WASHINGTON EARTH SCIENCES SUMMIT: EXAMINING THE TRANSFER PROCESS THROUGH AN EQUITY LENS

The Washington Earth Sciences Summit (https://bit.ly/3uXzBZa) invited geoscience faculty from 30 of 34 community and technical colleges (CTCs) and bachelors-granting institutions (4YCU) across the state. Our goal was to create pathways for Earth science majors that result in successful transfer. Two-year colleges have the potential to be a source of increasing diversity of majors across the state. But if the transfer process is unclear, inconsistent, or does not effectively prepare students, we are harming them and the field by decreasing completion of bachelor's degrees. Through this Summit, we developed partnerships and structures that we hope will improve both the number and diversity of successful students in geoscience programs.

We worked to build community among the CTC participants and across types of institutions through a true “retreat.” The Summit was held where there were no affiliated institutions in a desirable location, such that people would want to attend and not be distracted by their local demands. The basic design of the Summit started with CTC faculty only, building community and identifying challenges majors face in their transfer process. 4YCU faculty joined the Summit on day 2, where we heard from an expert (Dr. Xueli Wang) in transfer challenges, embedded with an equity lens. This led to larger conversations about what threshold concepts majors need to know prior to transfer, challenges for students and faculty, with specific time for regional-based discussions. By day 3 of the Summit, participants were asked to make commitments in moving forward. Future work will determine what are both areas of success and identifying barriers to these pathways.

One of the guiding frameworks for this Summit was equity. Dr. Wang’s work specifically focuses on the voice and experience of transfer students and ways that the system at both two-year colleges and 4YCU consistently obfuscate and challenge students’ ability to successfully transfer and graduate. By centering our conversations around equity, we chose to challenge the systems in which we (CTCs and 4YCUs) currently operate in an attempt to minimize some of those barriers. Ultimately, our goal for this Summit is to serve as a possible model that could be useful for other geoscience programs, which are generally discovered after students enter college.