The United States (US) airline industry is currently experiencing a pilot shortage that could quadruple between the years 2022-2025 (Baldwin, 2022). Although there is not a single cause for this pilot shortage, one of the reasons is the high cost of entry into the industry(Silk, 2019). For aspiring pilots to enter the aviation and/or airline…

Implementation of ESA programs will not be easy. The ESA model is novel and foreign to most state education agencies, which have little to no experience with helping families purchase a wide variety of educational goods and services using government funds. Even if agencies had the relevant experience, ESA programs are complex, involving millions…

The resources that federal financial aid, state financial aid, and federal public benefits programs provide, when they operate effectively, are critical to older students and students with children. This report seeks to shed light on how these programs are functioning by analyzing data and policies across four states--Colorado, Missouri, North…

One of the important things experts consider when reintegrating veterans back into society is post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). The illness mainly affects this population due to their different experiences in their line of duty as soldiers. The enactment of the Post-9/11 Veterans' Educational Assistance Act of 2008 enabled student veterans to…

The North Carolina Promise is a state-level policy that reduced the cost of tuition for all students who attended one of three campuses in the University of North Carolina System starting in fall of 2018. We use IPEDS data and a synthetic control approach to examine how this tuition reduction affected enrollment and persistence at these campuses.…

Community colleges offer a variety of workforce-oriented programs intended to help students gain skills and knowledge for a specific career or occupation. Among these are short-term credentials, designed to teach students a specific skillset related to an occupation, often in response to local labor market needs. Types of short-term credentials…

By themselves, colleges and universities cannot tackle all of the challenges facing students. They must collaborate with other organizations and state agencies to coordinate support and effectively communicate with students in need. Amid the global COVID-19 pandemic and ensuing economic recession, institutions must also provide emergency financial…

In this dissertation, I study the relationships between financial aid, student characteristics, persistence, and completion in three separate chapters. In all three chapters, I use detailed, student-level administrative data from the UNC System beginning in the Fall 2013 semester. The first chapter is entitled "Tuition Reduction and Student…

Education Savings Accounts (ESAs) are private savings accounts funded by a deposit from the state government and managed by a parent. The deposit amount varies from state to state and is typically based on the state's per-pupil amount. To use an ESA, parents withdraw their child from the public school system and use ESA funds to purchase specified…

The Independent Transfer Pathways in North Carolina Project served as a catalyst in forging a culture of cooperation between community colleges and independent colleges and universities in North Carolina by creating a unique opportunity to bridge the gap between the two systems. The project focused on developing discipline-specific articulation…

Education Savings Accounts (ESAs) are private savings accounts funded by a deposit from the state government and managed by a parent. The deposit amount varies from state to state and is typically based on the state's per-pupil amount. To use an ESA, parents withdraw their child from the public school system and use ESA funds to purchase specified…

Education Savings Accounts (ESAs) are private savings accounts funded by a deposit from the state government and managed by a parent. The deposit amount varies from state to state and is typically based on the state's per-pupil amount. To use an ESA, parents withdraw their child from the public school system and use ESA funds to purchase specified…

Education Savings Accounts (ESAs) are private savings accounts funded by a deposit from the state government and managed by a parent. The deposit amount varies from state to state and is typically based on the state's per-pupil amount. To use an ESA, parents withdraw their child from the public school system and use ESA funds to purchase specified…

Teacher diversity is beneficial for all students, but especially students of color. The evidence is clear that having a teacher that matches students' racial identity increases reading and math scores, reduces the use of exclusionary discipline practices, and increases the likelihood of graduating high school and matriculating into a postsecondary…

Education Savings Accounts (ESAs) are private savings accounts funded by a deposit from the state government and managed by a parent. The deposit amount varies from state to state and is typically based on the state's per-pupil amount. To use an ESA, parents withdraw their child from the public school system and use ESA funds to purchase specified…