Episode 12: Taka Yamashita

Amy Barnes27min

Dr. Ian Anson00:04

Hello and Welcome to Retrieving the Social Sciences, a production of the Center for Social Science Scholarship. I'm your host, Ian Anson, Associate Professor of Political Science here at UMBC. On today's show, as always, we'll be hearing from UMBC faculty, students, visiting speakers, and community partners about the social science research they've been performing in recent times. Qualitative, quantitative, applied, empirical, normative. On Retrieving the Social Sciences, we bring the best of UMBC's social science community to you.

Dr. Ian Anson00:40

As social scientists, we often like to think about the role of institutions in shaping our daily lives. From federal government agencies like the IRS, to local institutions like the DMV, to civil society institutions, like churches and rec leagues. Formal and informal rules and arrangements help to explain our behavior as individuals and as members of groups. On today's episode of Retrieving the Social Sciences, we returned to a type of institution we recently covered on an earlier episode with Nobel Laureate David Card. We're thinking about colleges, but there's a twist. This time we're discussing community colleges, or two-year institutions of higher learning. These colleges help train the workforce, they help aspiring learners bridge the gap between high school and a four year degree, and they generally play an incredibly unheralded role in our society. But how do these schools get learners from point A to a valuable degree?

Dr. Ian Anson01:42

That's exactly the question that today's guest is interested in understanding. Dr. Takashi Yamashita is an associate professor in UMBC's Department of Sociology, Anthropology and Public Health. Trained as a gerontologist, Dr. Yamashita's research interests are diverse and span many topics in public health and sociology. His new research focus on community colleges has already paid dividends as Dr. Yamashita and co-authors have recently been awarded a $1.4 million grant from the US Department of Education to study pathways to success in community college STEM education and job training. Dr. Yamashita's extensive expertise in research methods has led him to propose an ambitious project with both qualitative and quantitative components. In my recent interview with Dr. Yamashita, we talked about this project, where it stands today, and how it might reorient our understanding of the value of community college as a starting point for lifelong learning. Let's listen in.

Dr. Ian Anson02:47

Professor Yamashita, thank you so much, again, for agreeing to be with us. I'm really excited to have you here to talk a little bit about this interesting institution in American society, which, you know, I think is really important, right? This, this community college institution in America. You know, it's, it's really important. I think we as faculty tend to recognize that but you know, I think in popular discourse today, it does seem to be pretty overlooked. And so my first question to you today is: What really got you interested in community colleges as a subject for your scholarly work? And why do you think they're so commonly overlooked in popular discourse?

Dr. Taka Yamashita03:22

Yeah, thank you for having me. I'm really excited to be here. To answer your first questions. I think it's partially due to social and economic changes that happened fairly rapidly in the last couple of decades, particularly, you know, as we all know, the information and communication technologies, they have advanced quite fast, and it's most of us will have a hard time just keeping up with it. So those social economic changes probably have changed the way we look at what we call human capitals. In other words, that's a valuable knowledge or skills in an economic context. I was looking at recent data from the US Department of Commerce, showing that about 20 to 25% of, you know, commonly known what STEM jobs: science, technology, engineering, and mathematics related jobs only require two years associate degree.

Dr. Ian Anson04:18

25% of those jobs only required associate degrees, is that right?

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