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Public Two-Year Institutional Characteristics Associated With Credential Completion by Students With Disabilities

Sun, April 14, 11:25am to 12:55pm, Pennsylvania Convention Center, Floor: Level 100, Room 107B

Abstract

This study employed data from the 2012/2017 BPS to understand how institutional characteristics at public two-year institutions (P2Ys) are associated with students with disabilities credential (certificate, associate degree, or bachelor’s degree) completion. First, we asked whether P2Ys serve significantly more students with disabilities. Second, we established baseline credential attainment rates by June 2014 and June 2017 for students with disabilities who attended a P2Y as their first institution in 2011-12. Finally, we examined how the characteristics of the starting institution are associated with credential attainment by 2014 and 2017 for students with disabilities who started at a P2Y institution in 2012.

Literature

In 2015-16, 19% of undergraduates reported having a disability (NCES, 2017). The number of students with disabilities entering two-year institutions has increased (Garrison-Wade & Lehmann, 2009). This presents a need for understanding factors that affect their credential attainment. Studies by Yaghmaee (2013) and Vasquez Urias and Wood (2014) found institutional characteristics can be associated with completion. Madaus and colleagues (2021) indicated that current research on disability in P2Y contexts has focused on support-related or systematic domains. To our knowledge, however, no study has examined institutional factors specifically for students with disabilities who begin at P2Ys.

Method

First, we described attendance and credential attainment for students with disabilities attending P2Ys and all other institutional sectors. Further, we provided credential attainment rates in 2014 and 2017 for students with disabilities who started at P2Ys. We then regressed credential attainment on institution characteristics (geography, urbanicity, MSI-qualifying) at P2Ys for students with disabilities. We selected institutional characteristics available through public-use data and represented a large enough part of the NCES DataLab sample.

This study is novel in refusing to compare students with disabilities to students without disabilities. This comports with critical quantitative analysis practices by considering the subgroup unto itself (Carter & Hurtado, 2007). Such filtering helps elucidate factors important for promoting within-group success.

Results

Students with disabilities are significantly more likely to start at P2Ys compared to all other institutional sectors. We found 12.2% of all survey respondents who started at P2Ys identified having a disability, while 10.6% of survey respondents who started at all other institutional sectors identified having a disability. We found 10.9% of survey respondents with disabilities who started in 2011 at a P2Y attained a credential by 2014. This increased to 28.9% by 2017.
In the logistic regression analyses, we found no significant relationships between credential completion and institutional aspects, such as geography, urbanicity, and MSI-qualifying racial composition.

Discussion

The null result from predictive analyses is surprising, as we anticipated state-level policies and resources to influence student success, urbanicity to relate to easily accessible resources, and MSIs to offer more tailored student services. We urge caution in interpreting these null findings. If there are no differences based on institutional characteristics such as location, urbanicity, and compositional diversity, our findings offer evidence that program-level interventions remain the best mechanism for improving credential completion rates for students with disabilities who begin at P2Ys.

Authors