Educators, researchers, and policymakers across the political spectrum agree that the nation must send more of its young people to college and find ways to help them graduate--especially young people from low-income families. To that end, in 2010, MDRC and a group of partners developed College Match, an innovative school-based college advising…

Since 2012, community colleges have made a considerable effort to increase student success and completion. Today, as much greater attention is being paid to drawing stronger linkages between education and workforce needs, institutions are becoming more strategic and deliberate in this work. In particular, many institutions are building stronger…

Community colleges, with their commitment to open access, admit millions of students each year who are unprepared for college-level work, even though they have earned a high-school diploma. For decades the schools had a built-in base of students attracted to their open doors and relative affordability. But enrollment at public two-year college has…

The Literacy Design Collaborative (LDC) and the Mathematics Design Collaborative (MDC) are strategies designed to improve how teachers teach and students learn. The designs encourage teacher collaboration and creativity and offer flexible frameworks for building lessons in all disciplines. Their purpose is to engage students to read challenging…

The Developmental Strategies for College Readiness and Success Resource Guide was produced by the Education Commission of the States and the Southern Regional Education Board for the "Countdown to 2015: Developmental Strategies to Advance Readiness in the Common Core Era" convening held April 21-23, 2014 in Charlotte, North Carolina. The…

Developmental education, also termed remedial education, refers to curricula intended to improve the academic skills and knowledge of students who are underprepared for undergraduate coursework, particularly in the areas of mathematics, reading, and writing. Many practitioners and researchers agree that developmental education should be improved,…

"Straight A's: Public Education Policy and Progress" is a biweekly newsletter that focuses on education news and events both in Washington, DC and around the country. The following articles are included in this issue: (1) Education Appropriations Bill Signed into Law: U.S. Department of Education to Receive $1 Billion Increase in…

The CollegeKeys Compact[TM] is a national call to action to school districts, colleges and universities, state education agencies, and nonprofit organizations to identify, share and expand programs and practices that address the needs and challenges of low-income students and help them get ready for, get into and get through college. The College…

The National Center for School Counseling Outcome Research (CSCOR) at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst studied exemplary practices of 18 high schools that received recognition for college preparation and placement in 2004 and 2005. Through interviews with key personnel at each of the high schools, the researchers generated a set of ten…

Educational Policy Improvement Center (EPIC) researchers visited 38 public high schools around the United States in 2007 and 2008 with the goal of validating and operationalizing a definition of college readiness. Schools in the sample were selected because they were demonstrating success at enabling more students from underrepresented groups to…

A sixth grade class is asked: "When should you start thinking about and planning for college?" Most students answer with "tenth or eleventh grade," but invariably some brave soul raises a hand and tentatively responds with more of a question than an answer: "Now?" Yes, now. In 1992, Sallie Mae, the nation's largest…

In the first decade of the 21st century, the nation, the states, and colleges and universities began to grapple with the challenges of globalization, changing demography, the implications of the digital era, and of a less expansive public sector. Although not a transformative period for higher education, the decade saw significant innovations in…