Community College Counselors' Perceptions of Cross-Enrollment

• In Event: Troubling Perceptions of Organizational Barriers to Access

Abstract

The majority of community college (CC) students intend to attain a bachelor's degree, yet only about 30% do. Cross-enrollment, a policy that permits CC students to concurrently take courses at 4-year universities, shows promise in addressing this aspiration-attainment gap. Yet, cross-enrollment has low uptake among CC students and studies have yet to examine administrative perspectives on promoting cross-enrollment, particularly those of CC counselors who play a key role in guiding course decision-making. This study utilizes focus groups to examine counselor perceptions of cross-enrollment and factors affecting counselors’ ability to support students in the cross-enrollment process. Three themes were developed from this study including 1) counselors’ workplace organizational structure, 2) disjointed higher education systems, and 3) the ideal cross-enrollment student.

Authors

• Maricela Banuelos, University of California - Irvine

• Kassandra Flores, University of California - Irvine

• Veronika Rozhenkova, University of California - Irvine