It’s About Time, Part II - Does Time Poverty Contribute to Inequitable College Outcomes by Gender and Race/Ethnicity?

Oct 15, 2026

Uploaded by Adam

A study examines whether unequal access to time as a resource helps explain gender- and race/ethnicity-based differences in college outcomes. Using data from a large urban public university with two- and four-year campuses, the analysis shows that time poverty accounts for a significant share of disparities in retention and credit accumulation. Groups facing greater time poverty also devote more of their limited discretionary time to education, with implications for reduced time for sleep, exercise, and healthcare, positioning time poverty as an under-addressed higher-education equity issue.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryResearch & Report

FormatPDF

Pages20

Reading Time50 min

AccessFree to download

Literature Review and Conceptual Framework

Time Poverty

AERA Open January-December 2024, Vol. 10, No. 1, pp. 1–20 DOI: 10. 1177/23328584241237971 Article reuse guidelines: [sagepub.com/journals-permissions](sagepub.com/journals-permissions)[ ](sagepub.com/journals-permissions)© The Author(s) 2024. [https://journals.sagepub.com/home/ero](https://journals.sagepub.com/home/ero) It’s About Time, Part II: Does Time Poverty Contribute to Inequitable College Outcomes by Gender and Race/Ethnicity? Claire Wladis Borough of Manhattan Community College and the Graduate Center at the City University of New York Alyse C. Hachey University of Texas Katherine M. Conway Borough of Manhattan Community College of the City University of New York Existing research demonstrates gender-and race/ethnicity-based inequities in college outcomes. Separately, recent research suggests a relationship between time poverty and college outcomes for student parents and online students. However, to date, no studies have empirically explored whether differential access to time as a resource for college may explain differential outcomes by gender or race/ethnicity. To address this, this study explored the relationship between time poverty, gender or race/ethnicity, and college outcomes at a large urban public university with two and four year campuses. Time poverty explained a significant proportion of differential outcomes (retention and credit accumulation) by gender and race/ethnicity. More time-poor groups also dedicated a larger proportion of their (relatively limited) discretionary time to their education, suggesting that inequitable distributions of time may contribute to other negative outcomes (e.g., reduced time for sleep, exercise, healthcare). This suggests that time poverty is a significant but understudied equity issue in higher education. Keywords: time poverty equity, gender, race and ethnicity, retention, academic momentum Prior studies have highlighted inequitable college outcomes by gender and race/ethnicity in the United States (Cohen et al, 2021; Michener & Brower, 2020), exploring various potential explanatory variables, including financial resources, prior academic preparation, and social/cultural capital (Enriquez et al., 2014; Goldrick-Rab, 2016) . One unexplored potential explanatory variable is time as aresource for college. In recent work, we found that women, Black, and Hispanic students were all significantly more time-poor compared to men and White or Asian students (Wladis et al., 2024). In other qualitative research, time pressures or a lack of time have been cited by minoritized students as a reason for dropout (Hodges et al., 2013; Horstmanshof & Zimitat, 2007) . Based on this existing research, it seems reasonable to hypothesize that differential access to time as a resource for college may explain some or all of the differences in college outcomes by gender and/or race/ethnicity. However, to date, no large-scale quantitative studies have been conducted to examine this. Some limited research has described time as a finite resource that can be spent on college (Bennett & Burke, 2018; Mathuews, 2018; Wladis et al., 2018, 2023). However, in general, time as a finite resource for college is not widely used in the higher education lexicon; nor has time been routinely included in completion models. To address this gap, this study aims to provide the first quantitative evidence of how measures of time poverty (i.e., insufficient time to devote to college work [Wladis et al., 2018]) may explain differences in college outcomes by gender or race/ethnicity. This study also explores for the first time in a large-scale quantitative study the extent to which more time-poor student groups may sacrifice more of their “free” time for their education and, thus, may experience negative nonacademic consequences of time poverty as well. Based on these results, we discuss how addressing time as a finite resource may bea potential approach to redressing various sources of inequ

FAQs

What question does the article investigate about time poverty?

It investigates whether differential access to time as a resource for college can explain differences in college outcomes by gender and race/ethnicity.

Which college outcomes does the study relate to time poverty?

The study links time poverty to retention and credit accumulation as indicators of college outcomes.

How does the article explain the potential mechanism behind inequitable outcomes?

It argues that groups with greater time poverty may redirect a larger share of their limited discretionary time toward education, leaving less time for sleep, exercise, and healthcare.

Oct 15, 2026

Uploaded by Adam