Stated Value, Renewed Commitment? Community and Technical Colleges’ Response to Racial (In)equities During COVID-19

Abstract

ABSTRACTIn this study, we interrogated the efforts adopted by community and technical colleges in a Midwestern state to address racial inequities since the onset of COVID-19. We analyzed such efforts reported in institutional newsletters and associated media through critical content analysis supported by text mining techniques. Our findings demonstrate a notable reckoning with racial inequities on the part of institutional leaders and stakeholders. However, many initiatives remain short-term solutions and are detached from a holistic equity focus. This study challenges community and technical college leadership to reimagine their policies, structures, and practices toward advancing racial equity.KEYWORDS: COVID-19 crisiscommunity collegetechnical collegeracial equitycritical content analysis AcknowledgmentsThe authors are grateful for valuable input and feedback by Turina Bakken, Mary Ellen Kraus, Kelly Wickersham, Ben Konruff, as well as editors and anonymous reviewers of the Journal of Higher Education.Disclosure statementNo potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).Notes1. While in the scholarly literature the term “community college” is often used to broadly include most public “2-year” institutions, in practice, this term does not resonate with some of the institutions with workforce development as a primary mission, often with the word “technical” in their institutions’ names. To be more precise and to honor practitioner colleagues’ positionality and varying mission priorities, we use the term “community and technical college” in our study to mirror the differences in the missions and functions of public “2-year” colleges.2. Our choice of critical content analysis, as opposed to critical discourse analysis — an equally valuable approach that often represents a “competing” choice — is grounded within our research questions that center communicated content and its embedded values and ideologies, as opposed to discursive practices by different groups. While both types of analysis focus on communication and both offer insights into power dynamics and ideology, critical content analysis deals with the content of communication to uncover hidden power relations and ideologies (Jackson & Mazzei, Citation2012), while critical discourse analysis examines the social context in which communication occurs and the discursive practices used by different groups (Blommaert & Bulcaen, Citation2000).3. Among the 76 entries, five of them were from the institutions’ websites, four from national media sources, and 67 from local media websites.4. We also examined pre-pandemic newsletters (2018–2020) using R programming and generated the frequency of the key terms that appeared in the newsletters. The results showed that the term “race” or related terms only appeared 10 times in 82 newsletters during that two-year period. Additionally, the term “equity” or related terms appeared only twice, and “scholarship” in support of Students of Color only appeared one time.5. Nearly all 76 entries referenced the racial unrest during 2020 as the impetus of the initiatives.6. Some of the media entries reported multiple efforts that fell into multiple categories. Thus, the percentages reported add up to more than 100%.7. 86% of scholarship mentions were specifically established to support Students of Color after the pandemic and racial unrest emerged in 2020.8. There were nine new scholarships mentioned in the newsletters (mentioned 14 times). The range of total scholarship funds varies from $20,000 (by a single faculty member) to $5.5 million (by a company). Since many of the scholarships created due to the racial unrest in 2020 were still in the fundraising stage, the ultimate dollar amount was not available.Additional informationFundingThis study was conducted as part of a larger research project supported by the National Science Foundation [Grant No. DUE-2100029]. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed herein are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation.