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Computational Language Analysis Reveals that Process-Oriented Thinking About Belonging Aids the College Transition
Inequality 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., 2023) but are hard to measure. In our pre-registered study, we provide the strongest evidence to date that the belief that belonging challenges are common and tend to improve with time (“a process-oriented perspective”), the primary target of social-belonging interventions, is critical. We did so by developing and applying computational language measures to 25,000 essays written during a randomized trial of this intervention across 22 broadly representative US colleges and universities (Walton et al., 2023). We compare the hypothesized mediator to one of simple optimism, which includes positive expectations without recognizing that challenges are common. Examining the active control condition, we find that socially disadvantaged students are, indeed, significantly less likely to express a process-oriented perspective spontaneously, and more likely to express simple optimism. This matters: Students who convey a process-oriented perspective, both in control and treatment conditions, are significantly more likely to complete their first year of college full-time enrolled and have higher first-year GPAs, while simple optimism predicts worse academic progress. The social-belonging intervention helped distribute a process-oriented perspective more equitably, though disparities remained. These computational methods enable the scalable and unobtrusive assessment of subtle student beliefs that help or hinder college success.
The Impact of Dual Enrollment on College Application Choice and Admission Success
Dual 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 from two cohorts of ninth-grade students in one anonymous state, we found that taking DE credits increased the likelihood of applying to highly selective in-state four-year institutions. Attempting DE credits also increased the probability of gaining admission to a highly selective in-state four-year college. Heterogeneous analysis further indicates that the gains were extended across Black, Latinx, and white student populations.
Education, gender, and family formation
We study the effect of educational attainment on family formation using regression discontinuity designs generated by centralized admissions processes to both secondary and tertiary education in Finland. Admission to further education at either margin does not increase the likelihood that men form families. In contrast, women admitted to further education are more likely to both live with a partner and have children. We then pre-register and test two hypotheses which could explain each set of results using survey data. These suggest that the positive association between men's education and family formation observed in the data is driven by selection. For women, our estimates are consistent with the idea that, as increased returns to social skills shift the burden of child development from schools to parents and particularly mothers, education can make women more attractive as potential partners.
The Graduation Part II: Graduate Program Graduation Rates
This paper documents several facts about graduate program graduation rates using administrative data covering public and nonprofit graduate students in Texas. Despite conventional wisdom that most graduate students complete their programs, only 58 percent of who started their program in 2004 graduated within 6 years. Between the 2004 and 2013 entering cohorts, graduate student completion rates grew by 10 percentage points. Graduation rates vary widely by field of study--ranging from an average of 81 percent for law programs to 53 percent for education programs. We also find large differences in graduation rates across institutions. On average, 72 percent of students who entered programs in flagship public universities graduated in 6 years compared to only 57 percent of those who entered programs in non-research intensive (non-R1) institutions. Graduate students who do not complete may face negative consequences due to lower average earnings and substantial levels of student debt.
Experimental Estimates of College Coaching on Postsecondary Re-enrollment
College attendance has increased significantly over the last few decades, but dropout rates remain high, with fewer than half of all adults ultimately obtaining a postsecondary credential. This project investigates whether one-on-one college coaching improves college attendance and completion outcomes for former low- and middle-income income state aid recipients who attended college but left prior to earning a degree. We conducted a randomized control trial with approximately 8,000 former students in their early- to mid-20s. Half of participants assigned to the treatment group were offered the opportunity to receive coaching services from InsideTrack, with all communication done remotely via phone or video. Intent-to-treat analyses based on assignment to coaching shows no impacts on college enrollment and we can rule out effects larger than a two-percentage point (5%) increase in subsequent Fall enrollment.
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 transition to college, we investigate how two similar local community college tuition guarantees in Pennsylvania affected college-going outcomes. The Morgan Success Scholarship has large impacts on community college attendance and associate degree attainment. The program diverts students away from four-year colleges, though much of this effect is temporary. Meanwhile, we find little evidence that the Community College of Philadelphia’s 50th Anniversary Scholars program has any impact on college-going behavior. We suggest reasons for divergent findings and offer suggestions for practice.
College Students and Career Aspirations: Nudging Student Interest in Teaching
We survey undergraduate students at a large public university to understand the pecuniary and non-pecuniary factors driving their college major and career decisions with a focus on K-12 teaching. While the average student reports there is a 6% chance they will pursue teaching, almost 27% report a nonzero chance of working as a teacher in the future. Students, relative to existing statistics, generally believe they would earn substantially more in a non-teaching job (relative to a teaching job). We run a randomized information experiment where we provide students with information on the pecuniary and non-pecuniary job characteristics of teachers and non-teachers. This low-cost informational intervention impacts students' beliefs about their job characteristics if they were to work as a teacher or non-teacher, and increases the reported likelihood they will major or minor in education by 35% and pursue a job as a teacher or in education by 14%. Linking the survey data with administrative transcript records, we find that the intervention had small (and weak) impacts on the decision to minor in education in the subsequent year. Overall, our results indicate that students hold biased beliefs about their career prospects, they update these beliefs when provided with information, and that this information has limited impacts on their choices regarding studying and having a career in teaching.
The Role of Education-Industry Match in College Earnings Premia
There is substantial variation in the returns to a college degree. One determinant is whether a worker’s employment is “matched” with their education. With a novel education-industry crosswalk and panel data on 295,000 graduates, we provide the first estimates of an education-industry match premium leveraging within-person variation in earnings. We document which majors have the most and least matching, how earnings premia vary across fields and gender, and how premia evolve over time. With robust estimators, we show that workers in industries “matched” with their degree experience an average earnings premium of 7-11%, with variation by degree level and major.
The Role of Emergency Financial Relief Funding in Improving Low-Income Students’ Academic and Financial Outcomes Across Demographic Characteristics
This quasi-experimental study examined the effectiveness of a one-time emergency financial relief program among Pell Grant eligible undergraduate students in Spring 2015 pursuing their first bachelor’s degree across academic and financial outcomes. The academic outcomes included retention to the next semester, degree completion, attempted credit hours, and grade point average. The financial outcome captured whether students received a stop registration hold due to an unpaid financial balance in the semester after receiving the emergency relief. The results reveal that financial relief applied to low-income students’ accounts can improve their retention and graduation rates. The financial relief was most effective among first-generation college students, resulting in a complete elimination of the retention gap for first-generation students. The emergency relief did not improve GPA or substantially change the number of credits earned. A concerning finding was that students receiving this emergency support were more likely to receive a financial hold in a subsequent semester and that effect was stronger among students of color (Black/African American, Hispanic/Latine, Asian, Multiracial, American Indian/Alaska Native), males, and first-generation college students.
How Powerful Are Promises? A Systematic Review of the Causal Mechanisms and Outcomes of "Free College" Programs in the United States
“Free college” (sometimes called Promise) programs are common in U.S. higher education. Reviewing 88 studies of 25 state and local programs, I provide a nuanced picture of the mechanisms through which these programs may work and their likely effects on students, communities, and colleges. Some commonly-claimed mechanisms for these effects—e.g., improving secondary school environments or impacting residential decisions—lack empirical support or are implausible for most existing programs. Programs are consistently found to shift college-bound students to colleges where they can use more scholarship dollars, increase enrollment at eligible colleges, and (for generous local programs only) increase community school district enrollment. Less consistently, programs boost college participation and thereby degree attainment, but evidence for direct effects on college performance, persistence or completion net of enrollment is weak. There is insufficient or inconsistent evidence for program effects on secondary school performance and graduation, post-college income and debt, community population or property values, and inequality reduction according to gender, race, or socioeconomic status.