Improving Teaching in Community College: The Impact of Faculty Professional Development on Student Success

• In Event: The Experiences of Community College Faculty

Abstract

Unlike elite research universities, community colleges are “teaching colleges”, where the most academically vulnerable students gain access to postsecondary education. Faculty instruction plays a critical role in promoting student success in these colleges. In this paper, we examine whether faculty professional development affects student academic outcomes, using administrative data from three community colleges. We use a difference-in-difference research design and compare student outcomes before and after faculty professional development (PD) implementation in two departments of each of the three colleges, using departments without faculty PD activities as control group. We find that faculty PD activities significantly improved student course pass rates, course grades, and next-term persistence rates.

Authors

• Florence Xiaotao Ran, University of Delaware

• Yifeng Luo, Teachers College, Columbia University