Resource Library

Community college baccalaureate programs are growing in Texas as they have the potential to offer more streamlined paths for learners to credentials that lead to good jobs. This brief offers policymakers and practitioners more information on who enrolls in these programs and what happens to graduates in the labor market so they can understand how these degrees can serve learners from low-income backgrounds.

Sectoral training programs can offer flexible, affordable, and accessible pathways to upward mobility and career achievement. With the goal of helping to scale and strengthen sectoral training programs, this brief from MDRC focuses on the challenges providers and workers face and the current opportunities to collaborate with providers in applying evidence, innovating, and expanding effective practices.

This brief provides a snapshot into the process and progress of the STEM Transfer Partnership (STP) initiative. STP teams worked together for over 18 months to better understand and dismantle the obstacles for low-income STEM transfer students interested in completing a bachelor’s degree. Their documentation can serve new, future transfer partnerships by providing direction and inspiration.

This report provides a nuanced look at the status of educational attainment and employment in rural areas, finding that rural workers today are as likely as those in urban areas to hold a good job — one that pays a living wage for their region. But the report also shows that racial and gender disparities exist in who gets access to those jobs, even as rural areas grow more diverse. As rural economies shift and populations continue to decline and evolve, these communities need greater investment in education and workforce training to ensure future economic vitality.

To better understand the impact of accelerated (shorter-than-15-week) courses on learners from low-income and other nontraditional backgrounds, the College System of Tennessee studied whether seven-week courses affect learner outcomes and how faculty, staff, and learners experience accelerated courses. The resulting interactive policy brief showcases the changing landscape of accelerated course offerings at Tennessee community colleges while setting the stage for further study.

To bridge the gap between promising practices for advancing equity in postsecondary education and current postsecondary education in prison practices, the Vera Institute of Justice launched a multiyear, cross-state, collaborative project to explore racial inequities in both systems. This report presents their findings along with strategies aimed at tackling these inequities in postsecondary education in prison programs.

One of several in this series, this report shows that transfer enrollment increased along all pathways for the fall 2023 semester. The series aims to better serve the education community with new, timely, and detailed data on transfer progress and mobility.

To understand how its programs support incarcerated individuals in New York both during and after their time in prison, SUNY’s Office of Higher Education in Prison created a longitudinal data system. It merges student data from SUNY's system and the National Student Clearinghouse with New York State Department of Corrections data. This report utilizes these combined datasets to examine various aspects of incarcerated learner participation, including enrollment, diversity, course subjects, retention rates, and completion rates.

In the second episode of their two-part conversation with Reach University Chancellor Mallory Dwinal-Palisch, Future U podcast hosts Jeff Selingo and Michael Horn consider the teacher apprenticeship model’s potential for scaling to other public sector jobs. As part of their analysis, they discuss how this model addresses staffing shortages through job-embedded learning.

In the first episode of their two-part conversation with Reach University Chancellor Mallory Dwinal-Palisch, Future U. podcast hosts Jeff Selingo and Michael Horn learn about Reach’s apprenticeship approach to teacher education. Focusing on Reach’s foundation, theory, and practice, they discuss how it addresses rural workers’ lack of access to affordable training pathways leading to high-quality jobs.

The reinstatement of Pell Grant eligibility for incarcerated learners is a positive step toward normalizing opportunity to pursue education and career goals. This digital field guide was created to ensure postsecondary education leaders and corrections professionals have open access to free resources necessary to create high-quality postsecondary education in prison programs that lead to quality jobs and successful reentry.

Community colleges are well-positioned to expand apprenticeship opportunities and create affordable, equitable pathways into careers in healthcare, information technology, business services, and more. Resources from New America detail how colleges can fill the role of apprenticeship intermediary while serving the needs of learners and their communities.