More Knowledge Needed Of College Finance Incentives to Increase Student Completion

  I am attending the American Education Finance Association Meeting where finance scholars met to discuss what is needed in future research. The consensus is that we know a lot more about student financial aid than about what performance funding incentives for colleges that would work to spur student persistence and completion. Colleges are mostly paid on full time student counts, or like Ca. community colleges for the full time equivalent of the number enrolled after 3 weeks of a class. This allows colleges to churn students and still be fiancially viable. As long as there is a body in  a seat, student persistence and completion are not needed to collect full FTE from the state.

 Scholars agree most past state incentives for student completion have been too small or badly designed. We know little about the micro economics of specific broad access colleges, and how to design state aid formulas that would enhance completion. There are thousands of colleges and many different college missions. These topics need much more research and experimentation, but it is not clear who will fund or do this work.

National Standards For College Readiness Gains Momentum

The Obama administration and the Gates Foundation are exploring national k-12 standards that will include college readiness. State k-12 standards are all over the map with some high and many low. So the interest grows in how to bring about a more uniform high level. But what should be the standard for college readiness and who should decide it? Some want  college readiness standards to be internationally based on OECD PiSA tests. Others want to use a consensus of college remediation cut scores, or base college readiness on what is expected in first year college courses. Some feel the NEW York Regents exams are close, but others say these exams do not have enough international flavor.

Even more problematic is who should decide national standards: Congress, a blue ribbon group, state consensus, or universities and colleges. Deciding what knowledge is most worth knowing to be successful in college is a political and technical process. Should OECD and Singapore Math be used , or should we convene college presidents? We are not very close to anwering all these questions , but at least in this round of k-12 standards setting college transition will not be ignored.

College Completion Pathways Are Obscure

One of the best writers on transition to broad access postsecondary education is James Rosenbaum, Professor of Sociology at Northwestern.  His new paper is a must read.

Permeability and Transparency in the High School-College Transition

Jennifer Stephan, Doctoral Student, Human Development and Social Policy, Northwestern University; and James Rosenbaum, Human Development and Social Policy and Institute for Policy Research, Northwestern University.

Dramatic changes have taken place in the who, where, and how of higher education.  Colleges are no longer dominated by traditional undergraduates attending traditional colleges.  Now there is great variety in the types of students who attend college, the institutions they attend, and their attendance patterns.  This working paper proposes a conceptual framework for thinking about how higher education policies shape students’ pathways through higher education.  The authors present evidence about the operation of American higher education in terms of this framework and then use the framework and then use the framework to consider three policy areas: high school counseling policies; community college policies, including open-admissions; and financial aid policies.  Stephen and Rosenbaum argue that while the current policies have increased accessibility and choice in higher education, they also obscure the pathway to completion.

Note:  Put IRB Working Papers, 2006-2008 in Google, then go to WP-08-07. Rosenbaum’s book, College for All is a major influence on my thinking about college transition.

Achieve Report Shows Progress and Problems

Achieve launched the American Diploma Project (ADP) in 1996 to encourage states to increase secondary school standards to the level of college and workforce readiness.  Each year Achieve surveys all states on their K-12 progress.  The 2009 report displays the pattern of prior years — states are moving ahead on setting higher standards but not on measuring whether schools are meeting them.  Nor are states embedding college ready standards in their accountability or professional development policies.  Only 10 states have assessments rigorous enough to measure whether students are college ready.

So the easy part of proclaiming high standards for college is complete in twenty states, but the hard part is still ahead.  (www.achieve.org )

Assessment Is Not Coherent For College Transition From High School

Admissions literature focuses upon what is most beneficial to postsecondary education without contemplating the impact of admissions tests upon secondary schools, K-12 students, and teachers. Admissions tests send powerful and clear signals to all K-12 groups about what knowledge is most worth knowing and how it should be taught.

Probably the biggest issue is the proliferation of tests in grades 9 through 11 that occurs because of the postsecondary assessments for admission, and the new statewide tests created by the K-12 standards movement. For example, California tests all students grades 9 through 11 with a cross-cutting mathematics and language arts assessment, and has stat-mandated end-of-course exams in most academic subjects, such as biology, U.S. history, and English literature. As of 2007, none of these K-12 tests are used as an admissions factor by the University of California or California State University. The California State University placement exam includes more advanced mathematics than SAT I . During the Spring of the 11^th grade, there is a particularly onerous amount of testing for UC applicants that includes: the SAT I, SAT II, Advanced Placement tests, and at least six state K-12 tests that have no admissions or placement stakes for students.

