Our Programs

We conduct research on high-performing colleges and offer multiple programs to help leaders and teams from community colleges and four-year institutions achieve higher and more equitable outcomes for their students, both during college and after. These programs provide practical guidance, tools, and learning experiences for leaders and teams to craft reforms rooted in data and effective practices. (See our focus area page for more on our insights and tools.)

American Talent Initiative

The American Talent Initiative (ATI) is an alliance of four-year institutions with high graduation rates committed to expanding access and opportunity for talented students from lower- and moderate-income backgrounds. ATI member presidents and teams set goals to increase opportunity for these students; they also come together to support one another and learn from exemplars in the field.

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Aspen Prize for Community College Excellence

The $1 million Aspen Prize for Community College Excellence is the nation’s signature recognition for America’s community colleges—as one U.S. president called it, “basically the Oscars for great community colleges.” The Prize is rooted in deep research into community colleges that achieve excellent and equitable results, uncovering models of excellence that Aspen shares with the field and embeds in our professional development programs.

Aspen Presidents Fellowship

The Aspen Presidents Fellowship is a year-long executive leadership program for 25 reform-minded community college presidents. The program provides fellows a structured set of experiences to reconsider and refine their student success reform agenda based on Aspen’s research, custom data reports, assessment results, and conversations with accomplished former presidents.

Aspen Rising Presidents Fellowship

The Aspen Rising Presidents Fellowship aims to develop the next generation of community college presidents to lead colleges to higher and more equitable levels of student success, both in college and after graduation.

State & System Engagement

Aspen partners with states and higher education systems to deliver professional development for college presidents, trustees, institutional leadership teams, and mid-level leaders on improving student outcomes. Our extensive curriculum, data reports, and assessment tools form the basis of customized programming that varies from a single day to multiple days over several years.

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Transfer Intensive

The Aspen-AASCU Transfer Student Success Intensive is a year-long program for leaders and teams from pairs of community colleges and four-year institutions to develop scaled plans to improve transfer student outcomes.

Transfer Scholars Network

The Transfer Scholars Network aims to increase the number of high-achieving lower-income community college students who attend colleges and universities with high graduation rates. We work with admissions representatives from American Talent Initiative members and a set of nominating community colleges to connect these students to opportunities at four-year colleges and universities with high graduation rates.

Unlocking Opportunity

Unlocking Opportunity is a project that intensively engages community college leaders and teams over multiple years to develop and enact bold reforms focused on increasing the number of students, including students of color and those from lower-income backgrounds, entering and completing high-value community college programs. The project's central goal is to ensure that more students complete programs that lead directly to jobs that pay a sustaining wage or to transfer and completion of a bachelor’s degree.

Read Models of College Excellence

Learn from colleges in the field that have achieved excellence and equity in student outcomes