"Free college" (sometimes called Promise) programs are common in U.S. higher education. Reviewing 88 studies of 25 state and local programs, I provide a nuanced picture of the mechanisms through which these programs may work and their likely effects on students, communities, and colleges. Some commonly-claimed mechanisms for these…

The nonprofit community-based organization Pittsburgh Promise aims to help revitalize Pittsburgh and its public school system by offering college scholarships to any Pittsburgh Public School graduate who meets the academic requirements. Executive director Saleem Ghubril spoke with "Voices in Urban Education" guest editor Jacob Mishook…

The Tennessee Education Lottery Scholarship (TELS) program was designed to meet the unique needs of the state of Tennessee while also incorporating the hallmark elements of existing merit-based aid programs in other states. Developed through a process involving elected officials and members of the academic community, the TELS program aims to…

Individual ACT reports contain students' results and basic explanations of what the results mean. This booklet provides more information keyed to the three parts of the report: (1) ACT scores (including how scores are computed on each of the tests, how to understand and use ACT scores, how high schools and colleges use them, and whether or not it…

The Kentucky Education Excellence Scholarship (KEES) is a merit-based scholarship program intended to increase college access, long-term academic commitment, and retention of top students within the state. KEES uses a heavily graduated award structure and both high school grade point average and standardized test scores to establish award amounts.…

This article describes how the Global Challenge allows high school students to do something for the environment while winning an award that will help them financially through college. The Global Challenge is an online competition for high school students across the world. Students from other nations can pair up with students in the U.S. and…

At Coppin State University, a historically Black university, nearly 120 ninth-graders are enrolled in the Coppin Academy. The academy is one of nearly a dozen such innovative school partnerships nationwide, aiming to apply study results that suggest that African-American students may perform better in smaller, more personalized learning…

Although colleges and universities interested in the most cost-effective way of diversifying their entering class or meeting enrollment targets have an array of analytical techniques to choose from, issues of accuracy, scope, and usability continue to slow their widespread use. To address these issues, this article develops an institutional…

During recent years more and more people have become interested in the question of financial aid to students in institutions of higher education. The Office of Education, in response to the need for more information on the problem, has planned a series of reports, of which this bibliography is the first. For the most part, the books and articles…