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Many websites and digital tools have emerged to support pretransfer students. However, there is little understanding of the perception of availability and accessibility of these digital tools. This gap is even wider for engineering transfer contexts. Since engineering students transfer differently and need more preparation, more needs to be known about engineering pretransfer. This qualitative study of elite interviews, guided by transfer student capital theory, integrates data from interviews with transfer experts and researchers, an analysis of literature, and an Internet search. The three themes emerging from this data highlight (1) the importance of accessible, accurate, and utilizable information; (2) the need for tools and resources developed for transfer students; and (3) the lack of digital resources for engineering transfer contexts. This study provides an expansive list of digital transfer tools and identifies ways to improve upon and expand these existing resources, especially into engineering education contexts. 

Community colleges with their open-access mission, broad accessibility, and lower higher education costs play a vital role in educating and awarding advanced credentials to future engineers, scientists, and technicians. Transfer pathways to engineering are confusing, vague, and complex. Further, many transfer students, who tend to be more diverse, are viewed through a deficit-based perspective where the focus has been on barriers instead of viewing their abilities, skills, talents, and advantages through an asset-based lens. Thus, the purpose of this work-in-progress qualitative study, guided by Laanan’s theory of transfer student capital, is to investigate expert perspectives of assets, factors, and strategies enabling access for two-year college students to engineering transfer pathways. 11 experts, influencers, and programs across the United States participated in semi-structured interviews. Inductive analysis of the interviews resulted in 13 categories that formed four major themes: assets, factors, strategies, and challenges. These results build on prior transfer student research through a focus on practical strategies and tactics used to build transfer student capital for engineering transfer students. Most importantly, these results also highlight a previously missing asset-based perspective of transfer students to shift the lens to strengths-based views and conversations about transfer students.