In 2015, Tennessee launched Tennessee Promise (TN Promise), one of the most comprehensive and well-funded statewide free-college scholarship programs in the country. To support TN Promise students, and especially those from the lowest-income households, tnAchieves, a key partner facilitating all non-financial components of TN Promise, implemented…

The so-called refugee wave in the summer of 2015 led to an impressive wave of helpfulness in Austrian society. Universities Austria (uniko)--the umbrella organization of the 22 public universities in Austria--set up and launched an initiative called MORE. MORE provides refugees and asylum seekers with additional opportunities and perspectives that…

In 2015, the American Association of Community Colleges (AACC) announced the AACC Pathways Project, a national initiative designed to support a cohort of community colleges to implement and scale whole-college guided pathways reforms. When the project launched, guided pathways was still a new idea. Yet, momentum was building around a set of…

Postsecondary education is widely seen as a necessity in the modern economy, yet among low and middle-income families, college enrollment rates are dismayingly low -- and graduation rates are even lower. College Promise programs, which cover local students' college tuition and fees, are one strategy states and municipalities use to help. But…

While the United States has made strides in increasing college access among low-income students, college completion has remained low. Graduation rates are particularly low at the nation's community colleges, which enroll a disproportionate percentage of low-income and nontraditional college students. Seeking to address this problem, in 2014 three…

College Promise programs are thriving in California, and with the continued growth comes a need to understand the features of these diverse efforts and the perspectives of the communities in which they exist. In 2018, the James Irvine Foundation supported California College Promise Project (CCPP) at WestEd to study the College Promise landscape in…

Church-related small private liberal arts baccalaureate minority-serving institutions like Wesley College have modest endowments, are heavily tuition-dependent, and have large numbers of financially-challenged students. In order to sustain the level of academic excellence and to continue to build student demographic diversity in its accessible…

The City University of New York's (CUNY's) Accelerated Study in Associate Programs (ASAP) combines many of the ideas from a range of programs into a comprehensive model that requires students to attend school full-time, and provides supports and incentives for three years. ASAP's financial aid reforms, enhanced student services, and scheduling…

This 2017 annotated bibliography reviews seven postsecondary peer cooperative learning programs that have been implemented nationally to increase student achievement. An extensive literature search was conducted of published journal articles, newspaper accounts, book chapters, books, ERIC documents, thesis and dissertations, online documents, and…

Organizing for Student Success draws on data from more than 50 institutions to provide insight into how university colleges are organized, the initiatives they house, and the practices in place to ensure their effectiveness. Twenty case studies from 15 different campuses offer an in-depth understanding of institutional practice. Ultimately,…

The Medical Interpreter Training Project, created as a collaborative effort of Northern Essex Community College (Massachusetts), private businesses, and medical care providers in Massachusetts, developed a 28-credit, competency-based certificate program to prepare bilingual adults to work as medical interpreters in a range of health care settings.…

For the past 10 years, the School of Technical Careers at Southern Illinois University has blended government Job Training Partnership Act or Comprehensive Employment and Training Act funds, existing college programs, and local health facilities into successful training programs in allied health careers. The School of Technical Careers, through…

The "open-door" policy, educational opportunity programs, and financial aid to high-risk students are implicit promises that the community college will provide successful learning experiences for all students. Within this framework of concerns and promises, the Milwaukee Area Technical College designed and offered a developmental program…

During a 2-year period, Fox Valley Technical College (FVTC) in Wisconsin developed a "New Directions" project, funded by the Job Training Partnership Act (JTPA), that successfully identified, enrolled, and graduated 30 women in a training program for nontraditional occupations. Project activities included scheduling morning and evening…

A project was conducted at Central College of the Houston Community College System to provide office skills training to students with developmental disabilities so they can obtain employment as office assistants in the community. The Office Occupations Certificate Program was designed for this purpose. Students involved included those with mental…