Equity, Race & the College Family

(A. Solano)
June 5, 2020

There's an awakening taking place in the United States. As a student of American history and politics, I have not learned about or seen anything like what we are witnessing--millions of Americans from all backgrounds supporting Black Lives Matter. What a beautiful a thing. In the midst of all the pain and anguish, there are rays of light in the darkness. People now seek the light, and as educators, we have a responsibility to expand the light to overcome the darkness. We must also remember that for institutions to be productive places of learning for students, they must also be for the college educators. College educators, especially whites, are seeking learning opportunities now more than ever to improve equity and racial justice at their institution. I'd like to briefly address equity and race at campuses. There's also another issue highly relevant to the current situation that I want to address--the division at so many campuses regarding Guided Pathways. This division hurts students of color.

I liken my work to cooking. I will help calibrate the oven, ensure the pots, pans, and other tools are in order, and even help sequence how to cook a delicious meal. However, I don't provide the food. That's up to the college, and the experts (see the bottom of the article for experts on race in higher education). You see, having worked for years in both K12 and higher education settings, I know the dish won't be that good when the food is cooked in a broken oven, and with cooking tools that are out-of-date. I'm the process and structures guy. The experts bring in the content. In my upcoming free downloadable guide, Why Colleges Struggle to Implement Priorities and What to Do About It, I explain it this way.

In the inputs section on the left of Figure 1 below are general priorities such as policies, mandates, curriculum, strategies, assessments, and technology that are injected into the institution represented by the center box. In the center box, college educators are supposed to make sense of all of these inputs, plan and implement them ideally through a continuous improvement cycle so that the desired outcome is improved student outcomes and closed equity gaps.

Figure 1. Why Colleges Struggle to Implement Priorities

Each state or region may have a variety of specific inputs. When we drill down to specific inputs in Figure 2, we see a variety of approaches that are supposed to produce significantly improved student outcomes, such as:
• Implementing a new performance-based funding formula to incentivize higher student completion rates;
• Using the Guided Pathways framework to better prepare the institution to support students to completion;
• Integrating multiple measures into assessment practices to place more students into college-level math and English;
• Strengthening career and technical education programs to increase job placement;
• Leveraging grant implementation (e.g., Title III/V Strengthening Institutions) to enhance programs; and
• Utilizing new student success metrics to standardize and provide a common language across colleges

Unfortunately, that is not what typically happens.

Figure 2. Specific Inputs Injected Into the Institution

Why do inputs rarely turn into campus-wide significant increases in student outcomes and equity gap reductions? In a nutshell, colleges tend to have a weak structure and support system that hinders the most important foundational and recurring action colleges need to undertake: continuous improvement. In Figure 3 below, the structure image underneath the planning and implementation box represents the quality structure and support that is needed in order for college educators to make better sense of all the inputs injected into their institution and how to have what I like to call the “Three Cs”: clarity, coherence, and consensus. Without clarity, coherence, and consensus, continuous improvement is impossible.

Figure 3. Why Colleges Struggle: Weak Structure & Support

After years of being neck-deep in the work of change, embedding with a multitude of colleges to help them get results, and parachuting in at countless colleges to facilitate difficult conversations to get the work of change moving, I have concluded that there are six factors that describe why colleges struggle to implement priorities. I will unpack that these factors and provide promising approaches when the free guide is released. For now, I wanted to provide visuals for articulating why colleges struggle to implement priorities, mandates, projects, strategies, and activities and produce improved student outcomes. I reside in the planning and implementation box. It's the college's oven, if you will. That oven is broken. So when I said I'd like to briefly address equity and race at campuses, if that oven isn't fixed and continually improved, it makes that delicious dish--equity and racial justice--an uncooked dream. This leads me to Guided Pathways.

Let's be real. Guided Pathways implementation has failed at too many colleges, in good part, because of people I call "institutional conservatives" (ICs) who fight to maintain the status quo. Ironically, many ICs are self-described hardcore social justice and equity warriors, but mainly when it comes to outside the academy. Inside the academy, they care more about their pet programs that lead graduating students to unemployment. They talk incessantly about equity and social justice in meetings, but don’t walk the walk.

Institutional conservatives:

- Discount Redesigning American's Community Colleges because of the "white, privileged researchers" who wrote the book, yet make privileged statements such as, "When I was a student, I wandered. We need to make sure we let our current students continue to wander and explore." Meanwhile, a multitude of student focus group findings tell us that students, especially of color, are under tremendous pressure to make a living wage. They also express concern about their financial aid running out before transferring because they've accumulated anywhere from 80 to 100 units wandering and exploring courses.
- State that meta-majors, program maps, revamping the schedule, and developmental education reform are bad for students, but what it's really about is maintaining a faculty-centered status-quo and all of the perks that go with it, instead of a student-centered approach. It's OK to have students of color lost in the developmental education wilderness, never to graduate or transfer, because inequitable placement tests are important and remedial courses “need” to be taught.
- Shared with me that they abhor Guided Pathways (yes, abhor, that's the kind of language they use) because the framework is race-neutral. I don’t argue that it’s race-neutral, but when I point to data that students of color (including from what are called "minority majority" colleges) benefit from Guided Pathways, they refuse to look at the data and respond with, "Well, that's your narrative." When I share that, as a practitioner focused on equitable results, I'm glad that Guided Pathways is race-neutral because if it wasn't anti-equity forces would've made sure the framework didn’t get off the ground across the country, I hear crickets. When I share that Guided Pathways can be applied with an intentional equity lens, more crickets.

Planning to plan, allowing institutional conservatives to control the agenda, and all of the politics woven in this unproductive state hurts students of color. Colleges need to make sure students have the skills and knowledge they need to earn a living wage. If we truly care about helping students of color escape poverty, we need to take Guided Pathways seriously. And as I have been saying for years, the most important aspect of Guided Pathways is its forth pillar: ensure learning. Improving instruction is the equity issue of our time! (See my pieces here, here, here, and a webinar with West Los Angeles College). This leads to the "College Family" part of the title of this article.

A community college is, in essence, a family. As dysfunctional as some of these families are, it is nonetheless a family. Families argue but the outcome from the arguments shouldn't result in the kids getting hurt. Given that most of my readers are from California, remember my California friends--you have only two years left of Guided Pathways funding. We're in a crisis situation, with looming draconian budget cuts that exclude GP funding from the chopping block. Improving student success and closing equity gaps will require a family reconciliation around Guided Pathways. Debates are fine, but the harsh reality is that millions of dollars have been wasted in unproductive debates over the last three years. It's time to bring the family together to do right by students, especially Black students.

I'm an equal opportunist who is willing to point out hypocrisy and/or call out anyone or any group that obstructs student success and equity, but know that it comes from a kind heart. I'm cautiously optimistic that positive change is coming, and colleges have a critical role to play. So, let's live up to the challenge.

Onward...

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Also visit: Guided Pathways Checklist (Yes, During COVID) | Student Success Team Challenges | Guided Pathways Resources

For experts on race in higher education, please visit my favorites:

Dr. Frank Harris, III