MY research question is that, are community colleges as a two year to four year stepping stone working for students?
in some of my research i came across the way that community colleges are portrayed in fiction. just as many other "norms" we live come from media, so does the way that we portray community colleges. according to Bourke, "the image of the community college as a stepping stone dominates fictional work. This is certainly an aspect of the community college that can be stressed during recruitment and admissons." This type of behavior seems to acknowledge the fact that in fiction community college is portrayed for the students who don't seem to do too well in high school and they use it as a drawing in tactic to show students that college is a completely different life and you can turn your grades around. however, that's also not a good thing because there are those students that are brilliant and can not seem to afford school that go there also so when it comes time for transfering it is not as easy.
Community colleges as a whole do not seem to be working as a stepping stone for four year institutions because the types of skills and learning tactics taught in community colleges do not prepare you for the types of classes at four year school. According to some studies " students who come to Rutgers from community colleges seem to struggle when taking expository writing 101" because the type of writing skills required to take this course are not implemented because at community college the teaching has to cover students of very high proficciency to very low. According to one study," Honors students comprise only 2% of community college students compared to 7% at four-year institutions." This type of statistic shows how those at community colleges have different learning styles and to compensate for those students the teacher has to teach so that the class can learn and be as strong as their weakest student.
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Your project seems to be at a crossroads between talking about whether or not community college can be a stepping stone to 4 year and whether that mode (which many states, including NJ, are following) can really be successful -- AND -- trying to talk about fictional portrayals of community college students. I do not think you succeed in bringing those two ideas together. I also think you would be much better off just researching the history of the ARTSYS system and "articulation agreements" between 2 and 4 year schools and whether or not that is working out. I think you will lose focus if you try to incorporate the fiction element when you really just have to talk about the hard facts....
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