Search Results | VOCEDplus, the international tertiary education and research database

Is it really cheaper to start at a community college?: the consequences of inefficient transfer for community college students seeking bachelor's degrees

For many students who intend to complete a bachelor's degree, the savings from starting their undergraduate educati ... Show more
For many students who intend to complete a bachelor's degree, the savings from starting their undergraduate education at a community college is a major factor in their college choice. Yet, given inefficiencies in pathways through college and in the credit transfer process, initially attending a two-year college may be a false economy. In this paper [the authors] investigate whether it is more efficient for students to start at a two-year or four-year college if their intent is to complete a bachelor's degree. [The authors] use data from two [US] state systems, including term-by-term course-level information with matching student demographics and degree records on entering cohorts of students at each state's public two- and four-year institutions. [The authors] combine these data with cost and tuition data to estimate the relative efficiency of starting at a two-year versus a four-year college.
[The authors] find that the optimal choice about where to start varies across a number of dimensions: low rates of credit transfer are important but the most salient factor is the diversionary effect of two-year colleges on ever transferring to a four-year college. Sensitivity testing and break-even analyses illustrate how findings vary across student pathways.
Published abstract. Show less

Authors: Belfield, Clive R.; Fink, John; Jenkins, Davis

Date: 2017

Geographic subjects: United States; North America

Resource type: Report, paper or authored book

Series name: CCRC working paper

Subjects: Pathways; Finance; Statistics ... [+] Show more
Building pathways to success for low-skill adult students: lessons for community college policy and practice from a statewide longitudinal tracking study

Evidence suggests that adults in the US with a high school education or less need to achieve at least some postseco ... Show more
Evidence suggests that adults in the US with a high school education or less need to achieve at least some postsecondary education, and preferably a degree, to improve their economic prospects. Community colleges are an important entry point to postsecondary education for adults with no previous college education. This paper attempts to redress the paucity of information about what happens to adults with limited education who enter community college and how their educational attainment and labour market outcomes differ from those of traditional college-age students. It reports the findings from a study of the experiences and outcomes of low-skill adults in community colleges. It draws on student record information from the Washington State Community and Technical College System to track the progress of two cohorts of adult students 25 or older with, at most, a high school education who entered one of the state’s community or technical colleges for the first time in 1996-97 or 1997-98. The cohorts include adults who enrolled in adult basic skills programs as well as those who enrolled directly in college-credit courses. The study examines the educational attainment of the students in both cohorts as well as their earnings five years after they first enrolled. The evidence suggests that attending college for at least one year and earning a credential provides a significant boost in earnings for adults with a high school diploma or less who enter higher education through a community college. Adult basic skills education by itself produces little benefit in terms of employment or wages. This evidence, supported by other research, suggests that community and technical colleges ought to set as a minimum goal for low-skill adult students, at least one year of college-level courses and earning a credential. Show less

Authors: Prince, David; Jenkins, Davis

Corporate authors: Columbia University. Teachers College. Community College Research Center (CCRC)

Date: 2005

Geographic subjects: North America; United States

Resource type: Report, paper or authored book

Subjects: Providers of education and training; Students; Income ... [+] Show more
Community college student success: what institutional characteristics make a difference?

Most of the models developed to examine student persistence and attainment in postsecondary education largely fail ... Show more
Most of the models developed to examine student persistence and attainment in postsecondary education largely fail to account for the influence of institutional factors, particularly when attendance is observed at multiple institutions. Multi-institutional attendance is common for students who begin at a community college, but until now an empirical framework to estimate the contribution of more than one institution’s characteristics on students’ educational outcomes has been largely absent in the literature. One of the goals of this study is to determine which institutional characteristics are correlated with positive community college outcomes for students who attend one or more colleges as measured by individual student probability of completing a certificate or degree or transferring to a baccalaureate institution. Using individual-level data from the National Education Longitudinal Study of 1988 (NELS:88) and institutional-level data from the Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS), we find consistent results across different specifications; namely, a negative relationship between relatively large institutional size, proportion of part-time faculty and minority students on the attainment of community college students.
Published abstract reprinted from ‘Economics of education review’, copyright 2008, with permission from Elsevier. Show less

Authors: Calcagno, Juan Carlos; Bailey, Thomas R.; Jenkins, Davis; Kienzl, Gregory ... [+] Show more

Date: 2008

Geographic subjects: North America; United States

Resource type: Article

Journal title: Economics of education review

Subjects: Outcomes; Students; Performance ... [+] Show more
Using longitudinal data to increase community college student success: a guide to measuring milestone and momentum point attainment

This guide is intended to help researchers in colleges and state agencies to use longitudinal student unit record ( ... Show more
This guide is intended to help researchers in colleges and state agencies to use longitudinal student unit record (SUR) data to create simple and meaningful statistics on student achievement.
Longitudinal SUR data can be used to answer many important questions about student progression. This guide shows researchers how to use longitudinal SUR data to identify different student groups among first-time community college students, calculate rates of attainment of milestones and momentum points for each group, and identify barriers to success for each group. The information from such an analysis can be used to identify college practices and student behaviors that are associated with successful outcomes, and it can inform the development of policies and practices that address barriers to achievement. Examples are presented from an analysis CCRC researchers conducted for the Washington State Board for Community and Technical Colleges.
Published abstract reprinted by permission of the copyright owner. Show less

