Rural California community college students want bachelor’s degrees, but have few options

Most students at California’s rural community colleges want to earn a bachelor’s degree, but geography and limited access to transfer information and support can make that goal difficult,  according to a new report. 

The RP Group, a nonpartisan research organization focused on California’s community colleges, surveyed nearly 5,000 community college students for its report, released Tuesday. The survey found little difference between rural and non-rural students in their confidence about their academic abilities and their aspirations to earn a bachelor’s degree.  

The problem, according to the report, is that rural students often don’t have the means to relocate and transfer to a four-year university, often because moving is too expensive or because they need to care for family members. They are also less likely to be familiar with the transfer process.

With transferring not always a realistic option, the majority of rural students are open to earning a bachelor’s degree at their local community college. The report’s authors, however, worry that recently-approved legislation will make it more difficult for rural campuses to create those programs. 

“For the rural students, they want that degree. They’re less concerned with how they physically get it,” Katie Brohawn, one of the report’s authors, said in an interview.

In the fall of 2025, The RP Group surveyed 4,745 current and recent community college students — 2,592 from rural campuses and another 2,153 from non-rural campuses to serve as a point of comparison.

Rural students showed a similar level of confidence as non-rural students, with only 8% reporting a complete lack of confidence in their academic capabilities, compared to 7% of non-rural students, according to the survey.

“Their inability to transfer is more structural than something internal that they might not see themselves as a university student,” said Daisy Segovia, one of the co-directors of the survey.

For some rural students, the problem boils down to geography: They are located in what the report labels “university deserts,” or locations where there are no public California universities within at least 25 miles of a community college.

For students in those areas, transferring would mean paying relocation costs, leaving behind family members or giving up a job. Rural students are more likely than non-rural students to report caring for children, older relatives or other dependents, the report found. 

On top of the geographic challenges, students at rural community colleges also find it more difficult to navigate the transfer process. They don’t have the same access as their peers at non-rural campuses to guidance and information that can be helpful to transferring. They are less likely to have attended transfer fairs or toured university campuses. They also report being less familiar with the procedural steps of transferring.

The report recommends that rural colleges be proactive with their counseling, noting that “passive solutions, such as a resource on a website” are not sufficient. Recommendations include providing students with step-by-step guides and checklists as well as hosting transfer workshops.

Counselors also need “protected time for proactive advising” as well as better professional development on transfer pathways, the report says.

“It’s not the quality of the counseling that is the issue,” Brohawn said. “It’s making sure that the counselors themselves are supported.”

Aside from transferring, rural students are also open to earning a bachelor’s degree at a community college. About 72% of them said they would consider a community college baccalaureate degree, compared to 60% of respondents from non-rural colleges.

Earlier this month, Gov. Gavin Newsom signed Assembly Bill 2694 and Senate Bill 960, a two-bill package that will, among other changes, create a new tiered system determining how many bachelor’s degree programs each community college district can offer.

Each community college district will be placed into one of five tiers based on the share of students who complete a degree or certificate or transfer to a four-year university. Districts with the highest rates will be permitted to offer more bachelor’s degrees — up to a maximum of 12. Districts with the lowest transfer and completion rates will only be eligible to create one or two bachelor’s degrees.

Kate Mahar, associate vice president of innovation and strategic initiatives at Shasta College, suspects the system will limit rural colleges’ capacity to offer bachelor’s degrees because their students typically have a harder time transferring.

“This arbitrary ranking of what colleges are worthy to have bachelor’s degrees could end up working against us for the very reason we want to have it,” Mahar said. “So that was disappointing.”

This story was originally published by EdSource.