Most students at California’s rural community colleges want to earn a bachelor’s degree, but geography and limited access to transfer information and support can make that goal difficult, according to a new report.
The RP Group, a nonpartisan research organization focused on California’s community colleges, surveyed nearly 5,000 community college students from rural and more urban area campuses for its report, released last week. The survey found little difference between rural and nonrural students in their confidence about their academic abilities and their aspirations to earn a bachelor’s degree.
The problem, according to the report, is that rural students often don’t have the means to relocate and transfer to a four-year university, often because moving is too expensive or because they need to care for family members. They are also less likely to be familiar with the transfer process.
With transferring not always a realistic option, the majority of rural students are open to earning a bachelor’s degree at their local community college. The report’s authors, however, worry that recently approved legislation will make it more difficult for rural campuses to create those programs.
“For the rural students, they want that degree. They’re less concerned with how they physically get it,” Katie Brohawn, one of the report’s authors, said in an interview.
For some rural students, the problem boils down to geography: They are located in areas where there are no public California universities within at least 25 miles of a community college.
For students in those communities, transferring would mean paying relocation costs, leaving behind family members or giving up a job. Rural students are more likely than nonrural students to report caring for children, older relatives or other dependents, the report found.
Those students also find it more difficult to navigate the transfer process. They don’t have the same access as their peers at nonrural campuses to guidance and information that can be helpful for transferring.
The report recommends that rural colleges be proactive with their counseling, noting that “passive solutions, such as a resource on a website” are not sufficient. Recommendations include providing students with step-by-step guides and checklists as well as hosting transfer workshops.
Counselors also need “protected time for proactive advising,” as well as better professional development on transfer pathways, the report says.
About 72% of rural students said they would consider a community college baccalaureate degree, compared with 60% of respondents from nonrural colleges.
Last month, Gov. Gavin Newsom signed Assembly Bill 2694 and Senate Bill 960, that will, among other changes, create a new tiered system determining how many bachelor’s degree programs each community college district can offer.
Each community college district will be placed into one of five tiers based on the share of students who complete a degree or certificate or transfer to a four-year university. Districts with the highest rates will be permitted to offer more bachelor’s degrees — up to a maximum of 12. Those with the lowest transfer and completion rates will only be eligible to create one or two bachelor’s degrees.
Kate Mahar, associate vice president of innovation and strategic initiatives at Shasta College, said she suspects the system will limit rural colleges’ capacity to offer bachelor’s degrees because their students typically have a harder time transferring.
“This arbitrary ranking of what colleges are worthy to have bachelor’s degrees could end up working against us for the very reason we want to have it,” Mahar said. “So that was disappointing.”
Burke is a reporter for EdSource, a nonprofit, nonpartisan journalism organization covering education in California.
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