Category: Transfer News

How colleges are reenrolling stopped-out students during the pandemic

By Natalie Schwartz, Higher Ed Dive, November 23, 2020

A number of higher education institutions across the country have been reaching out to students who had stopped out of their degree program to encourage them to re-enroll and finish via online learning. Roughly 36 million adults in the United States have college credits but no degree. According to the article, “online learning is helping some colleges and organizations make inroads with this population despite the pandemic.” Students drop out or stop out of school for a myriad of reasons, so institutions must take that into account when students re-enroll. Some of the incentives that schools are offering include: financial aid, lower tuition, support from coaches and advisors, or credit for prior learning assessments. Many institutions began these efforts before the pandemic, but re-enrollment has remained steady this semester as students need to upgrade skills or simply, finally, finish that degree.

Why Don’t Students Graduate on Time?

By Allegra Lubar, Vemo Education, November 19, 2020

This essay examines various factors that contribute to delayed graduation. In addition to financial reasons – a significant and common problem – “transferring, working, changing majors, juggling too many obligations, and failing to forge social connections at school” are obstacles for many students. They prevent students from taking a full course load, which is “crucial for on-time graduation.” Institutions can help students understand the scope of the problem through public campaigns that encourage full course loads and why students will benefit (on-time graduation, entering the workforce sooner, less money spent on tuition, and thus, perhaps, less money owed in student loans). Institutions can also provide financial aid to students through pay-for-success programs like income-share agreements and expanded career services.

College completion rate stays flat: report

By Hallie Busta, Higher Ed Dive, Pearson, December 3, 2020

This short summary of data reported by the National Student Clearinghouse highlights the slowing rate of college completion across the U.S. Data is reported on the six-year graduation rates of undergraduate learners who started in the fall of 2014, including transfers; the completion data was collected through June 2020. The changes have been slight and not all students and institutions are experiencing the trend in the same way. Community colleges reported a 0.5 percentage point decrease in completion after two years of growth; drops at two-year schools were steepest among Black and Hispanic students. However, completion rates for Black students at public four-year colleges increased by one percentage point. Black men in particular had the biggest decrease in stop-out rates. The COVID pandemic has hit two-year public schools hardest, and fewer undergraduates are attending all U.S. colleges this fall – factors that will continue to slow completion rates.

More California community college students are taking transfer-level courses, but critics say colleges must do more

By Michael Burke, EdSource, December 8, 2020

Two new reports examine the outcomes of legislation passed in 2017 in the state of California – AB 705 – which was intended to boost community college completion rates by allowing students access to transfer-level courses without first taking remedial classes. Studies have shown that students placed in remedial classes, primarily English and math, rarely go on to complete degrees or earn certificates, yet many of them likely could have passed transfer-level classes if allowed access. A new report from the Public Policy Institute of California shows that the law, which went fully into effect last fall, has indeed increased the number of students who enroll in transfer-level courses, and has also narrowed gaps between white students and students of color in accessing transfer-level English and math courses. Despite this progress, over half of the state’s degree-granting community colleges still offer remedial introductory math courses; only three offered no remedial math courses this semester. By law, students cannot be denied access to transfer-level courses, but if remedial courses are their first option, the standard of the law is being violated. The Public Policy Institute of California and the California Acceleration Project, which advocates for eliminating remedial classes altogether to increase completion rates, analyze results and compliance with the new law in the following new reports.

• Public Policy Institute of California, A New Era of Student Access at California’s Community Colleges.

• California Acceleration Project, Still Getting There: How California’s AB 705 Is (and is not) Transforming Community College Remediation and What Needs to Come Next.

What community colleges can teach higher ed about supporting students during and beyond the pandemic

By Xueli Wang, Inside Higher Ed, November 18, 2020

This opinion piece draws from a longitudinal study cohort that the author has followed for six years. She recently conducted interviews of 30 students from that cohort on their community college experiences in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. Wang contends that community colleges “are sites of agile adaptation and innovation, perpetually responsive to emerging societal needs.” Students praised their colleges for their focus on the following factors:

• Practicality of training and research capacity
• Technology and communication skills in virtual formats
• Cultivating resilience
• Diversity as a highlight of education
• An education for the community.

