NCPR Publications
Papers
Learning Communities for Students in Developmental Reading: An Impact Study at Hillsborough Community College.
By: Michael J. Weiss, Mary G. Visher, and Heather Wathington with Jed Teres and Emily Schneider (June 2010).
This report presents results from a rigorous random assignment study of a basic learning community program at Hillsborough Community College in Tampa Bay, Florida. Hillsborough is one of six community colleges participating in NCPR's Learning Communities Demonstration, whose goal is to determine whether learning communities are an effective strategy for helping students who need developmental education. Hillsborough's learning communities co-enrolled three cohorts of students (for a total of 1,071), in groups of around 20 students, into a developmental reading course and a "college success" course. Findings from this study show that overall, the learning communities program did not have a meaningful impact on students' academic success; however, the program became more comprehensive over time, and evidence suggests that it had positive impacts on the educational outcomes for the third cohort of students. DOWNLOAD:
Full Report (PDF)* |
Executive Summary (PDF) *
Note: A corrected version of this report was posted on August 5, 2010. As originally posted, in Table 2.2 on page 17 and in the text on page 18 there was an error in the reporting of the sample who were the first person in their family to attend college. These numbers should have read: 31.1 percent of the full sample, 29.6 percent of the program group, and 34.0 percent of the control group.
Scaling Up Learning Communities: The Experience of Six Community Colleges.
By: Mary Visher, Emily Schneider, Heather Wathington, and Herbert Collado (April 2010).
The Learning Communities Demonstration is a large-scale, random assignment evaluation of learning community programs at six community colleges being conducted by the National Center for Postsecondary Research and MDRC. During the first year of the demonstration, all six colleges expanded their learning community programs and, in the process, faced similar challenges in selecting courses to link, recruiting and supporting faculty, filling the learning communities with eligible students, and helping faculty use instructional strategies such as curricular integration to enhance learning. By spring 2009, the colleges operated more than 130 learning communities serving around 3,000 students. This report describes the strategies the colleges used to scale up their programs while working to improve their quality, and the many complex challenges that are likely to be faced by any community college intent on scaling up effective learning communities--including scheduling, faculty engagement with and approach to teaching, and balancing developmental courses with traditional college-level courses. DOWNLOAD:
Full Report (PDF) |
Executive Summary
(PDF).
By: Eric P. Bettinger, Bridget Terry Long, Philip Oreopoulos, & Lisa Sanbonmatsu (September 2009).
Growing concerns about low awareness and take-up rates for government support programs like college financial aid have spurred calls to simplify the application process and enhance visibility. This project examines the effects of two experimental treatments designed to test of the importance of simplification and information using a random assignment research design. H&R Block tax professionals helped low- to moderate-income families complete the FAFSA, the federal application for financial aid. Families were then given an estimate of their eligibility for government aid as well as information about local postsecondary options. A second randomly-chosen group of individuals received only personalized aid eligibility information but did not receive help completing the FAFSA. Comparing the outcomes of participants in the treatment groups to a control group using multiple sources of administrative data, the analysis suggests that individuals who received assistance with the FAFSA and information about aid were substantially more likely to submit the aid application, enroll in college the following fall, and receive more financial aid. These results suggest that simplification and providing information could be effective ways to improve college access. However, only providing aid eligibility information without also giving assistance with the form had no significant effect on FAFSA submission rates.
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The Learning Communities Demonstration: Rationale, Sites, and Research Design (An NCPR Working Paper). By: Mary G. Visher, Heather Wathington, Lashawn Richburg-Hayes, and Emily Schneider with Oscar Cerna, Christine Sansone, and Michelle Ware (May 2008).
Learning communities are a popular strategy that community colleges nationwide have embraced in support of developmental students. In a learning community, a cohort of students takes two or more courses linked by integrated themes and assignments that are developed through ongoing faculty collaboration. While the number of learning community programs continues to grow, rigorous studies measuring their effectiveness are limited. To address this need for evidence, the Learning Communities demonstration, launched in 2007, uses random assignment to test models of learning communities at six community colleges. This working paper describes the study's design, including a summary of the theoretical and empirical research relevant to learning communities, descriptions of the sites and their learning community models, the random assignment procedures, and plans for data analysis.
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The Impact of Postsecondary Remediation Using a Regression Discontinuity Approach: Addressing Endogenous Sorting and Noncompliance (An NCPR Working Paper). By: Juan Carlos Calcagno and Bridget Terry Long (April 2008).
This paper reports findings from a study that uses a detailed dataset and a regression discontinuity design to identify the causal effect of remediation on the educational outcomes of nearly 100,000 college students in Florida. The paper also discusses concerns about endogenous sorting around the policy cutoff, which poses a threat to the assumptions of the regression discontinuity model in multiple research contexts.
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What Is Known About the Impact of Financial Aid? Implications for Policy (An NCPR Working Paper).
By: Bridget Terry Long (April 2008).
Years of research support the notion that financial aid
can influence students’ postsecondary decisions, but questions remain about the best ways to design and implement such programs and policies. This paper serves as a discussion of the research literature on the effectiveness of financial aid with special attention to its implications for policy. As such, the goal of this paper is to address issues central to today’s debates about how to improve college access and affordability while encouraging researchers to continue to advance the line of inquiry.
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Briefs
Evaluating the Impact of Remedial Education in Florida Community Colleges: A Quasi-Experimental Regression Discontinuity Design (An NCPR Brief). By: Juan Carlos Calcagno and Bridget Terry Long (August 2009).
