Abstract
As California works towards closing a projected degree gap by 2030, enrollments in online courses steadily increase. This mixed-methods study dis-aggregated online course outcomes (grades and persistence) for Latino students enrolled in a California State University campus between Fall 2015 and Fall 2019. Students of all ethnicities demonstrated a small, but significant difference between the mean of the their term GPA (2.91) and the online course GPA (2.89) (n=44,700). However, dis-aggregating online GPAs between non-Latinx students (2.94) and Latinx students (2.79) reveals a larger disparity, especially for Latino students (2.73) whose grades are significantly lower than their Latina (2.82) counterparts. Writ large, Latino students achieve an online GPA nearly two tenths lower than the campus mean at this Hispanic Serving Institution. The study identifies factors significantly correlated with these GPA gaps and possible avenues for decreasing the gap and increasing Latino educational opportunity. OLS regression models indicate that, net of demographic factors, academic determination (a domain of student thriving) (p=<0.001), student-faculty interaction (p<0.01), and high school GPA (p<0.01) all significantly positively correlate with online GPA, while Latino participation in first-year seminars is negatively associated with online GPA. Qualitative research revealed that online courses may represent an additional acculturation challenge for first year students and shift the locus of control for the Latinos academic journey, although first-year seminars appear not to help this process for online courses. These findings suggest that higher education institutions offering online courses may require improved student-faculty interactions in online courses (including through smaller class sizes), expanded pre- and in-course student supports tailored to online delivery, and a broad equity focus for tracking and serving subgroups to better facilitate Latino student success.