Are We Doing Enough? COVID Responses from Urban and Rural Community Colleges

ABSTRACT

Working through the COVID-19 pandemic, many community colleges were driven to continue operations in a time of extreme uncertainty, all while dealing with enrollment declines, helping those already marginalized through wrap around services, and transforming educational service delivery in an online environment. Throughout rapidly changing circumstances of the pandemic and post-pandemic environments, equity-minded leaders are prompted to ask, “Are we doing enough?” The current article describes the COVID-19 responses of two community colleges in North Carolina, Forsyth Technical Community College, an urban institution serving the areas in and around Winston-Salem, and Wilkes Community College, serving a three-county service area in a more rural area of the North Carolina mountains. The approaches of the two colleges from different geographic areas shows both common and unique challenges, as we describe how they took action to (1) maintain continuity, (2) address enrollment declines and engage the disengaged, and (3) lead for the future through academic, workforce, and equity initiatives. The colleges benefited from a strong commitment among their faculty and staff to convert to virtual service delivery, engaged in bold actions that will pay dividends for years to come, and experienced their share of challenges implementing safety protocols. Some of the post-pandemic recommendations based on the experiences of the two colleges include: expecting greater demand for virtual learning, considering the needs of colleges from diverse geographies, committing to varied forms of communication in crisis, staying innovative even in uncertain times, and considering the needs of the whole student.