Authors: Leinbach, D. Timothy; Jenkins, Davis

Corporate authors: Columbia University. Teachers College. Community College Research Center (CCRC)

Date: 2008

Geographic subjects: North America; United States

Resource type: Report, paper or authored book

Series name: CCRC research tools

Subjects: Performance; Participation; Statistics ... [+] Show more
Stepping stones to a degree: the impact of enrollment pathways and milestones on community college student outcomes

[This paper] presents findings from a study of the experiences and outcomes of older and younger community college ... Show more
[This paper] presents findings from a study of the experiences and outcomes of older and younger community college students. We developed a discrete-time hazard model using longitudinal transcript data on a cohort of first-time community college students in Florida to compare the impact of enrollment pathways (such as remediation) and enrollment milestones (such as attaining a certain number of credits) on educational outcomes of older students - those who entered college for the first time at age 25 or later - with those of traditional-age students. Results suggest that reaching milestones such as obtaining 20 credits or completing 50 per cent of a program is a more important positive factor affecting graduation probabilities for younger students than it is for older students. We also found that although enrollment in remedial courses decreases the odds of graduating for all students, older students who enroll in remediation are less negatively affected than are younger ones who do the same.
Published abstract reprinted by permission of the copyright owner. Show less

Authors: Calcagno, Juan Carlos; Crosta, Peter; Bailey, Thomas R.; Jenkins, Davis

Corporate authors: Columbia University. Teachers College. Community College Research Center (CCRC)

Date: 2006

Geographic subjects: North America; United States

Resource type: Report, paper or authored book

Series name: CCRC working paper

Subjects: Pathways; Providers of education and training; Outcomes ... [+] Show more
Using census data to classify community college students by socioeconomic status and community characteristics

Colleges and state higher education agencies too often lack accurate information about the socioeconomic status (SE ... Show more
Colleges and state higher education agencies too often lack accurate information about the socioeconomic status (SES) of their students. This report describes the methodology that CCRC researchers used to estimate the SES of individual students in the Washington State community and technical college system.
Published abstract reprinted by permission of the copyright owner. Show less

Authors: Crosta, Peter; Leinbach, D. Timothy; Jenkins, Davis; Prince, David ... [+] Show more

Corporate authors: Columbia University. Teachers College. Community College Research Center (CCRC)

Date: 2006

Geographic subjects: North America; United States

Resource type: Report, paper or authored book

Series name: CCRC research tools

Subjects: Students; Providers of education and training; Statistics ... [+] Show more
The effects of institutional factors on the success of community college students

The goal of this report is to measure the institutional characteristics that affect the success of community colleg ... Show more
The goal of this report is to measure the institutional characteristics that affect the success of community college students, particularly low-income and minority students. While there is a growing literature on this topic for baccalaureate institutions, few researchers have attempted to address the issue for community colleges. Evidence shows that different community colleges enrolling essentially similar types of students may have vastly different graduation rates. What characteristics of these institutions might play a role in explaining student outcomes, when controlling for student characteristics? This report investigates that question using different models and sets of data.
Excerpt from published summary reprinted by permission of the copyright owner. Show less

Authors: Bailey, Thomas R.; Calcagno, Juan Carlos; Jenkins, Davis; Kienzl, Gregory ... [+] Show more

Corporate authors: Columbia University. Teachers College. Community College Research Center (CCRC)

Date: 2005

Geographic subjects: North America; United States

Resource type: Report, paper or authored book

Subjects: Students; Performance; Demographics ... [+] Show more
What community college policies and practices are effective in promoting student success?: a study of high- and low-impact institutions

This study seeks to identify policies and practices of community colleges that are effective in enabling their stud ... Show more
This study seeks to identify policies and practices of community colleges that are effective in enabling their students to succeed in postsecondary education. [The] study builds on earlier research the Community College Research Center (CCRC) has done using national survey data. We used transcript-level data on 150,000 students in three cohorts of first-time Florida community college students and a regression methodology to estimate the effect that each of the 28 Florida community colleges has on the probability of its students' achieving a successful outcome, after controlling for characteristics of the individual students. This effect can be seen as a measure of value added - the impact that a college has on its students' educational success independent of the characteristics of individual students. We then ranked the colleges according to their estimated effects on student success. [Colleges were selected] for field research using rankings of the magnitude of the effect of each institution on the probability that the African American and Latino students would attain successful outcomes. In Florida, as in other states, African American and Latino community college students are less likely than other students to complete degrees or to transfer to baccalaureate programs. At the same time, because we are interested in what colleges are doing to retain students generally, we also examined each institution's impact on outcomes for all first-time students. We used these rankings along with an analysis of descriptive statistics on each institution to select six colleges for field research: three that have higher impacts on the chances that their minority students succeed and three that have lower impacts. The purpose of the field work was to compare the institutional policies, practices and cultural characteristics of the high- and low-impact colleges during the period in which the student cohorts were tracked (1998-99 through 2002-03) to determine why some colleges had a greater net effect on their minority students' educational success than did others.
Excerpts from published summary reprinted by permission of the copyright owner. Show less

Authors: Jenkins, Davis; Bailey, Thomas R.; Crosta, Peter; Leinbach, Tim ... [+] Show more

Corporate authors: Columbia University. Teachers College. Community College Research Center (CCRC)

Date: 2006

Geographic subjects: North America; United States

Resource type: Report, paper or authored book

Subjects: Outcomes; Students; Performance ... [+] Show more