Though counseling is one commonly pursued intervention to improve college enrollment and completion for disadvantaged students, there is relatively little causal evidence on its efficacy. We use a regression discontinuity design to study the impact of intensive college counseling provided by a Massachusetts program to college-seeking, low-income…

This study is a mixed-methods research project designed to measure the effectiveness of a peer mentor program in meeting institutional goals such as increased academic performance and retention. The results suggest that peers are useful in helping students manage the demands of the first year by normalizing the experience and linking the students…

In order to study whether college scholarships can be an effective tool in raising students' performance in secondary school, we use one aspect of the Kalamazoo Promise that resembles a quasi-experiment. The surprise announcement of the scholarship created a large change in expected college tuition costs that varied across different groups of…

The purpose of this study was to: examine differences in students' perceptions of their noncognitive skills and school environments by race/ethnicity, and explore whether students' perceptions of their noncognitive skills and school environments were related to three outcomes that have been identified in the research as mattering most for a…

Nationwide, almost a third of 1st-year college students do not return to begin their sophomore year, and the 5-year graduation rate for undergraduates is only around 40%. It is important for universities to implement interventions, such as freshman transition courses, to help new students adjust to college life and succeed, and it is critical that…

This study examines how interactions with institutional agents (faculty and academic counselors) and select student support programs influence success (i.e., grade point average) and intentions to persist to degree completion for Latino/a community college students. Using social capital theory and college impact models, the study controls for the…

The purpose of this study was to examine how a student's college academic success at Iowa State University (ISU) is related to college credit earning while in high school. The unit of analysis for this research was first time full time first year students who entered ISU in the fall semester of 2006, 2007, and 2008. This study examined the…

The purpose of this study was to determine the relationship between participation in the Summer Bridge Program, grade point averages and retention of first-year college students. Additionally, this study examined the differences in grade point averages of college students after their first semester and first-year of college with regard to their…

Performance was examined for five cohorts of 1998-2002 Texas public high school graduates through their first year and 1998-2001 cohorts through their fourth year of Texas public higher education. Student performance on college outcomes included (a) first- and fourth-year grade point averages (GPAs), (b) first- and fourth-year credit hours earned,…