Xueli Wang

Mixed methods research is increasingly used to study educational inequities, yet its potential to serve as a transformative approach remains underarticulated, particularly in higher education. Drawing on the transformative paradigm and foundational mixed methods scholarship, this essay conceptualizes transformative mixed methods research (TMMR) as an orienting framework that guides how researchers approach study design, knowledge production, and the integration of qualitative and quantitative approaches in pursuit of justice and social change. Using higher education, including community colleges, as a generative context, the essay articulates core considerations and practices of TMMR that move mixed methods inquiry beyond methodological pluralism toward transformative engagement. In doing so, it positions TMMR as a way of aligning how we study inequity with how we seek to transform it.

This study investigates how holistic teaching practices and institutional support at community colleges shape science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) students’ momentum and self-efficacy in career-relevant competencies. Using survey data from three community colleges, we apply structural equation modeling (SEM) to assess these relationships while accounting for institutional variation using multi-group analysis. Our findings demonstrate that holistic teaching practices are positively associated with students’ curricular, cognitive, and meta-cognitive momentum, indicating that integrated, supportive classroom instruction contributes to sustained engagement and self-regulated learning in STEM pathways. Holistic teaching practices also show a marginal positive relationship with career readiness self-efficacy and professional and interpersonal self-efficacy, with cognitive and meta-cognitive momentum mediating these associations. In contrast, institutional support is not related to students’ momentum but is positively associated with professional and interpersonal self-efficacy, which may point to its role in shaping broader skill development independent of short-term academic engagement. These findings suggest that holistic teaching practices and institutional support differentially contribute to students’ academic momentum and career-related self-efficacy, which highlights the importance of coordinated efforts across classroom and institutional levels within the broader STEM ecosystem in fostering both short-term engagement and long-term professional competencies among diverse community college STEM learners.

Objective/Research Question: The global pandemic has caused major disruptions to technical education, a leading innovator in providing students with the most up-to-date education and training as they transition into careers. Although there is growing evidence of instructional changes in higher education more broadly in response to COVID-19, we have yet to learn what has happened in community colleges and specifically technical education. This study examines what new policies, practices, and initiatives pertaining to technical education emerged as a result of COVID-19, along with prominent patterns and themes that underlie the uncovered changes and innovations. Methods: We leveraged the concept of disruptive adaptation, technical college system media sources, and cutting-edge text mining techniques to present a portrait of the changes and innovations that emerged in technical education during the pandemic across a statewide technical college system. Results: Findings revealed seven key areas of change and innovation: technology/material access for virtual learning, instructional adaptations, student support, college operations, return to campus, COVID-19 and community support, and new initiatives. Four themes underlie the emerging patterns and priorities: access and flexibility, holistic support for students, community focus, and agility to innovate. Conclusions/Contributions: Our study points to community colleges’ and technical education’s commitment to students amid disruptions, as well as the need for a focus on faculty support and development and sustained diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts. Moreover, through the lens of disruptive adaptation, the pandemic has served as a catalyst accelerating technical education innovation in widespread and overlapping ways within the college, community, and beyond.

Objective: This study explores how community college faculty adjust their instructional approaches and student supports amid the COVID-19 pandemic. Method: This research drew on a basic qualitative approach to analyze 18 semi-structured interviews with faculty teaching math or math-heavy courses at two institutions. Results: Our findings add to the research literature on community college students’ learning experiences, faculty teaching practices, and emergency remote teaching. Our analysis revealed five themes: (a) Community college faculty ensured and maintained continuity and minimized disruptions in student learning; (b) they humanized teaching and student support without centering their personal struggles; (c) they deepened community building to foster a sense of connection among students; (d) they empowered students in both mindset and practices to keep them engaged; and (e) they viewed the crisis as a learning opportunity to inform future instructional approaches and student services long after the pandemic. Contribution: Our study reveals a change model that captures the holistic and humanizing nature of faculty efforts to inform the future of teaching and learning in community colleges. In addition, our findings unveil some of the most critical components for faculty and institutions to consider when preparing for future crisis management and preparation.

As colleges and universities continue to navigate the longer-term impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic, a wealth of knowledge and insights exists within many community colleges to inform how to best prepare students for the fast-changing demands of learning, work, and life. Using a strengths-based approach and interviews with students from three large community colleges in the Midwest, this study explores how a community college education prepared students for the pandemic and areas in which students could be better equipped. The students appreciated their community college education for its practicality of training and research capacity, technology and communication skills in virtual formats, cultivating resilience, diversity as a highlight, and an education for the community. Areas where the students wished they had learned more were handling stress and managing time, engaging with diverse perspectives and work styles, and keeping up with the evolving technology landscape.

Community colleges have increasingly played a critical role in expanding the pathway to baccalaureate degrees in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields of study. At the same time, little is known about the course pathways that facilitate transfer into STEM disciplines at 4-year institutions. Adopting the STEM momentum concept, this research explored course-taking patterns that predict transfer into STEM fields of study and the timing of transfer. Employing a combination of longitudinal multidimensional k-means cluster analysis and multinomial logistic regression, the study revealed five clusters of course-taking patterns. Among them, three clusters of course-taking exhibited momentum toward transfer in STEM: one concentrating on courses in general education, one centering around major-specific coursework within and outside of STEM, and one involving the coupling of remedial courses and a broad distribution of courses within and beyond STEM. Furthermore, the first two patterns seemed to generate optimal momentum for middle transfer compared with early or late transfer, whereas the third cluster exhibited momentum for middle transfer and even greater momentum for late transfer. Discussion of the findings in the context of STEM momentum and implications for policy, practice, and research are presented.

Objective: Although upward transfer in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields represents a prominent national policy concern, community college students’ aspirations for transfer in STEM are often impeded, resulting in lower transfer rates. This study investigated four aspects of community college STEM students’ aspirational experiences and behaviors with regard to transfer: support for transfer, transfer service usage, transfer-oriented interactions, and transfer information acquisition. Particular attention was paid to how these factors may impact students’ aspirational momentum differently based on gender and race/ethnicity. Method: The study drew upon survey and administrative records from 1,245 first-time students beginning in STEM majors or courses at three large comprehensive 2-year institutions in a Midwestern state. A logistic regression model with interaction terms was employed to explore whether and how the relationship between students’ aspirational momentum toward STEM transfer and their aspirational experiences and behaviors vary across gender and race/ethnicity. Results: Results indicate that, overall, students engaging in more frequent transfer service usage were significantly more likely to have aspirational momentum, but this relationship is weaker among female students, compared with males. Also, Black and Hispanic students’ aspirational momentum was significantly less affected by support for transfer than for White students. In contrast, the effect of transfer service usage on aspirational momentum for Black students was significantly stronger than for White students. Contributions: Our findings hold implications for how to cultivate aspirational momentum toward transfer in STEM, especially how to resolve potential gender and racial disparities within this unique and pivotal transfer pathway.

This study explored whether and how beginning 2-year college students’ engagement in active learning within science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) classrooms is related to their intent to transfer to a 4-year institution. Despite the potentially important role active learning experiences play in shaping 2-year college students’ intent to transfer upward, there is a dearth of research to investigate this relationship. To fill this gap, we explored the linkage between active learning and intent to transfer. In addition, we explored whether and how transfer self-efficacy may mediate this relationship. Based on survey data collected from a statewide sample of 1st-year 2-year college students beginning in STEM programs or courses and controlling for student entry characteristics and postsecondary factors, a path analysis of mediation revealed that active learning is directly related to transfer intent and exerts an indirect relationship through its positive influence on transfer self-efficacy.