Wang offers all higher education institutions three takeaways gleaned from her research:

• Build a stronger curriculum to help students thrive in crisis and a rapidly changing world. 
• Establish more purposeful, meaningful and structured opportunities for students to engage with their community.
• Encourage support-seeking and cultivate multiple levels of connection.

Xueli Wang is the Barbara and Glenn Thompson Professor in Educational Leadership and a professor of higher education in the department of educational leadership and policy analysis at the University of Wisconsin, Madison.

Private Iowa college partners with all state’s community colleges on transfer

By Madeline St. Amour, Inside Higher Ed, November 17, 2020

Clarke University, a private institution located in Dubuque, Iowa, has entered into a partnership with all 15 of the state’s community colleges to create a transfer pathway for students in eight different degree programs. Students in these pathways who transfer to Clarke with an associate degree are guaranteed junior standing. The partnership was championed by the university’s new president, Thom Chesney, who recognized that Clarke needed to respond to community needs as well as put students first. National Student Clearinghouse data indicate students who transfer to private colleges can lose up to 40 percent of their credits. On the other hand, private universities have higher graduation rates, potentially more individualized attention, and financial aid for students. In fact, Clarke University will provide scholarships for transfer students when they are admitted. School leaders and staff must ensure that the transfer students receive the support they need to complete their degrees. This partnership signals Clarke’s commitment to students and its openness to diversity.

Transfer Is Workforce Development: A reminder of a basic truth

By Matt Reed, Inside Higher Ed, December 3, 2020

The author revisits an essay published in 2016 about the merits of a liberal arts education and how it, along with the general education curriculum, prepares students for the workforce. Two-year degrees can look “unfocused,” but Reed makes the point that they are part of a whole, i.e., the baccalaureate. And the general education curriculum needed – no, required – to earn the four-year degree provides the skills and information students need to succeed in the workforce: communication, analytical thinking, teamwork, and problem solving – proficiencies that employers want.

New ACE Network Will Help Students Earn College Credit for Prior Learning

American Council on Education, December 3, 2020

The American Council on Education (ACE) has created a network of colleges and universities that will ensure learners can easily transfer ACE credit recommendations for prior learning experience toward completion of a degree or credential. The initiative will utilize portable, digital credentials supported by postsecondary standards. Higher education institutions that make up the network will guarantee acceptance of ACE credit recommendations to support flexible academic completion pathways. The two-year project is supported by a grant from ECMC Foundation.

ACE will use the Passport Learning Outcomes (PLOs) as one method of assessing learning. Specifically, ACE will use the PLOs as a framework for evaluating general education, college-level knowledge and skills embedded in some of the extra-institutional learning opportunities. The specific PLOs achieved by a learner will appear on a new digital transcript on Credly’s Acclaim platform, which institutions can use to translate students’ documented knowledge and skills into courses for general education credit. The PLOs provide colleges and universities with more depth as to what ACE transcript holders know and are able to do as they consider credit recommendations.

The population that makes up post-traditional learners are adult students who bring multiple sources of learning. However, current practice and policies impede the transfer and award of credit for these learning experiences and undermine success for these students. This new network seeks to recognize and validate learning to facilitate students’ ability to earn a credential or degree.   

Supporting Student Transfer During COVID

Webinar, League for Innovation in the Community College, December 2020

Moderator: Rufus Glasper, President and CEO, League for Innovation in the Community College

Presenters: Sylvia Jenkins, President, Moraine Valley Community College; Seppy Basili, Executive Director, Jack Kent Cooke Foundation; Kathleen DeLaski, Founder, Education Design Lab

This hour-long webinar discusses how community colleges can support their students in this unprecedented time and, most importantly, keep those students on the path to degree completion by facilitating transfer. “Now more than ever community colleges must play a critical role in providing access and fostering social mobility for students.” Presenters discuss the effective initiatives and strategies at their institutions and organizations and highlight the importance of faculty and advisors.

