What Maria, Dolores, and Jesus Taught Me About Flexible Assignment Deadlines

• In Event: Faculty Are Subverting Racial Injustice and Expanding Educational Opportunities for Students Through Practitioner Research at Our Minority-Serving California Community College

Abstract

I chose to align my practitioner inquiry project with Delta College’s Equity Guiding Principle of flexibility, which states, “We will challenge the status quo by disrupting and questions out assumptions. We will be flexible in how we design the student learning experience so that we encourage innovation and creativity. We will support risk taking and the opportunity to learn from our failure.” Given that many of the students that I serve at Delta College are identified as underrepresented minority students (URMs) and disproportionately impacted, I wanted to explore ways to reduce the barriers that these students face. My FETA practitioner inquiry project investigates student outcomes associated with a flexible assignment submission policy that I implemented in my community college hospitality course. In this paper, I closely examine data associated with three focal students who I call Maria, Dolores, and Jesus.
My review of relevant literature convinced me that students perceived flexible deadlines as beneficial. For example, Schroeder et al. (2019) concluded that students viewed a late bank policy positively and regarded it as helpful because it provided flexibility with demanding deadlines. Like the students that Schroeder investigated, each of my focal students

• Maria is a middle-aged Latina (35-44 year age range) who describes herself as a straight, heterosexual female student. According to Maria, she has not adjusted well to college and has difficulty balancing her personal life and schoolwork. Maria advocates for herself by frequently reaching out to me to express concerns and ask questions.

• Dolores is a Latina teen (17 years old or younger) who describes herself as a straight, heterosexual female student. She is a first-time college student that is enrolled full-time at Delta College. Dolores has a neutral view about her adjustment to college life feels that she finds a good balance between school and personal life. During the term Dolores reached out to me following the death in her family.

• Jesus is a Latino young adult (19-21 age range) who describes himself as a straight, heterosexual male. Like Dolores, Jesus is a first-time college student that is enrolled full- time at Delta College. Jesus also shares Dolores’ view about having a neutral view of his adjustment to college and he believe that he is balancing schoolwork and personal life

well. During the term, I noted that Jesus struggled with navigating technology critical to virtual instruction. For example, Jesus had difficulty navigating our course’s virtual Learning Management System (LMS), the Canvas platform. As a result, rather than communicate with me through the various Canvas options, Jesus’ preferred method of communication was through text messaging.
Findings from my analysis of the data associated with Maria, Dolores, and Jesus were counterintuitive. While findings from the larger study overwhelmingly supported continued use of this intervention, deep analysis of the focal student data (discussed in the paper) have allowed me to gain deeper insights. By tracking the reliance on the intervention by Maria, Dolores, and Jesus suggest that the difference between students who were most successful with the flexible assignment deadline policy was associated with the frequency of use—not adoption of the policy. In other words, unless done right, flexible assignment deadline can do more harm than good.

Author

• Kevin Cabrera, San Joaquin Delta College