Aligning Practice With Pedagogy: Funds of Knowledge for Community College Teaching

• In Event: 42.046 - Funds of Knowledge in Higher Education

Abstract

In efforts to increase Latino college completion rates, state policies have focused attention on community colleges. The California legislature, for example, passed the Student Success Act of 2012 and established funding for the Student Success and Support Program (SSSP) and Student Equity Planning (SEP). California community colleges were given generous funding to increase degree attainment and mitigate equity gaps among the most disproportionately impacted student populations, which in the state of California are Latino students. The principal policy strategies of SSSP and SEP include college preparation activities, transfer reform, and coordinated counseling and education planning services. While all the above-mentioned approaches are instrumental to increasing student success, academic outcome, and degree attainment, there remains a crucial component absent. This study identifies the missing element as attention toward the pedagogical approaches and classroom practices of community college faculty.

The pedagogical approaches and practices of community college faculty are important to student success (Umbach & Wawrzynski, 2005), but seldom does community college faculty become the focus of student success initiatives. Hence, the intent of this research is to redirect attention toward community college faculty by highlighting how they develop their approaches to teaching and to assess the potential of developing a Funds of Knowledge (FoK) approach that fits the community college context. The findings indicate that community college faculty, due to the complexities and dynamics inherent in the community college system, have not substantively reflected and evaluated the process by which they adopt their pedagogy or measure the effectiveness of their teaching practices. Findings also suggest that community college professors unwittingly use deficiency frameworks to inform their teaching practices and types of engagement with their students. While there are discreet elements of funds of knowledge (FoK) observed in their teaching, the dominant pedagogical approach remained grounded in deficit thinking.

These findings affirm the immediate need for community college faculty to collaboratively develop a pedagogical approach to teaching that is more conducive to higher student academic achievement and degree attainment for nontraditional students, which in the California community colleges are Latino. This study also recommends further research to fully innovate a FoK approach to community college teaching.

Author

• Juana Maria Mora, Claremont Graduate University