Publications
The False Dichotomy Between Academic Learning and Occupational Skills
This essay compares broad academic and vocational program goals, embodied skills, tasks, and jobs, with a focus primarily on community college students.
Adapting Lesson Study for Community College Mathematics Instruction: Early Observations
This short report provides a rationale for implementing Lesson Study, a collaborative and structured professional development approach, in the community college context.
Redesigning Your College Through Guided Pathways: Lessons on Managing Whole-College Reform From the AACC Pathways Project
This report and the five case studies that accompany it describe how institutions are managing the broad-based transformation of programs, student services, and related support systems using the guided pathways model.
iPASS in Practice: Four Case Studies
This report shares the stories of four community colleges that participated in the Integrated Planning and Advising for Student Success (iPASS) initiative, which provided support for institutions as they redesigned their advising processes and adopted and implemented new technologies.
Early Outcomes of Texas Community College Students Enrolled in Dana Center Mathematics Pathways Prerequisite Developmental Courses
This study examines if students participating in Dana Center Mathematics Pathways (DCMP) developmental courses enroll in and pass college-level math courses at higher rates than students who take traditional developmental math courses.
Integrating Technology and Advising: Studying Enhancements to Colleges’ iPASS Practices
This study, conducted in partnership with MDRC, examines the effects of three institutions’ efforts to expand the use of advising technologies and to use administrative and communication strategies to increase student contact with advisors.
How and Why Higher Education Institutions Use Technology in Developmental Education Programming
This paper explores how technology is integrated into developmental education programming and considerations for institutional leaders when deciding whether and how to integrate technology in developmental education.
Early Momentum Metrics: Leading Indicators for Community College Improvement
In this brief, the authors examine how well nine measures of students’ progress in their first year predict student completion in subsequent years, and thus how suitable these early momentum metrics are as leading indicators of the effectiveness of institutional reforms.
Humanities and Liberal Arts Education at Community College: How It Affects Transfer and Four-Year College Outcomes
Using transcript-level data from two community college state systems and a nationally representative survey, this short report examines how course-taking in humanities and liberal arts at community colleges affects transfer and outcomes at four-year colleges.
Humanities and Liberal Arts Education Across America's Colleges: How Much Is There?
This short report provides a systematic accounting of the provision of humanities and liberal arts education at public colleges in the United States, including community colleges.
Teaching Matters and So Does Curriculum: How CUNY Start Reshaped Instruction for Students Referred to Developmental Mathematics
This paper describes key features of CUNY Start mathematics and how it differs from traditional developmental education.
Scaling Success: Lessons From the ASAP Expansion at Bronx Community College
This brief examines the expansion and adaptation of the City University of New York’s Accelerated Study in Associate Programs (ASAP), using Bronx Community College as an illustrative case study.
English Learners and ESL Programs in the Community College: A Review of the Literature
This paper examines factors within the community college context that affect the experiences and academic outcomes of the English learner population broadly and students who enroll in ESL courses in particular.
American Honors: The Life and Death of a Public-Private Partnership
In 2012, Quad Learning partnered with two community colleges to pilot American Honors, a program designed to help academically talented community college students overcome the challenges of transferring to more selective four-year destinations. This paper traces the components of the program's socially conscious theory of change, its for-profit business model, and the tensions between the two.
Mixed-Methods Research Through the Lens of a Funding Agency
In this piece for the Teachers College Record, CCRC Director Thomas Brock describes how mixed methods may be used in education research and offers advice to researchers who are seeking funding from IES for mixed methods studies.
Modernizing College Course Placement by Using Multiple Measures
Written in conjunction with the Education Commission of the States, this brief provides an overview of multiple measures assessment and placement and describes how several states are implementing the approach.
Re-Envisioning College Readiness Reforms
Using Florida as a case study, this Change Magazine article describes the complexities of implementing effective college readiness reforms and offers insights for policymakers looking to improve student success.
The Evolving Mission of Workforce Development in the Community College
This paper describes how community colleges became a major resource for the nation's workforce development requirements and discusses how this role continues to evolve to meet the needs of students, employers, and local communities.
Performance Standards in Need-Based Student Aid
This paper illustrates student responses to Satisfactory Academic Progress (SAP) requirements as well as the tradeoffs faced by a social planner weighing whether to set performance standards in the context of need-based aid.
Demography as Opportunity
This working paper describes the idea of demography as opportunity, which marries the racial and ethnic shifts underway in the country and in higher education with equity perspectives on historically disenfranchised populations.