The merits of undergraduate research are well-established at four year institutions, but little is known about the impact it has at the community college level. In this work, we examined a Pacific Northwest two-year college physics education research program to identify possible impacts of undergraduate research on the academic journey of community college students. We designed an interview protocol for current and past students from the program using open-ended questions. Students shared how their undergraduate research experiences affected them personally and educationally, and using a qualitative analysis, we coded for keywords and ideas that aligned with: increasing sense of belonging, boosting self-confidence, building a stronger community, and fostering student-instructor relationships. With all the advantages shared by these students, it is not far-fetched to posit that undergraduate research experiences can lead to better retention, completion, and transfer of community college students. In this presentation, we hope to highlight exemplary work already occurring at the community college level and recommend that a stronger focus be placed on increasing opportunities for these students to engage in research in the future.

Although much has been explored regarding introductory physics students' everyday ideas about energy, it is often still taught in much the same way as it was 30 years ago (e.g., balls falling off cliffs, roller coasters, skateboarding). During that same time period, the climate crisis and society’s energy consumption has become a culturally important topic that is largely neglected in physics courses. At a community college in the Pacific NW, instructors introduced activities from Levy et al. (2023)  “An Energy Unit Fueled by Climate Change” to the physics curriculum, aiming to explicitly tie energy topics to climate change issues. Post implementation of the unit, we asked students to share their views of the relevance of and relationship between energy topics in physics and their society, specifically in the context of climate change. Using a phenomenographic qualitative analysis, we examined students' written reflections and coded their responses into similar themes. In this presentation, we share the results of our analysis and recommend a more robust integration of the culturally relevant topic of climate change into introductory physics education.