Education standards and tests are set in different K-12 and postsecondary orbits that only intersect for students in Advanced Placement courses. How else could 49 states (all but Iowa) set K-12 standards and assessments in the 1990″s without talking with higher education institutions and state boards for higher education? The huge disjuncture between K-12 and postsecondary school standards results in a lack of K-16 understanding, collaborative design, and knowledge about the assessments used by each education level. Higher education is concerned with the upward trajectory of pupils, for example, admissions test’s purported ability to predict student performance in the first year of college. Secondary education is concerned with high school graduation and the attainment of annual state and federal growth goals for K-12 state assessments. Secondary educators rarely discuss or consider the impact upon postsecondary education that new and expanding assessment policies might create. Moreover, there is no K-16 accountability system that might cause the two levels to work together on common assessment goals or reduce postsecondary remediation. [1]

Universities provide some good arguments to explain why they pay little attention to K–12 standards or assessments. First, the universities emphasize that they are not involved in the creation or refinement of the K–12 standards. Second, the universities observe that both politics and technical problems effect frequent changes in state K–12 standards. Third, they note that the K–12 assessments have not been evaluated to see how well they predict freshman grades (although such evaluations are not difficult to conduct). The result is a K-16 babble of education standards that leads to unclear signals for students (particularly those from low-SES families), high remediation rates, and much misdirected energy by students caught between conflicting standards.

For 80% of students who do not go to selective four-year schools, a crucial standard is an institutionally administered placement exam which is not very well aligned with the ACT or SAT I. Yet placement exams are essential for channeling students into non-credit postsecondary remedial courses.

Obamas New Plan For Higher Education Is Aggressive

Restoring America’s Leadership in Higher Education

Our competitiveness abroad depends on opening the doors of higher education for more of America’s students.  The U.S. ranks seventh in terms of the percentage of 18-24 year olds enrolled in college, but only 15^th in terms of the number of certificates and degrees awarded.  A lack of financial resources should never obstruct the promise of college opportunity.  And it’s America’s shared responsibility to ensure that more of our students not only reach the doors of college, but also persist, succeed, and obtain their degree. 

·         President Obama’s FY 2010 budget makes a historic commitment to increasing college access and success by restructuring and dramatically expanding financial aid, while making federal programs simpler, more reliable, and more efficient. 

·         The President will restore the buying power of the Pell Grant for America’s neediest students and guarantee an annual increase tied to inflation.  His plan will end wasteful subsidies to banks under the Federal Family Education Loan (FFEL) program, and re-direct billions in savings toward student aid. 

·         And it will dramatically simplify the Federal Application for Student Aid (FAFSA), making it easier to complete and more effective for students. 

·         The President supports strengthening the higher education pipeline to ensure that more students succeed and complete their college education.  His plan will invest in community colleges to conduct an analysis of high-demand skills and technical education, and shape new degree programs for emerging industries.

Many Colleges Will Be Easier For Admission

Declining high school enrollment in many states over the next decade will lower admission standards. This will be especially true for second and third tier private schools. But regional 4 year public colleges in the midwest and mid Atlantic will be scrambling to maintain enrollment. This will send a signal to high school students that they do not need to work hard to get into 4 year colleges.  Consequently, we will need stronger messages and signals that the hard part is to complete college, not admission. I have written a lot about clear signals to students, so check out my biography at the top of this blog.

Webinar On College Retention From Noted Expert

An Introduction to Student Success & Retention

Thursday, March 24, 1:00 – 2:30 pm EST

Hosted by Dr. Watson Scott Swail, President & CEO, Educational Policy Institute

Attend this webinar and learn the ins and outs of postsecondary Student Retention 101. Host Dr. Watson Scott Swail will present a core overview of retention at the secondary and postsecondary levels and will present a short exploration into contemporary issues related to student success.  In doing so, he will introduce his framework for student retention, which illustrates how institutions must consider student background and attributes in order to create effective success strateg ies for students. Dr. Swail will detail the most common barriers to Student Retention as well as successful strategies to overcome these barriers.

Dr. Watson Scott Swail is President and CEO of the Educational Policy Institute and is a well-known expert in the area of Student Retention.  He is author of the Jossey-Bass publication Retaining Minority Students in Higher Education and is a frequent keynote speaker and strategic planning consultant to colleges and universities across the US and Canada. Institutions and organizations that have utilized his services include Collin College (TX), Palm Beach Community College (FL), Red River College (Winnipeg, MB), the Ohio Association for Student Financial Aid Administrators (OASFAA), Innovative Educators, NelNet, TG, Canada Student Loans Programs, Northwest Educational Loan Association (NELA), Sallie Mae, ASPIRA, and the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board (THECB).

College And High School Standards Are Very Different

Community College Stdents Do Not Take Remedial Courses They Need

Although over 60% of community college students who enter from high school need remediation, large numbers shun these courses, and end up dropping out.  Data from Columbia Teachers College Center for Community College Research show 36% in math and 27% in English took other courses ,but never enrolled in a remedial course after placement. We need to know more about why this happens, but students cannot complete their programs without passing a developmental sequence.

I visited a Ca community college last week where students complained they could not take a vocational course they wanted until they passed out of remediation. But if colleges let students take what they want, students may never enroll in developmental education. Perhps you have some ideas on how to solve this dilema.