Toward Better College Completion Rates
MDRC has developed a body of rigorous evidence on interventions designed to help low-income college students succeed. This issue brief draws six lessons from that work for colleges and policymakers as they seek to improve college completion rates.
MDRC ’s College Promise Success Initiative provided technical assistance to College Promise and Free College programs interested in promoting success in college by implementing evidence-based student support practices. Through this initiative, MDRC disseminated best practices and tools to the 300-plus College Promise and Free College programs that exist...
Testimony Before the California State Assembly Higher Education Committee and the Budget Subcommittee on Education Finance
On February 6, Alex Mayer, MDRC’s Deputy Director of Postsecondary Education, explained to members of two California State Assembly committees that combining and integrating evidence-based strategies to address multiple factors can be highly effective in improving completion rates among low-income college students.
Lessons from the Annie E. Casey Foundation’s Pilot Project
Executive skills are the cognitive abilities that make it possible for people to set goals, regulate impulses, and complete the steps necessary to achieve their objectives. This paper describes a pilot of a coaching strategy based on executive skills conducted with three programs serving young people.
Lessons on Increasing College Completion from Six Talent Dividend Cities
The Talent Dividend competition encouraged major metro areas to find ways to boost their proportions of college graduates. The effort suggests that cross-sector partnerships and interventions that ease students’ transitions to the next level of education hold promise in aiding credit attainment and narrowing achievement gaps between groups of students.
The Effects of the City University of New York’s Accelerated Study in Associate Programs After Six Years
The City University of New York’s Accelerated Study in Associate Programs (ASAP) is an uncommonly comprehensive and long-term program shown to raise graduation rates among community college students. Following up after six years, MDRC finds that ASAP increases graduation rates and enables some students to earn their degrees sooner.
The college enrollment process is complex and includes many steps. Recent research has shown that short, action-oriented text messages can help people focus on critical tasks at the right times. Building on this promising research, the Text Ed project will develop and test a strategic text messaging intervention at Educational Opportunity Centers ( EOC s). One of eight...
Young people with juvenile justice involvement face many challenges, which may include a lack of education and employment skills, antisocial attitudes and values, unstable housing, and much more. These challenges make it difficult for them to pursue educational pursuits or enter the workforce and become productive citizens. Too often, these challenges continue into...
Although most college students receive financial aid, many are left with unmet financial needs and may take on loans or drop out as a result. But promising innovations in financial aid could help students pay for college and accelerate their studies.
Forty percent of all entering college students and over half of entering community college students must take at least one remedial course. Fewer than half make it through developmental education. This two-page Looking Forward memo provides an overview of research evidence in four areas of developmental education reform.
Get the latest info on MDRC publications, projects, and other news. We send email updates a couple of times each month.