The National Student Clearinghouse (NSC) recently released the second report in a series on the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on student transfer and mobility. This report presents a more complete picture of fall 2020 transfer patterns and shows sharp declines in enrollment and student mobility. As in the first report that came out this fall, NSC tracked the transfer and mobility pathways of students who enrolled in fall 2020, focusing on three student groups: first-time students; returning students (those who had a stop-out without undergraduate completion and re-enrolled in the current term); and continuing students (those who continued enrollment from the preceding term, with or without having earned an associate degree or certificate). Transfer and mobility were tracked across institutions, sectors, and states, including over summer terms and after a lapse of enrollment. The report shows that the decline in student transfer and mobility is “steep and widespread,” with significant demographic disparities.

Report Highlights:*

• Fall transfer student enrollment fell 8.1 percent over last year, more than triple the drop in non-transfer students this fall (-2.4 percent).
• Student mobility fell across all transfer pathways. Reverse transfers decreased the most (19.4 percent), followed by lateral transfers (-12.6 percent) and upward transfers (-0.7 percent).
• Community colleges saw an 18.5 percent drop in freshmen, a 19.6 percent decline in reverse transfers, an 18.7 percent drop in returning students, and 7.2 percent fewer continuing students.
• Four-year colleges experienced relatively smaller declines in transfer enrollment as well as overall enrollment during the pandemic.
• Black and Hispanic transfer students have been impacted the most, particularly at community colleges, whereas Asian students made gains in the four-year college sector.
• Male student mobility declined sharply during the pandemic, regardless of age.
• While fewer students re-enrolled this fall after a stop-out, more opted for primarily online institutions this fall than they did pre-pandemic.

*Source: Causey, J., Harnack-Eber, A., Lang, R., Liu, Q., Ryu, M., and Shapiro, D. (December 2020), COVID-19 Transfer, Mobility, and Progress, Report No. 2, Herndon, VA: National Student Clearinghouse Research Center.

The PDF version of this report is available here: https://nscresearchcenter.org/wp-content/uploads/Covid19-TransferMobilityProgress-FinalFall2020.pdf.

NCS plans to release the third report in the series, with the first snapshot of Spring 2021 patterns, in March 2021.

The Scaling Partners Network, a diverse group of 25 policy, advocacy, research and institutional membership organizations throughout the country, has issued a call to action regarding transfer in higher education. In response to the increasing number of students transferring across higher education institutions and the economic recession due to the pandemic, the Network calls on educators and policymakers to seriously examine and rethink articulation policies and practices. “The time has come for institutions to design systems to apply maximum credit in transfer and to lower artificial barriers to the creation of seamless pathways.” In addition to the well-known data points on the low number of credits that transfer and the dismal rates of degree completion among low-income and minority students, the current climate is exacerbating the existing barriers and inequities transfer students face. Collaboration among institutions is essential to make meaningful progress on students’ ability to transfer credits and to continue and their pathways to degree completion.

The Scaling Partners Network members have identified essential transfer actions for institutions to consider, including publicly championing transfer as a priority; examining policies related to transfer with a racial equity lens; thoroughly analyzing data to understand current outcomes of students who transfer; and Incentivizing institutions to develop, scale and sustain programs that promote collaboration between institutions.

Network members include, among others, the Charles A. Dana Center at the University of Texas at Austin, Complete College America, American Association of Colleges and Universities, Association of Public Land-Grant Universities, and the WICHE Cooperative for Educational Technologies. See the WCET Blog post on the Call to Action.

Read the Call to Action and see all members of the Scaling Partner Network here.

As Higher Education Navigates a New Normal, Don’t Let Transfer Students Waste Time and Money

By Laura Couturier and Josh Wyner, Real Clear Policy, June 1, 2020

In the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, student transfer is in the spotlight like never before. As more students are expected to transfer this year and beyond, the shortcomings of transfer policies and procedures are starkly evident. Students lose credits or may have to repeat coursework, leading to delays in degree attainment and increased costs. The worst consequence is when students drop out altogether. A number of efforts have been made in recent years by states and institutions to remedy the problems of student transfer, including, of course, the Interstate Passport. Even so, the pandemic has exacerbated the effects of uneven transfer practices within and across states.

