Institutional Change

This publication is the third installment of the Cutting Edge series, which aims to help colleges engage faculty, scale successful interventions, and create a strong culture of evidence through use of data to strengthen their institutional change and student success efforts. Since data generation and use are at its core, Achieving the Dream has developed a range of materials to help colleges understand the basic roles of institutional research (IR) and information technology (IT) and how to align them with the student success mission at community colleges.

Community colleges have played an essential role in expanding access to higher education, but their completion rates remain low. Of first-time college students who enrolled in a community college in 2003–04, fewer than 36% earned a postsecondary credential within six years (Radford, Berkner, Wheeless, & Shepherd, 2010).

Despite their best efforts, community colleges continue to see low rates of student persistence and degree attainment, particularly among academically vulnerable1 students. Of the students who entered community colleges during the 2003–2004 school year, 45% left college within three years without earning a credential (Provasnik & Planty, 2008).

There is mounting evidence that following the traditional sequence of developmental education courses is hindering community college students from progressing to college-level coursework and ultimately earning a credential. The Community College Research Center conducted an analysis of Achieving the Dream data and found that only 31% of students referred to developmental math and 44% of students referred to developmental reading completed the recommended sequence of courses within three years (Bailey, Jeong, & Cho, 2008).

Community colleges enroll over 40% of undergraduates in the United States. Thanks to their “open-door” admissions policy and relatively low cost, they have helped to broaden access to postsecondary education for students who in the past might not have gone to college. In part because of these uniquely American institutions, college access in the United States has expanded dramatically over the past 50 years.