Breakout Session 3

How to Quiet the Continuous Cycle of Complaints to Amplify a Continuous Cycle of Improvement

Strand: Research in Action

Room: Royal A

California community colleges are grappling with the full implementation of AB 1705 and how to approach closing disproportionate impact gaps in transfer-level math. Golden West College has developed a high functioning Community of Practice (CoP) centered on minimizing those gaps in enrollment and success. In this session, participants will examine potential structures for CoPs and initiate an institution-specific plan for replicating these efforts. We will share strategies for leveraging resources to support a CoP and outline how we established a culture of inquiry and facilitated data-informed enhancements to classroom instruction, student services supports, and campus culture.

We will focus on helping IRPE professionals manage setbacks, establish complementary relationships with campus partners, and facilitate challenging conversations with the goal of identifying and dismantling barriers and executing informed actions. Participants will also discover techniques for using the continuous cycle of improvement as an inclusive framework for their own CoPs.

Presenters: Erin Craig, Jeannette Jaramillo, Sacha Moore, and Lauren Sosenko, Golden West College

Making Meaning and Change Together: A Collaborative Approach to Strategic Plan Implementation

Strand: Planning for Change

Room: Terrace ABC

Join the San Diego Community College District (SDCCD) Institutional Innovation and Effectiveness District Strategic Planning team to learn how our newly minted division is transforming the process of strategic plan implementation to better facilitate equitable change within the strategic planning committee and the district by opening up the process of implementation to be more collaborative.

The team is using National Equity Project facilitation strategies and qualitative methods to co-create The SDCCD Roadmap to Implementation, understand the progress of aligned activities supporting the creation of a strategic planning dashboard, and unpack the ways in which colleagues make meaning (or do not make meaning) of the plan itself to guide improvement in future planning cycles. This process is catalyzing an ongoing culture shift, where humanized and equity-minded strategies for facilitating change create the very conditions in which the equity-focused goals of the plan can actually be achieved.

Presenters: Natalia Córdoba-Velásquez Alarcón and Jaime Sykes, San Diego Community College District

Transforming Mindsets: Using Adult Learner Research to Drive Belonging and Retention

Strand: Research in Action

Room: Terrace DEF

Adult learners—students aged 25 and older who balance work, caregiving, and other responsibilities—make up nearly half of our regional community college population, yet their needs often fall outside traditional academic structures. This session shares findings from the San Diego & Imperial Community Colleges’ Adult Learner Study, which gathered insights from more than 600 students to better understand the personal, structural, and systemic barriers they face.

The presentation highlights how IRPE teams across 10 colleges partnered with the San Diego & Imperial Center of Excellence to identify adult learners, design an inclusive survey instrument, analyze results, and facilitate conversations about campuswide redesign. Participants will explore key findings on scheduling, re-enrollment, and access to support services, and will gain practical strategies for informing institutional change.

Presenter: Tina Ngo Bartel, San Diego & Imperial Center of Excellence

You Can't Count If You're Not Counted: Inclusive Data to Drive Black Student Success

Strand: Research in Action

Room: Harbor

Existing data collection often limits or excludes students who identify with more than one race or ethnicity, leading to the undercounting of African American/Black students. This session calls for a culture change in how race is counted, emphasizing that “You Can't Count If You're Not Counted.” More inclusive identification methods, such as allowing students to “check all that apply” and reporting all selections, lead to more accurate data and a better understanding of African American/Black students.

We will present evidence from studies, including The RP Group's African American Transfer Tipping Point Study, which demonstrates that this inclusive method increased the identified population by 73%. These more comprehensive data are crucial for IRPE professionals to inform equity-focused policies and effectively allocate resources to drive student success.

Presenters: Temperence Dowdle, Cypress College; Lisa DiDonato and Marcell Gilmore, Mt. San Antonio College; Jeremy Smotherman, Santa Rosa Junior College; Darla Cooper, The RP Group

Changing Composition Together: Addressing Equity Gaps Through Student Data and Faculty-Driven Vulnerability

Strand: Research in Action

Room: Pacific

This session shares the story of a faculty–IR collaboration that embraced the vulnerability and complexity of equity-minded change. Using multi-term, disaggregated ENGL C101 data, IR facilitated a confidential and supportive data-reflection space that revealed disproportionate outcomes for several student groups. Together, we moved through reaction, meaning-making, and action planning to redesign pedagogy, grading practices, and course materials with measurable improvements.

The project demonstrates how IR can create trust-based, relational spaces that turn uncomfortable data into equitable instructional change. Participants will leave with templates for running their own equity-minded data dialogues and practical techniques for building safe, humanizing partnerships between IRPE offices and faculty. This presentation aligns with the conference theme by modeling what it means to embrace the messy work of equity and change together.

Presenters: Jaclyn Kessler and Debilyn Kinzler, Cerro Coso Community College