241 Harvard Educational Review Vol. 81 No. 2 Summer 2011 Copyright © by the President and Fellows of Harvard College Unique Challenges for Women of Color in STEM Transferring from Community Colleges to Universities MARIE-ELENA REYES Frida Kahlo Institute for Women at the Borderlands In this article, Marie-Elena Reyes presents the issues faced by women of color in the fields of science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) as they transfer from community colleges to universities. Community colleges offer a great potential for diversifying and increasing participation of underrepresented groups in STEM. Many women of color enter higher education through community colleges, but trans- fer rates are low, and retention rates of transfer students into STEM at universi- ties are lower still. Through interviews conducted with participants in the National Science Foundation–funded Futurebound program, Reyes reveals an atmosphere in which women of color transfer students experience attitudes and treatment signaling that they do not belong because of age, ethnicity, and gender as well as preconceptions that transfer students are not adequately prepared. Reyes proposes that programs and policies to integrate responses to these challenges could improve the transfer rates and retention of women of color into STEM fields. Historically, community colleges have been an important path for women and students of color entering higher education. Nettles and Millett (2008) refer to community colleges as “one of the most important innovations for higher education in the 20th century” (p. 1) established in response to the demand for continued education following high school completion in the United States. As of 2007, 6.6 million of the 15.6 million enrolled U.S. undergradu- ates attend community colleges (Planty, Hussar, & Snyder, 2009), which clearly demonstrates community colleges’ significance in the U.S. education system. In the past two decades, both part-time and full-time attendance have grown more rapidly at community colleges than at four-year institutions (Nettles & Millett, 2008). During those two decades, full-time enrollment of women increased by 53.3 percent and part-time enrollment rose to 82.8 percent at