Dr. Renn's research is in three main lines: LGBTQ college student success, women's higher education worldwide, and student success for low-income and minoritized students. She is the co-PI of the National Study of LGBTQ Student Success, a two-part study that has laid the groundwork for understanding how campus climate, peers, faculty, and structural features of campus influence LGBTQ-identified student success. "Success" for LGBTQ students is defined in terms of academic, social, health, career, and other outcomes such as persistence to graduation. Dr. Renn's international study of women's colleges and universities is a first-of-its-kind comparative study of women's institutions in 10 countries, looking at their contribution to access, positive climate, gender equity, and leadership development for women. Dr. Renn's research on low-income and minoritized student success is a more recent addition to her portfolio, encompassing a range of research designs to understand how institutions can remove obstacles to academic, personal, and social success for students. Examples of obstacles include confusing campus communication, policies that penalize students for not understanding how to navigate the college experience, and practices that assume the role of the university is to act as gatekeeper rather than facilitator of student success.