The authors of this article put forward the case that leadership from the statehouse is necessary and, indeed, essential to a successful transfer plan of action. “An ecosystem that can support the anticipated increase in transfer is far more likely to be built with supportive policy, compelling incentives, and collaborative work at the state level.”

The authors recommend three actions to be taken by state policymakers to accelerate improvements in transfer: (1) clearly declare that transfer students are a priority, (2) provide financial incentives for transfer students and institutions, and (3) assess progress on transfer student success.

The Many Forms of Postsecondary Inequity

New federal data highlight differences in educational outcomes across many individual variables

By Doug Lederman, Inside Higher Ed, August 25, 2020

This article presents findings from a set of studies released by the National Center for Education Statistics that are part of the center’s 2012-17 Beginning Postsecondary Students Longitudinal Study. In particular, the author draws from Six-Year Persistence and Attainment at Any Institution for 2011-12 First-time Postsecondary Students and Six-Year Withdrawal, Stopout and Transfer Rates for 2011-12 First-time Postsecondary Students. The studies show that the gaps between historically underrepresented groups of students — those who are Black and Hispanic, first in their families to go to college, adults or from families with lower incomes and all other students – are persistent and pernicious. Students in these groups were far less likely to earn a degree in six years, and more likely to have left college without a credential. Other factors considered in the study include parents’ college attendance, whether students started college right out of high school or waited a year, whether students worked, and whether students attended continuously.

The direction of transfer also made a difference. “More than half of students who transferred from one four-year institution to another (56.1 percent) earned a bachelor’s degree, compared to 42.7 percent who transferred from a two-year to a four-year institution and 25.2 percent who transferred from a four-year to a two-year college.”

See the Inside Higher Ed article for specific data results: https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2020/08/25/new-federal-data-highlight-differences-educational-outcomes-across-many-variables

The two NCES reports are available here: https://nces.ed.gov/pubs2020/2020238.pdf and https://nces.ed.gov/pubs2020/2020239.pdf

As Higher Education Faces a “Corona Swirl” of Transfer Students, Higher Education Must Create Clear Pathways to Degrees

By John Fink, Maria Hesse, Cheryl Hyman, Shirleatha Lee, Sharon Morrissey, and Elena Quiroz-Livanis, Diverse Issues in Higher Education, July 24, 2020

The authors, who are members of the national Tackling Transfer Policy Advisory Board, work to build equitable pathways for students to and through two-year and four-year institutions into careers. They propose four ways to end the transfer swirl and ensure that community colleges serve as an affordable and accessible gateway to higher education that will provide economic mobility to low-income students and students of color.

1. Map pathways with career goals in mind: bring employers to the table to understand the skills and knowledge most in demand in the workforce.
2. Review and redefine transfer policies: ensure that students can transfer their credits, which doubles their chances of earning a degree.
3. Deploy responsive, personalized advising: ensure that students enroll in the right courses in pursuit of their aspirations. States can fund and support advising programs that help students identify their career goals early on.
4. Fund innovation: states can provide financial incentives and challenge grants to motivate community colleges and four-year universities to build strong transfer pathways.

A National Snapshot: How Students Experience and Perceive Transferring Earned Credit

By Wendy Kilgore, Steven C. Taylor and Karina Pineda, American Council on Education National Task Force on Transfer of Credit, in collaboration with the American Association of Collegiate Registrars and Admissions Officers, 2020

This comprehensive report presents findings from a recent study by ACE and AACRAO on students’ perceptions about how transfer credit was applied and the potential accumulation of excess credits at graduation. The national study included 1,003 survey completers, with 65 percent of respondents currently enrolled at a public institution and 35 percent at a private institution; 78 percent transferred from a public institution and 22 percent from a private institution. Students were enrolled at institutions in 47 states, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico.

