By Bill DeBaun, Senior Director, Data and Strategic Initiatives
Reading time: Three minutes
It can be hard to keep up with all the latest reports in education related to college access and attainment. Acknowledging that, here are summaries of three recent interesting pieces of research. Are you an NCAN member who really likes data, evaluation,
and research? Email me at debaunb@ncan.org to get involved in our data, evaluation, and research listserv!
The National Student Clearinghouse Research Center is a valuable source of data because it draws on the Clearinghouse’s immense treasure trove of enrollment and completion data. Their latest
report, “Current Term Enrollment Estimates: Fall 2023 – Expanded Edition, ”shows that undergraduate enrollment grew about 1.2% (176,000 students)
year-over-year.
Community colleges saw the largest gains (+2.6%) among institutional sectors, while Asian (+3.7%) and Hispanic (+3.6%) did so by student race/ethnicity. This line, “There was no growth among freshmen 20 years old and younger. Their enrollment remains
5.3 percent below 2019 levels” is immensely worrisome. Indeed, the Research Center’s Executive Director (and an NCAN board member!) told Inside Higher Education:
“Undergraduates have finally turned the corner, it appears, after years of decline, and I’m sure that many colleges are hoping that they have finally seen the bottom and are now starting to recover … But we’re still in a deep hole. The total number of undergraduates is over a million fewer than the number enrolled five years ago, in 2018.”
Emphasis mine, because yikes.
The State Higher Education Executive Officers Association (SHEEO)released a survey of its members’ state priorities for higher education this year.
Economic and workforce development topped the list of 10 issues while priorities on NCAN’s own agenda like state operating support for public colleges and universities (#2), college affordability (#4), and college completion/student success (#7) all
make appearances. In the outrage of the year (remember, I produce the FAFSA Tracker), FAFSA completion was only an honorable mention. The big riser this year was “higher education’s
value proposition,” which flew up the list from #7 last year to #3 in 2024. SHEEO president Rob Anderson writes in a member newsletter, “Given the recent national scrutiny of higher education and perceived campus responses to student free speech and
student safety concerns, this leap to number three is no big surprise. I think the reality is that this value proposition is continually under threat, and specific events bring the issue to the fore of our attention.”
The City University of New York’s (CUNY) Accelerated Study In Associate Programs (ASAP) intervention continues to accumulate empirical evidence about its effectiveness. The latest comes out of an MDRC evaluation of an Ohio “demonstration” of the same intervention. Cincinnati State Technical and Community College, Cuyahoga Community College (Tri-C), and Lorain County Community College implemented the ASAP protocol and students
reaped the rewards. Specifically: “MDRC’s evaluation of these programs found that after six years, the Ohio programs increased graduation rates by 15 percentage points and annual earnings by $1,948. Taken together, these findings are important because
they (1) strengthen existing evidence that the ASAP model improves graduation rates and (2) provide new evidence that the ASAP model can increase long-term earnings.”
We need more ASAP, well, ASAP.
Two more quick hits:
First, Avery Davis asks “Is Working in College Worth It?”. Using data from the High School Longitudinal Study (N=4,418), Davis finds, “after adjusting for background characteristics, prior academic achievement, institution types, and family obligations, “traditional” undergraduate students begin seeing deleterious effects at 20 hours, which becomes even more severe for those working 28+ hours (and the worst for Pell Grant recipients working long hours).” Not a new finding, more like another brick in building the case against working and schooling concurrently (if possible).
Second, the National Student Clearinghouse puts out a “Call for Presenters” every month. They note, “Do you have tips on how to get the most out of your service? Is your school doing something interesting as a result of the Clearinghouse services and you want to showcase it? Help your fellow colleagues today! Reach out to the Clearinghouse Academy with a short description of your topic.” If you’re interested and want to collaborate – please email me!
That’s it for now – have research you’d like to elevate to the rest of the NCAN membership? Let me know at debaunb@ncan.org, and it’ll appear in a future rendition of this series.
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