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Objective: I implemented and evaluated a series of community college studies presentations. The seven monthly presentations were led by professors and an institutional researcher who conduct research on community colleges. Example presentation topics included the history of community colleges, developmental education, and transfer receptive culture. The presentations’ primary audience was community college students. Methods: I interviewed community college student attendees. I analyzed interview transcripts using structural coding and thematic analysis. Results: I identified two themes. The first theme was that the presentations improved most students’ perceptions of community colleges. The presentations dispelled negative stereotypes and dismantled a deficit thinking paradigm. In general, attendees felt empowered and recognized the strengths of community college students. The second theme was that the presentations improved most students’ community college advocacy. For example, several attendees informally shared the knowledge they gained from the presentations to empower their community college peers and combat family members’ community college stigma. Furthermore, several attendees became more effective advocates within institutional roles such as student advisory group member, office assistant, or peer advisor. Conclusions: My findings align with past research that suggests that community college studies, ethnic studies, and gender studies curriculum can improve learners’ perceptions and advocacy around community colleges, race/ethnicity, and gender, respectively.

Research suggests that community college alumni may be underrepresented within PhD programs. As such, we implemented and evaluated the Community College to PhD (CC2PhD) Scholars Program at the University of California, Los Angeles. CC2PhD was a 7month undergraduate research and PhD preparation program for community college sophomores in the social sciences. Like other undergraduate research programs, CC2PhD participants received research training and conducted research. What is novel about CC2PhD is that it purposefully equipped community college students with the skillsets to navigate forthcoming institutional barriers that transfer students will face when trying to apply for upper-division undergraduate research opportunities and engage in PhD preparation. During the program, CC2PhD participants conducted a qualitative interview research project, applied for external summer undergraduate research programs, wrote an upper-division research grant proposal, and developed a PhD preparation plan. To evaluate short-term program outcomes, we used a pre-and post-survey design and analyzed the survey data using t-tests. Out of 25 students who initially started the program, 19 students completed the 7-month program and completed the pre-and post-survey. We found statistically significant gains in four survey scales: Technical Research Skills, Research Proposal Writing, Research Program Application Components, and PhD Preparation Knowledge (all with p < 0.001).These gains all had large effect sizes, with Cohen's d values above 0.8. However, there were non-statistically significant declines in two survey scales: Interest in Academia and Soft Research Skills.

Objective: We evaluated mid-term outcomes of the Community College to PhD (CC2PhD) Scholars Program. This undergraduate research program is novel in that it intentionally prepared community college students to navigate forthcoming institutional barriers to upper-division research and PhD preparation at the transfer university. Methods: We conducted semi-structured interviews and surveys with seven CC2PhD alumni 2 years after they completed the program. We conducted a thematic analysis of interview data and examined descriptive statistics of the survey data. Results: We identified six themes. The first through fourth themes were that CC2PhD helped program alumni (a) apply for upper-division research opportunities, (b) conduct upper-division research, (c) engage in PhD preparation, and (d) start research and PhD preparation earlier as a transfer student. Fifth, despite being relatively prepared, some of our alumni still struggled with transfer-student-specific institutional barriers to upper-division research and PhD preparation. Sixth, CC2PhD helped alumni make informed decisions about continuing or ending their pursuit of academia as a prospective career. Conclusions: While it might not entirely nullify institutional barriers, our results suggest that providing community college students with research training and PhD preparation knowledge can positively impact their community-college-to-PhD journey. Our findings also indicate that typical community college transfer students, who are less prepared than CC2PhD alumni, may have an even harder time navigating these institutional barriers. As such, universities should do their part to implement transfer-receptive policies to broaden access to undergraduate research and PhD preparation.