currently operates in 5 elementary schools. Each school has taken on the role of “community center” for Hispanic families.     

THE FUTURE OF TWO‐YEAR COLLEGES: AN ADMINISTRATOR'S‐EYE VIEW

Individuals in eight different types of administrative positions in two‐year colleges were asked to rate the importance of a variety of external and internal issues in the next five years. The purpose of the study reported here was first to identify those internal and external issues that administrators viewed as being of high importance. A second purpose was to assess the degree of consensus among differing types of administrative positions. The third objective was to identify differences between public and independent two‐year college, between men and women, and minority and white administrators perceptions of issues identified as being most important. There was a high degree of agreement across administrative groups as to the importance of five external issues; and when asked to indicate the two most critical issues, administrators were almost unanimous in their assessment. There is less agreement on the two critical internal issues. Some differences by gender and racial/ethnic group were noted, but the differences were not as great as might have been expected.     

REFROMING WRITING AMONG STUDENTS IN COMMUNITY COLLEGES

ABSTRACT

The Writing Across the Curriculum (WAC) movement, which swept through all levels of American education during the 1960s and 1970s, seemed a logical remedy for student writing deficiencies. However, the impact of WAC has not lived up to its promise. The WAC movement, as currently implemented in many community colleges, may be ineffective at best. To significantly improve student writing, systemic reform in pedagogical practice in English composition courses and throughout the disciplines is imperative. With no reform, we may unintentionally rob writing of its ability to be a tool for learning, thus negating the movement's primary goal. This article provides an historical perspective of writing across the curriculum, alongside a suggested reform model that includes essential components.     

The surprising viability of a simple alternate estimation procedure for construction of large‐scale structural equation measurement models

As part of developing a comprehensive strategy for structural equation model building and assessment, a large‐scale Monte Carlo study of 7,200 covariance matrices sampled from 36 population models was conducted. This study compared maximum likelihood with the much simpler centroid method for the confirmatory factor analysis of multiple‐indicator measurement models. Surprisingly, the contribution of maximum likelihood to model analysis is limited to formal evaluation of the model. No statistically discernible differences were obtained for the bias, standard errors, or mean squared error (MSE) of the estimated factor correlations, and empirically obtained maximum likelihood standard errors for the pattern coefficients were only slightly smaller than their centroid counterparts. Further supporting the recommendations of Anderson and Gerbing (1982), the considerably faster centroid method may have a useful role in the analysis of these models, particularly for the analysis of large models with 50 or more input variables. These results encourage the further development of a comprehensive research paradigm that exploits the relative strengths of both centroid and maximum likelihood as complementary estimation procedures along an integrated exploratory‐confirmatory continuum of model specification, revision, and formal evaluation.