Curriculum Research Group

Leading with statistics, data science pathways, and modernizing community college mathematics.

The Curriculum Research Group (CRG) investigates and advances innovative approaches to the community college math curriculum. Our current research and implementation efforts focus on advancing introductory statistics and data science pathways. As data literacy becomes essential across nearly every discipline, modernizing introductory statistics and establishing entry-level data science pathways are critical to student success, degree completion, and career readiness. In a recent publication, Dr. Burn shares her archival research on the historical intersection of statistics and eugenics at University College London, a piece of history that is often overlooked. Now that statistics is the largest enrollment course in the undergraduate curriculum, all instructors and students should be aware of this history.

In addition to statistics and data science, our work builds on ongoing national reforms in corequisite mathematics and mathematics pathways. These structural changes replace traditional developmental sequences with gateway mathematics aligned directly to students’ intended programs of study. The end goal of both initiatives is to improve student learning of high-quality mathematics relevant to their programs of study, and to do so in a more effective and efficient manner.

Our Foundation & Future Direction

Historically, our research focused heavily on building equitable student outcomes in gateway mathematics and STEM pathways.Building directly on insights from the National Study of Calculus, our work led to the establishment of Transitioning Learners to Calculus in Community Colleges (TLC3)—a National Science Foundation-funded research project that identified equity-minded practices and institutional self-assessment tools to remove barriers for students of color in the STEM pipeline.

Despite these national and institutional efforts, calculus continues to stand as a significant gatekeeper and barrier to student degree attainment. However, higher education is shifting: four-year universities are increasingly tailoring their mathematics requirements to better reflect modern fields like data science. As four-year programs continue to evolve, these updated requirements will naturally filter down to the two-year college curriculum, further driving the need for modern, data-focused math pathways.

See our About Us page for a complete list of our research projects.

• Introductory Statistics and Data Science
• Racial Equity in College Mathematics
• Corequisite Mathematics
• Mathematics Pathways
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