Emerging Early College Models for Traditionally Underserved Students
This article features early college models and describes the variety of programmatic designs and student experiences.
On Their Own Terms: Two-Year Minority Serving Institutions
This report looks at the role of two-year Minority Serving Institutions (MSIs) in improving postsecondary access and degree completion for disadvantaged students in the United States.
What About the Non-Completers? The Labor Market Returns to Progress in Community College
Using a novel method for linking non-completers with completers, this paper calculates the labor market returns to programs of study, accounting both for those who obtain an award and those who do not.
What We Know About Transfer
This research overview reviews findings on transfer from community colleges to four-year colleges, including student outcomes, barriers to transfer, the economic benefits of transfer, and potential benefits to four-year colleges.
Increasing Institutional Capacity to Respond to Performance Funding: What States Can Do
This brief reviews what states can do to support public colleges and universities so they can effectively respond to the new demands placed on them by performance funding policies.
Pell Grants as Performance-Based Aid? An Examination of Satisfactory Academic Progress Requirements in the Nation's Largest Need-Based Aid Program
This CAPSEE working paper examines the prevalence and consequences of Pell Grant recipients’ failure to meet the standards for satisfactory academic progress required for grant renewal.
The Medium-Term Labor Market Returns to Community College Awards: Evidence From North Carolina
In this study, the authors examine medium-term returns to diplomas, certificates, and degrees for first-time college students who enrolled in the North Carolina Community College System in 2002–03.
Implementing Performance Funding in Three Leading States: Instruments, Outcomes, Obstacles, and Unintended Impacts
This paper summarizes findings from a large study on the implementation and impacts of performance funding in three states that are regarded as leaders in that movement: Indiana, Ohio, and Tennessee.
Policy Instruments in Service of Performance Funding: A Study of Performance Funding in Three States
This study examines the primary policy instruments through which state performance funding systems influence higher education institutions in Indiana, Ohio, and Tennessee.
Institutional Changes to Organizational Policies, Practices, and Programs Following the Adoption of State-Level Performance Funding Policies
This paper examines the ways that universities and community colleges in Indiana, Ohio, and Tennessee have altered their policies, practices, and programs to respond to the demands of performance funding programs.
Obstacles to the Effective Implementation of Performance Funding: A Multistate Cross-Case Analysis
This paper examines the major obstacles that hinder higher education institutions from responding effectively to the demands of performance funding programs in three states: Indiana, Ohio, and Tennessee.
Unintended Impacts of Performance Funding on Community Colleges and Universities in Three States
This paper identifies and analyzes the types and numbers of unintended impacts—actual or potential—of state performance funding policies on higher education institutions in three states: Indiana, Ohio, and Tennessee.
Labor Market Returns to Sub-Baccalaureate Credentials: How Much Does a Community College Degree or Certificate Pay?
This study provides one of the first estimates of the returns to different types of community college credentials across different fields of study.
On Second Chances and Stratification: How Sociologists Think About Community Colleges
This article provides an overview of sociology’s approach to understanding community colleges. It describes sociological theories and their contributions to the field and discusses recent debates on community colleges.
Three Accelerated Developmental Education Programs: Features, Student Outcomes, and Implications
This study examines three developmental acceleration programs—two in English and one in math—and finds that accelerated students were more likely to complete the relevant college-level course within 3 years.
Redesigning Arithmetic for Student Success: Supporting Faculty to Teach in New Ways
This chapter describes a promising approach to teaching developmental arithmetic and prealgebra and presents findings on a faculty support network that helped instructors adopt new teaching strategies.
Strengthening Program Pathways Through Transformative Change
This chapter reports on a major college-wide effort to smooth students’ paths as they enter the college, choose a program, and progress to a credential.
Adaptability to Online Learning: Differences Across Types of Students and Academic Subject Areas
This study examines how well students adapt to the online environment in terms of their ability to persist and earn strong grades in online courses relative to their ability to do so in face-to-face courses.
Performance Funding for Higher Education: Forms, Origins, Impacts, and Futures
This article reviews the forms, extent, origins, implementation, impacts (intended and unintended), and policy prospects of performance funding.
Can Community Colleges Afford to Improve Completion? Measuring the Costs and Efficiency Effects of College Reforms
This paper introduces a model that uses transcript data matched to credit-level cost data and funding formulae to calculate the implications for efficiency of reforms intended to improve completion rates.