Objective: The process by which students decide to stay in college has been primarily based on models that are independent of geographic context. This article describes the local labor market in which community college students are situated and discusses the multiple and complex ways these labor markets impact student decisions to persist and graduate. Method: Using institutional data and U.S. Census Data for 2010, this article argues that the process students use to decide to enroll and persist in community college needs to account for geographic context. Applying ArcGIS mapping, we layout students’ location, local labor market data, and the educational attainment data of a Houston area community college to map the geography of opportunity for these students. Results: The geography of opportunity signifies the educational or occupational opportunities afforded to individuals that are influenced by geography. Conclusion: Our findings suggest that research addressing persistence would benefit from acknowledging the geographic context of the higher education institution.
AlmJ.WintersJ. V. (2009). Distance and interstate college student migration. Economics of Education Review, 28, 728-738. doi:10.1016/j.econedurev.2009.06.008
BelfieldR. C.BaileyT. (2011). The benefits of attending college: A review of the evidence. Community College Review, 39, 46-68. doi:10.1177/0091552110395575
5.
BriggsX. (Ed.). (2005). The geography of opportunity: Race and housing choices in metropolitan America. Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press.
6.
CardD. (1993). Using geographic variation in college proximity to estimate the return to schooling (No. 4483). Cambridge, MA: National Bureau of Economic Research.
ChettyR.HendrenN.KlineP.SaezE. (2014). Where is the land of opportunity? The geography of intergenerational mobility in the United States (Working Paper 19844). Cambridge, MA: National Bureau of Economic Research.
9.
CohenA. M.BrawerF. B. (2008). The American community college (5th ed.). San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.
CorbinJ.StraussA. (2008). Basics of qualitative research: Techniques and procedures for developing grounded theory. Los Angeles, CA: SAGE.
12.
Dache-GerbinoA. (2018). College desert and oasis: A critical geographic analysis of local college access. Journal of Diversity in Higher Education, 11, 97-116. doi:10.1037/dhe0000050
13.
D’AmicoM. M.Rios-AguilarC.SalasS.González CanchéM. S. (2012). Career capital and the community college. Community College Journal of Research & Practice, 36, 251-261. doi:10.1080/10668926.2012.637860
14.
Deil-AmenR. (2011). Socio-academic integrative moments: Rethinking academic and social integration among two-year college students in career-related programs. Journal of Higher Education, 82, 54-91. doi:10.1353/jhe.2011.0006
15.
Deil-AmenR. (2015). The “traditional” college student: A smaller and smaller minority and its implications for diversity and access institutions. In StevensM.KirstM. (Eds.), Remaking college: The changing ecology of higher education (pp. 134-168). Redwood City, CA: Stanford University Press.
16.
DeOliverM. (1998). Geography, race, and class: A case study of the role of geography at an urban public university. American Journal of Education, 106, 273-301. Retrieved from https://www.jstor.org/stable/1085453
17.
DoC. (2004). The effects of local colleges on the quality of college attended. Economics of Education Review, 23, 249-527. doi:10.1016/j.econedurev.2003.05.001
18.
DoughertyK. J. (1994). The contradictory college: The conflicting origins, impacts, and futures of the community college. Albany: State University of New York Press.
19.
GalsterG. C.KillenS. P. (1995). The geography of metropolitan opportunity: A reconnaissance and conceptual framework. Housing Policy Debate, 6, 7-43. doi:10.1080/10511482.1995.9521180
20.
GordonC. (2008). Mapping decline: St. Louis and the fate of the American City. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press.
GrubbW. (2002). Learning and earning in the middle, Part I: National studies of pre-baccalaureate education. Economics of Education Review, 21, 299-321. doi:10.1016/S0272-7757(01)00042-5
23.
GrubbW.LazersonM. (2004). The education gospel: The economic power of schooling. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
24.
HarveyD. (2005). A brief history of neoliberalism. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.
25.
KaneT. J.RouseC. E. (1995). Labor market returns to two and four-year colleges. The American Economic Review, 85, 600-614. Retrieved from https://www.jstor.org/stable/2118190
26.
KienzlG. S.AlfonsoM.MelguizoT. (2007). The effect of local labor market conditions in the 1990’s on the likelihood of community college students’ persistence and attainment. Research in Higher Education, 48, 751-774. doi:10.1007/s11162-007-9050-y
27.
KolesnikovaN. (2009). Community colleges: A route of upward economic mobility. St. Louis, MO: Federal Reserve Bank.
28.
LeeJ. M.RawlsA. (2010). The college completion agenda 2010 progress report. New York, NY: The College Board. Retrieved from https://www.collegeboard.org/advocacy
29.
LiaoH.EdlinM.FerdenziA. (2014). Persistence at an urban community college: The implications of self-efficacy and motivation. Community College Journal of Research and Practice, 38, 595-611. doi:10.1080/10668926.676499
30.
López TurleyR. (2009). College proximity: Mapping access to opportunity. Sociology of Education, 82, 126-146. doi:10.1177/003804070908200202
31.
MullinC. M. (2012, February). Why access matters: The community college student body (Policy Brief -PBL. 201201). Washington, DC: American Association of Community Colleges. Retrieved from https://eric.ed.gov/?id=ED532204
32.
RephannT. J. (2007). Community college growth opportunities: Untapped potential in America’s heartland?Growth and Change, 38, 443-459. doi:10.1111/j.1468-2257.2007.00378.x
33.
RhoadsR. A.ValadezJ. R. (1996). Democracy, multiculturalism, and the community college: A critical perspective. New York, NY: Garland.
34.
RosenbaumJ. E. (1995). Changing the geography of opportunity by expanding residential choice: Lessons from the Gautreaux program. Housing Policy Debate, 6, 231-269. doi:10.1080/10511482.1995.9521186
35.
RosenbaumJ. E.ReynoldsL.DelucaS. (2002). How do places matter? The geography of opportunity, self-efficacy and a look inside the black box of residential mobility. Housing Studies, 17, 71-82. doi:10.1080/02673030120105901
36.
SanchezT. W.StolzR.MaJ. S. (2003). Moving to equity: Addressing inequitable effects of transportation policies on minorities. Cambridge, MA: Civil Rights Project at Harvard University.
37.
SlaughterS.TaylorB. J.RosingerK. O. (2015). A critical reframing of human capital theory in U.S. higher education. In Martinez-AlemanA. M.PusserB.Bensimon’sE. M. (Eds.), Critical approaches to the study of higher education: Competitive advantage (pp. 80-102). Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press.
38.
StuartR.Rios-AguilarC.Deil-AmenR. (2014). “How much economic value does my credential have?” Reformulating Tinto’s model to study persistence in community colleges. Community College Review, 42, 327-341. doi:10.1177/0091552114532519
TateW. (2008). “Geography of opportunity”: Poverty, place, and educational outcomes. Educational Researcher, 37, 397-411. doi:10.3102/0013189X08326409
41.
TintoV. (1975). Dropout from higher education: A theoretical synthesis of recent research. Review of Educational Research, 45, 89-125. doi:10.3102/00346543045001089
42.
TintoV. (1993). Leaving college: Rethinking the causes and cures of student attrition (2nd ed.). Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
43.
TolbertC. M.SizerM. (1996). U.S. Commuting Zones and Labor Market Areas: A 1990 Update (Staff Paper No. AGES-9614). Rural Economy Division, Economic Research Service, U.S. Department of Agriculture. Retrieved from http://purl.access.gpo.gov/GPO/LPS47146
