College readiness
Do Innovative Career Pathways in Massachusetts High Schools Promote Equitable Access to Higher Education?
Two persistent shortcomings of the American labor market are the wage gaps and unequal unemployment rates that exist between racial groups. More specifically, Black and Latinx high school graduates earn less and are more likely to be unemployed than their White counterparts, on average. Likewise… more →
Expanding School Counseling: The Impacts of California Funding Changes
Topics: Policy, Politics, and GovernanceCounselors are a common school resource for students navigating complicated and consequential education choices. However, most students have limited access to school counselors. We study one of the largest U.S. policies to increase access to school counselors - California's Supplemental School… more →
Are Community College Students Increasingly Choosing High-Paying Fields of Study? Evidence from Massachusetts
The labor-market payoff to workers with associate degrees in healthcare and STEM occupations is very high in Massachusetts. We examine whether this induced a growing proportion of students in MA community colleges (MACCs) to earn an associate degree (AD) in one of these fields. We do this by… more →
Credit Loss, Institutional Retention, and Postsecondary Persistence Among Vertical Transfer Students
Although community colleges have served as a gateway to universities for millions of students—disproportionately so for students from populations historically underrepresented in higher education—prior research has demonstrated that the majority of vertical transfer students lose at least some… more →
Toward a Comprehensive Model Predicting Credit Loss in Vertical Transfer
Tags: College readinessA growing body of research has documented extensive credit loss among transfer students. However, the field lacks theoretically driven and empirically supported frameworks that can guide credit loss research and reforms. We develop and then test a comprehensive framework designed to address this… more →
Foreign Student Share and Supply of STEM-Designated Economics Programs
Over the past decade, there has been a significant increase in the number of U.S. institutions offering STEM-eligible degree programs in economics. This paper documents the trends in STEM-degree offerings across degree levels and examines the share of foreign students and other characteristics… more →
Computational Language Analysis Reveals that Process-Oriented Thinking About Belonging Aids the College Transition
Dorottya Demszky, C. Lee Williams, Shannon T. Brady, Shashanka Subrahmanya, Eric Gaudiello, Gregory M. Walton, Johannes C. Eichstaedt.Tags: College readinessInequality in college has both structural and psychological causes; these include the presence of self-defeating beliefs about the potential for growth and belonging. Such beliefs can be addressed through large-scale interventions in the college transition (Walton & Cohen, 2011; Walton et al… more →
The Impact of Dual Enrollment on College Application Choice and Admission Success
Tags: College readiness, High schoolsDual enrollment (DE) is one of the fastest growing programs that support the high school-to-college transition. Yet, there is limited empirical evidence about its impact on either students’ college application choices or admission outcomes. Using a fuzzy regression discontinuity approach on data… more →
Implementation and Impacts of Career-Focused Advising
Recent policies have expanded the availability of career-focused advising in high schools, including for students pursuing career and technical education (CTE) courses of study who might not have been adequately served by traditional college-focused advising. However, there is limited research… more →
Some Promises are Worth More than Others: How “Free Community College” Programs impact Postsecondary Participation, Destinations, and Degree Completion
“Free college” programs are widespread in American higher education. They are discussed as addressing college access, affordability, inequality, and skills shortages. Many are last-dollar tuition guarantees restricted to use at single community colleges. Using student-level data spanning the… more →
Empowering Educational Leaders: On-Track Indicators for College Enrollment
As states incorporate measures of college readiness into their accountability systems, school and district leaders need effective strategies to identify and support students at risk of not enrolling in college. Although there is an abundant literature on early warning indicators for high school… more →
Does Corequisite Remediation Work for Everyone? An Exploration of Heterogeneous Effects and Mechanisms
The landscape of developmental education has experienced significant shifts over the last decade nationwide, as more than 20 states and higher education systems have transitioned from the traditional prerequisite model to corequisite remediation. Drawing on administrative data from Tennessee… more →
Challenges and opportunity: An examination of barriers to postsecondary academic success
Community colleges are a critical component of the U.S. higher education system, providing access to students from traditionally underserved communities. However, enduring challenges to completion stemming from educational, economic, and social inequities persist. Building on prior work that… more →
GED® College Readiness Benchmarks and Post-Secondary Success
Tags: College readiness, AssessmentIn 2016, the GED® introduced college readiness benchmarks designed to identify testers who are academically prepared for credit-bearing college coursework. The benchmarks are promoted as awarding college credits or exempting “college-ready” GED® graduates from remedial coursework. I show… more →
The Benefits of Math Corequisite Support for Academic Outcomes for Students in Texas
An increasing body of robust evidence concludes that corequisite remediation in math and English is a cost-effective alternative to traditional developmental education, offering improved immediate course progression and potentially better persistence and completion. This is the first study to… more →
Clearing Up Transfer Admissions Standards: Impact on Access and Outcomes
Tags: College readinessStudents’ college choices can affect their chances of earning a degree, but many lack the support to navigate the opaque college application and admissions process. This paper evaluates whether guaranteeing four-year college admissions based on transparent academic standards affected community… more →
Strategic Disclosure of Test Scores: Evidence from US College Admissions
The impact of test-optional college admissions policies depends on whether applicants act strategically in disclosing test scores. We analyze individual applicants’ standardized test scores and disclosure behavior to 50 major US colleges for entry in fall 2021, when Covid-19 prompted widespread… more →
The Unintended Consequences of Academic Leniency
In response to widening achievement gaps and increased demand for post-secondary education, local and federal governments across the US have enacted policies that have boosted high school graduation rates without an equivalent rise in student achievement, suggesting a decline in academic… more →
Experimental Evidence on "Direct Admissions" from Four States: Impacts on College Application and Enrollment
Complexity and uncertainty in the college application process contribute to longstanding racial and socioeconomic disparities in enrollment. We leverage a large-scale experiment that combines an early guarantee of college admission with a proactive nudge, fee waiver, and structural application… more →
“Non-Submitters:” Evidence on Students Who Start but Don’t Complete a College Application
Not all students who could benefit from college apply. With novel data on over 1.2 million high schoolers, we show that nearly 25% start but never complete a college application. We use descriptive techniques, data visualizations, and fixed effects models to explore this population of college-… more →