Transfer is the first potential point of credit loss for a student. Seventy-seven percent of students had transfer credit evaluations occur automatically; 23 percent of students had to ask the receiving institution to evaluate their transcripts for potential transfer credit. The report presents 12 different factors that are considered in the application of credit earned by a transfer student, all governed by institution policy or practice. For example, 14 percent of institutions do not accept dual enrollment credit. Some institutions limit the number of credits that can be awarded by the course level. Others have curricular policies that impose limits on specific courses that can be awarded in transfer as opposed to being earned at the institution to which the student transferred (e.g., awarding transfer credit for ENG101 but requiring that ENG102 be residential credit).

See Transfer Facts in this newsletter for selected findings from the report.

Highlights from the report summary include:

• More than half of transfer students successfully transfer all credit.
• Among students that were not successful in transferring all credit, most are aware of why the credit did not transfer.
• Most knew credit would be lost in transfer and were not displeased with the outcome.
• Academic advising is an integral part of the transfer funnel, having both positive and negative implications.
• Dual enrollment courses have a role in the credit loss story for almost a third of students who lost credit.

Strong Start to Finish: How Course Pathway Maps Increase Student Success

By Emily Warren, Ed Note, Education Commission of the States, August 11, 2020

Strong Start to Finish is an initiative at the Education Commission of the States that seeks to help higher education institutions increase the number and proportion of low-income students, students of color and returning adults who succeed in college math and English. Course pathway maps provide a visual guide of the links between every class ending with the first college-level (i.e., gateway) math or English course applicable to a degree.

Curricular information collected from six higher education systems produced over 440 individual maps that resulted in three primary takeaways:

1. Clear and simple maps help advisors guide students. Course names, sequential course numbering systems, and course descriptions help both students and advisors navigate a pathway to complete a degree requirement in math or English.
2. Asset-based course names spur success. Instead of using terms like basic, low-level or remedial to describe developmental education courses, which focus on a lack of skill and can negatively affect students, SSTF recommends using asset-focused language to encourage academic persistence.
3. Consistent Definitions Aid Students. Unsurprisingly, the mapping data collected for the project revealed a lack of agreement across institutions on the definition of a gateway course. Consensus across institutions helps students understand degree requirements and can avoid problems with transfer credits.

Essential Practices to Improve Student Transfer: A Call to Action from the Texas Transfer Alliance

By Martha Ellis, University of Texas at Austin, Charles A. Dana Center, June 18, 2020

Formed in late 2018, The Texas Transfer Alliance is a joint effort between the Charles A. Dana Center, the Texas Association of Community Colleges, and four of the state’s public university systems (Texas A&M, Texas State, University of North Texas and the University of Texas). Alliance members seek to collaborate across the state in order to make meaningful progress on transfer student outcomes. In response to the COVID-19 pandemic as well as the national movement toward racial justice, the Alliance has issued a Call to Action to institutions of higher education in the state of Texas, asking colleagues to make transfer a key priority in institutional and COVID-19 response plans. The request asks colleges and universities to create clear pathways for students to transfer successfully with earned credits applied and on track for degree programs, and to provide tailored student services and advising that are responsive to COVID-19 exigencies.

The Texas Transfer Alliance has set ambitious goals to be achieved by 2025, all of which seek to eliminate gaps by race/ethnicity and Pell status: increase four-year bachelor’s completion rate of community college transfers; increase the six-year transfer-out rate; decrease the average number of attempted credits to degree; decrease the average time-to-degree for transfer students, and increase the percent of Texas community college students completing college-level math and writing in the first year.

Transfer Partnerships: Lessons to Improve Student Success During and After COVID-19

by Debra D. Bragg, Lia Wetzstein, Elizabeth Apple Meza, & Theresa Ling Yeh, Data Note 11 / May 2020

This issue of Transfer Partnerships Series – Data Note 11 includes discusses their upcoming release of New Directions for Community Colleges (NDCC) on “Transfer Partnerships for More Equitable Student Outcomes” (Volume 192) and the lessons learned from their research on transfer partnerships and equitable student outcomes. IN particular how two- and four-year institutions coordinated their actions to improve transfer policies and practices, especially for underserved populations. The authors note that transfer partnerships are an important way to battle the racial transfer gap as well as help address the new pandemic realities: “swirling” between colleges, food and housing insecurity, and affordability and equity gaps.