Studies have explored the relationship between travelling non-linear post-secondary (PSE) pathways and student achievement in multiple jurisdictions. This research aims to overcome some of the major challenges faced by scholars in this area by leveraging a new administrative linkage in Ontario, Canada containing detailed information on students'…

In higher education, significant efforts have been made to improve student success outcomes. In this dissertation, two important problems related to student academic success are considered. The curriculum plays a crucial role in shaping student success. Curricular complexity has been shown to be inversely related to the graduation rate of…

Transfer students face many challenges integrating into a 4-year college that affect their retention and success, yet very little research has documented how to create wraparound programming to support them. There remains a need to establish retention models that are adaptable and can serve a variety of students and institutions. The Learning…

Improving baccalaureate degree attainment for transfer students continues to be a key topic across the nation. The Associate Degree for Transfer is the latest attempt to improve outcomes. This quantitative study examines the effectiveness of the Associate Degree for Transfer pathway program as compared to other transfer pathway programs over a…

Objective: Although most community college students intend to transfer to a 4-year college, few ultimately do. We sought to assess how student experiences of the Exploring Transfer (ET) program influenced transfer rates. The ET program was offered by a private, 4-year liberal arts college. Methods: We used data from a cross-sectional survey of…

The purpose of this quantitative nonexperimental study was to investigate the success of students who use transfer articulation agreements to transfer from any of the 13 community colleges in Tennessee to one of the state's public, four-year, locally governed institutions to complete a bachelor's degree. Data were collected from five 4-year public…

In a spring 2021 survey of California Community College students exploring the impact of COVID-19 on their transfer journey, the RP Group identified colleges where students felt highly satisfied with the transfer support and communication they were receiving during the pandemic. To better understand what these community colleges were doing to…

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to explore not only the academic measures such as grade point average of success of college-to-university transfer programs (Pathway Programs), but also the social-cultural facilitators and barriers throughout the students' Pathway experience. Design/methodology/approach: The experience of students and…

Currently, there remains a shortage of women in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) fields despite recent efforts to increase numbers. The Department of Commerce is predicting that STEM job openings will grow 17% by 2018, which is a much faster rate than most other careers. These are among the highest-paying fields, in part…

The Office for Community College Research and Leadership (OCCRL) founded in 1989 focuses on P-20 education and the role of community colleges in facilitating educational access and equity. This article highlights the work of OCCRL as a research center that bridges inquiry, policy, and practice in contributing to the national dialogue on relevant…

In this article, the Institute for Higher Education Policy (IHEP) presents research that can inform policy and practice to improve student success at community colleges. Grounded in IHEP's mission of advancing college access and success for underserved students, the article shares lessons learned about the importance of data and transparency in…

The Microbiology and Cell Science (MCS) Department at the University of Florida (UF) developed a new model of a 2 + 2 program that uses a hybrid online approach to bring its science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) curriculum to students. In this paradigm, 2-year graduates transfer as online students into the Distance Education in…

This paper considers the impact of transfer credits on the GPA of college-university transfer students. The data come from the academic records of students enrolled at 2 different campuses at an undergraduate university in Ontario across a 4-year period. The results from multivariate regression analyses show that the number of transfer credits is…

This article contributes to the literature addressing the needs of increasing student enrollment and retention across university campuses by identifying programs where progress can be made to improve the student retention rate and increase university enrollment. This article derives from a provisional program that began in the fall of 2009 at a…

"The Talent Blind Spot," which is divided into two reports, demonstrates that, each year, more than 50,000 high-achieving, low- and moderate-income community college students do not transfer to a four-year institution. Approximately 15,000 of these students have a 3.7 GPA or higher, which suggests they could succeed at even the most…