In 2019, MDRC launched the Scaling Up College Completion Efforts for Student Success (SUCCESS) project to improve college completion rates for traditionally underserved students, such as students from low-income backgrounds and students of color, at community and broad-access colleges (those that have open or minimally selective admissions…

Single measures of college performance fail to reflect the mix and diversity of students served. First-time students vary widely in terms of their readiness to succeed in college. Higher education environments (ecosystems) also vary widely and afford students differing admission and transfer opportunities. These factors confound college completion…

Higher education in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) faces a number of challenges. There are many calls for STEM education to make significant changes moving forward, including calls for competency-based learning and greater integration of the humanities. These efforts require systemic change. Systemic change has significant…

The Council for Adult and Experiential Learning (CAEL) developed the Adult Learner Leaders for Institutional Effectiveness (ALLIES) Framework to help guide institutional policies and practices in their work to support adult learners. This document begins by describing the Framework's series of planning and operational domains through which…

This report shares the perspectives and aspirations of 17 low-income and working-class students based on interviews the Institute for Higher Education Policy (IHEP) conducted over two semesters of their college journeys. The report identifies opportunities for policymakers and institutional leaders to support all students through completion,…

This report details findings from focus groups with college students across Indiana. All of these students were planning to transfer or had transferred from the state community college system, Ivy Tech, to a school in the Indiana University system. We wanted to find out what these students had to say about their experiences preparing for and…

Because of their commitment to the voluntary measurement and improvement of student learning outcomes, colleges and universities that are members of the Council of Independent Colleges (CIC) have been at the forefront of the national shift from teacher-centered to student-centered learning. The institutions participating in the CIC Degree…

Using multi-institution data and a longitudinal, pretest-posttest design, this study investigated the impact of honors programs on student experiences of good practices in undergraduate education as well as cognitive development in the first year of college. We found students in honors programs advantaged in terms of the good practice measures…

The author was not a great student in high school, yet she had ambitions to succeed as a psychologist. She also had difficulty attaching herself to one friend or a group of friends with which she felt comfortable. She was the only self-identified Native student in her high school, however, and there were no support groups or clubs for Native…