Community colleges and doctoral programs are not frequently thought of as partners, but as two new collaborative programs funded by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation show, together they can strengthen and amplify their missions and support a vision of equity and diversity in higher education. The "new majority" of college students are more racially and ethnically diverse than ever before, predominantly low-income, often the first in their families to attend college—and most are enrolled in community colleges. How does this new demographic landscape affect what should doctoral study in the humanities look like?
This session convenes representatives from the two programs, which are partnerships between the City University of New York’s Graduate Center and LaGuardia Community College, and the University of Washington and the Seattle Colleges, respectively. Both support doctoral students in teaching increasingly diverse student populations while simultaneously broadening and strengthening access to and opportunity in the humanities for undergraduates. Program administrators will describe the structures of the partnerships, giving particular attention to the ways in which the two initiatives resonate with one another and the national landscape of graduate education reform. Doctoral students currently involved in cross-institutional teaching and research will present reflections on the value of the community college as a site of professional development and offer recommendations toward building sustained and productive exchanges between two-year and four-year colleges. All will work together to facilitate a roundtable discussion and field questions and input from audience members; we will directly invite humanities faculty from Scottsdale and Mesa Community Colleges, whose campuses are adjacent to the main conference location at Arizona State University, to attend the session.
