Resources

Overview

Increasing Student Success at Community Colleges: Institutional Change in Achieving the Dream
Date: Revised July 2006
This 15-page paper presents the rationale for Achieving the Dream and lays out the approach to institutional change that the colleges are pursuing to increase student success. The initiative emphasizes the use of data to diagnose problems, guide priorities, and assess impact. Colleges use leadership teams to mobilize broad-based involvement of people within the college and in the larger community. They seek to develop an institutional culture of inquiry, evidence and accountability.

• NOVA's Strategic Vision 2015: Gateway to the American Dream
• NOVA’s Implementation Proposal
• A Culture of Evidence: What Is It? Do We Have One?
• VCCS Achieving the Dream

Strategies

Strategies at Achieving the Dream Colleges
Each Achieving the Dream college develops strategies based on its analysis of institutional strengths, problem areas and achievement gaps.

Resources From Achieving the Dream Strategy Institutes, 2005 - 2010
Colleges participating in Achieving the Dream meet during the winter for a Strategy Institute. Many of the resources are available online.

National Research on Persistence

What Works in Student Retention? Two Year Public Colleges
ACT published their survey findings from 386 public two-year colleges.

Paths to Persistence: An Analysis of Research on Program Effectiveness at Community Colleges
Community colleges are designed to be open-door institutions, and they play a crucial role in providing access to college. During the last decade, educators and policy-makers have shifted their attention beyond access to examine the success of students once they enter community college. Accreditation agencies and state regulators are increasingly scrutinizing measures of student outcomes such as persistence and completion rates. At the same time, national initiatives by foundations and the U.S. Department of Education are focused on developing policy and institutional practices that will improve success rates for community college students.

This report presents a critical analysis of the state of the research on the effectiveness of four types of practices in increasing persistence and completion at community colleges:

1) advising, counseling, mentoring and orientation programs;

2) learning communities;

3) developmental education and other services for academically under prepared students and

4) college-wide reform.

The report draws lessons from the research about effective institutional practices. It also evaluates the state of program-effectiveness research at community colleges, identifies promising areas for future research, and makes recommendations for improving related research.

Achieving the Dream Partner Organizations

These organizations provide management, research or public relations support to the national Achieving the Dream initiative:

• The American Association of Community Colleges
• Community College Research Center, Teachers College, Columbia University
• The Community College Leadership Program, University of Texas-Austin
• Futures Project, Brown University
• Jobs for the Future
• MDC
• MDRC