While the majority of California community college students are of color, few complete their schooling and transfer to four-year institutions. Since student involvement has been shown to increase persistence rates, this dissertation examines how leadership for students of color affects their progress towards transfer. In particular I examine women of color, as they are often left out of higher education research.

The research questions associated with this study are: (1) How does race and gender impact a woman of color's leadership engagement in community college? (2) How does this leadership assist or hinder her readiness to transfer? The frameworks of critical race theory (CRT) and womanist theory are used to analyze these women's experiences.

The sight for this study is a highly transfer intensive community college in southern California that boasts a strong academic and student leadership culture. Individual interviews, a focus group interview, and participant observation of eleven women in four racial/ethnic student organizations were conducted over the course of an academic year. In addition, the use of social networking sites was utilized as a new method of data collection while in the field.

Overall this multi-method study aimed to uncover how race and gender impacted a woman of color's leadership engagement while attending a community college. To build on this, a further goal was to examine how this leadership either supported or deterred her from transfer readiness. The study found that race and gender was a complex intersection that influenced these women's leadership simultaneously and separately. Further, their leadership and transfer readiness became entangled as their involvement served as an obstacle and support to their transfer preparation.

Issues of racism and sexism were apparent not only in their lives as leaders, but as students as well. The experiences of these women on the transfer path are vital to include when discussing the racial disparities in the transfer function and the lack of people of color's voices in current theoretical leadership/involvement literature. With the use of CRT and womanism we begin to see the challenges and opportunities these raced and gendered institutions fulfill.