Community College Practices for U.S.-Educated Language-Minority Students: A Resource-Oriented Framework

Abstract

Community colleges are critical points of access for language-minority students and others historically underrepresented in U.S. higher education. Yet there is evidence that community colleges are far from reaching their potential as a stepping-stone to 4-year colleges and universities for underrepresented minorities, especially in states with the most ethnically diverse populations. Within this context, the needs of one particular group of students have not been adequately explored: students from immigrant language-minority backgrounds who have done some of their schooling in U.S. secondary schools yet whose language is still considered by community college faculty, staff, or assessment measures to be inadequate for mainstream academic work. In this article, we propose a framework that emphasizes building on these U.S.-educated language-minority students' strengths and experiences in order to support their academic and linguistic development, and we review the literature on innovative institutional practices and policies that have attempted to do so.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

We gratefully acknowledge the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation for supporting this research. We also wish to thank Andrea Venezia for helpful comments on an earlier version of the manuscript.

Notes

¹Where relevant, sources were also included that discussed (a) innovations for U.S. LM students at 4-year universities, and (b) community college innovations that were not specifically targeted toward U.S. LM students but likely included this population or exemplified promising practices for this group. While an exhaustive search for the latter category was outside the scope of this review, exemplars were identified and have been included.

²Two additional innovative practices related to supporting U.S. LM students' academic transitions that are less well documented in the research but nonetheless hold promise for this population are (a) K–12 and community college alignment of standards or competencies (Lay et al., 1999), and (b) innovative approaches to placement (R. Moore, 2009; Royer & Gilles, 1998, 2003).

³These six colleges were found through a series of linear regression analyses that identified schools with rates of transfer and graduation that were higher than would be predicted based upon the institutions' and the students' demographics and socioeconomic status. While individual innovations at these colleges cannot be causally linked to their transfer and graduation rates, such practices at successful schools are clearly worthy of further investigation.

⁴Students qualifying for ESL were specifically excluded from this program because the college had another ESL learning community that was not included in the study.

⁵Tutoring is an additional innovative practice related to supporting the integration of language and academic content for U.S. LM students. It is less well documented in the research than other innovations but nonetheless holds promise for this population.

⁶While the authors refer to a study that indicates students in the linked courses became better notetakers than those enrolled in other courses, the reference could not be found.