Transforming Transfer Culture at Scale: Insights for Public Universities
This is the third installment in a series dedicated to expanding transfer opportunity at high-graduation-rate, four-year colleges and universities. Public universities nationwide have long excelled in recruiting and admitting large numbers of community college transfer students: roughly 300,000 a year, about four times the number that private institutions enroll. For many of those students, however, […]
Loving Students to Success
In 2014, leaders at Amarillo College recognized that students were dropping out not because they struggled academically. Rather, they were struggling to survive—to afford housing and food and transportation, find care for their children, and get the health care and legal help they needed. So Amarillo College reshaped itself around a core conviction: You can’t […]
Advancing Social Mobility
In and around Paducah, Kentucky, there’s been a change in what it takes to support a family. Many low-skill jobs in dominant industries like agriculture and mining have gradually disappeared, and some fields, like marine technology, have begun to require more education to progress. Amid this transition, West Kentucky Community and Technical College has been […]
Taking Responsibility for Student Outcomes After Graduation
Over the last decade, many community colleges have made strides in committing to student success through graduation. At San Jacinto College, in the Houston metropolitan area, that commitment doesn’t end with a diploma. Rather, San Jac takes responsibility for how students fare even after leaving the college, both in the workforce and at transfer destinations. […]
Providing Students with a Roadmap to Success from Day One
Many colleges have adopted guided pathways reforms—that is, reorganizing the student experience so that everyone has a clear destination, an organized path to get there, and effective support along the way. Broward College adopted guided pathways early and remains a national exemplar. Every major comes with a program map that lays out each course to […]
Making Success a Given for Students
Candace Hooper-Ellison, 31, had been a stay-at-home mom without college ambitions when her husband lost his job. As Candace began looking for work to help support her family, she realized she would need a college degree to land a job. So, 10 years after graduating from high school, Candace enrolled in San Antonio College to […]
Supporting Black Students and Black Leaders in Higher Ed
For Black History Month 2022, we reached out to Aspen Presidential Fellows past and present to hear their thoughts on why it’s essential to support Black students and Black leaders in higher education. We received numerous thoughtful responses (check them out on Twitter and LinkedIn), but we were particularly moved by the response we received […]
Prioritizing Transfer for Tomorrow’s Higher Education Landscape
As four-year colleges and universities make their way through an unprecedented semester, they are now taking stock of a fall enrollment landscape informed by the public health impact of COVID-19 and the accompanying economic recession. Summer enrollment data and accounts from across the country make clear that students from lower-income backgrounds and communities of color […]
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