In this study we employed regression analysis and between-group matched pair design to analyze whether participation in a competency-based education pilot was associated with improved high school completion and postsecondary entry. Data were obtained for high schools participating in a CBE pilot program in Illinois. Results of the matched pair…

In 2023, the California Community Colleges Chancellor's Office launched Vision 2030. This bold plan provides a foundation for transformational change to ensure institutions work for students and provide equitable access to future learners through college. By working collaboratively as a system to advance the Vision 2030 priorities, colleges are…

Graduate study has rapidly expanded since the late 1990s, with women overtaking men in their enrollment in all levels of graduate degree. Once thought to be a relatively meritocratic space, due to increasing selection as educational transitions move into higher degrees, more recent research on graduate education has shown it to be a space where…

The global increase in enrolment in higher education (HE) has increased the diversity of students who access HE, which poses a challenge because we have a limited understanding of the way students experience HE institutions. This paper investigates why students dropout of HE and propose preventive measures. Dropout has adverse effects on student…

This paper examines the long-term impact of the 1993 Massachusetts Education Reform Act (MERA) and the Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System (MCAS) on postsecondary education outcomes, with a focus on historically underserved students. MERA aimed to improve educational standards and close achievement gaps through the introduction of MCAS,…

The student retention of freshman students at Historically Black Colleges and Universities as of recent has been comparably low which leads to low graduation rates. To understand this phenomenon, there is a need to investigate the factors that impact the enrollment and retention of freshman students at Historically Black Colleges and Universities.…

Evaluations of Early College, a type of intervention that enables simultaneous enrollment in secondary and post-secondary courses in the United States, consistently find positive effects on educational attainment across racial and socioeconomic groups. Unlike Early College initiatives in other states, Massachusetts launched Early College in Fall…

The California Community College (CCC) system serves a large student body, diverse in backgrounds, experiences, and educational goals. The accompanying report uses data from the CCC system's records to measure variation in achievement across the state's Strong Workforce Regions. The report considers a range of achievement measures, including…

Objective/Research Question: Community college graduation rates are typically quite low, and developmental mathematics enrollment and coursetaking patterns may constrain academic outcomes. To identify ways in which community college graduation rates may be improved, decision trees were utilized to examine the STEM coursetaking patterns of N =…

This paper examines the impact, characteristics, and entrepreneurial proclivities of foreign-born college graduates in the United States. A significant body of research has found that immigrants are more likely to start businesses than those born in the U.S., and the propensity of international students to concentrate in STEM fields indicates…

Some high school seniors who plan to attend college in the fall following graduation do not enroll. This phenomenon, known as summer melt, contributes to lower educational attainment, particularly among low-income students. We extend the literature on summer melt in two ways. First, we show that melt estimates can be sensitive to measurement…

The charter school movement encompasses many school models. In Massachusetts in the 2010's, the site of our study, urban charter schools primarily used "No Excuses" practices, whereas nonurban charters had greater model variety. Using randomized admissions lotteries, we estimate the impact of charter schools by locality on college…

This article studies a sample of displaced workers during the deep 1990s recession in Sweden and estimates the effect of secondary-level adult education on tertiary-level educational attainment. Plant closures and mass layoffs are used to identify job separations unrelated to individual productivity. Results indicate a large positive effect of…

In this dissertation, I study the relationships between financial aid, student characteristics, persistence, and completion in three separate chapters. In all three chapters, I use detailed, student-level administrative data from the UNC System beginning in the Fall 2013 semester. The first chapter is entitled "Tuition Reduction and Student…

Most students who begin at a community college do not complete their desired credential. Many former students fail to graduate due to various barriers rather than their academic performance. To encourage previously successful non-completers to re-enroll and eventually graduate, a growing number of community colleges have implemented re-enrollment…