Achieving the Dream

Community Colleges Count

Achieving the Dream: Community Colleges Count is a multiyear national initiative to help more community college students succeed. The initiative is giving 83 colleges the tools they need to close the achievement gaps that exist for low-income and minority students. Research form the 15 states participating in the initiative shows that targeted data analysis can determine early in a student’s college career whether he or she is on track for success.

Rationale

Community colleges offer broad access to higher education through open admissions. When their students succeed, the benefits are far-reaching. Community colleges educate new workers so our nation can stay competitive, and they retrain current workers to address evolving jobs or circumstances. In the process, community colleges prepare students for lives as productive, engaged members of society—preparation that serves both the students and their communities.

But today, many students leave college without meeting their educational goals and there are significant achievement gaps for low-income students, students of color and others.

Achieving the Dream was created to help more community college students succeed—complete courses, earn certificates and earn degrees. The initiative is built on the belief that broad institutional change—informed by student achievement data—is critical to achieve this result.

A multiyear national initiative with 83 colleges in 15 states, Achieving the Dream acts on multiple fronts. The initiative:

•    Provides planning and implementation grants to colleges and state policy efforts
•    Helps colleges develop and implement strategies to improve student success and build a culture of evidence in which decisions are based on data about student achievement
•    Conducts research about effective practices and student achievement at community colleges
•    Works to influence public policy so it supports colleges’ improvement efforts
•    Engages communities, businesses and the public

Participating colleges enroll high percentages of low-income students and students of color, who are less likely to attain their educational goals. These colleges are working to close achievement gaps while maintaining open access and increasing student success overall. To do so, colleges will have to make lasting changes in their practices and cultures.

Approach
 
JFF coordinates the effort to improve policies in 15 states participating in the initiative. JFF also co-leads the national policy effort and participates in engaging the public and developing knowledge around the role of community colleges. In this role, JFF selects a lead organization in each state, makes grants to those organizations, and helps leadership teams from each state to set agendas for policy change.

State Policy

While Achieving the Dream primarily focuses on institutional change among participating community colleges, public policy innovation is integral to the initiative. Achieving the Dream is organized on the premise that participating colleges will find obstacles to their strategies for improvement that are due in part to the particulars of education policies, primarily in their states but also at the federal level. The policy component of Achieving the Dream is designed first to promote policy innovations that can make it easier for participating colleges to improve student outcomes. Second, this work is intended to help move lessons from the institutional change efforts of participating colleges into state—and national—policy so that they can be broadly institutionalized and sustained.

Achieving the Dream states have identified the following policy priorities:

•    Develop visible public policy commitment to student access and success;
•    Strengthen state data systems to measure student outcomes and encourage higher performance;
•    Better align community colleges and other levels of education;
•    Provide incentives for improved services for academically under-prepared students;
•    Expand access to financial aid and other financial incentives that increase persistence; and
•    Build strong public support for policies that promote access and success.
 

ENTER CONTENT RELATING TO AtD AND THE DATA QUALITY CAMPAIGN?
 

Participating States

Arkansas       Connecticut          Florida
Hawaii           Massachusetts      Michigan
New Mexico    North Carolina     Ohio
Oklahoma      Pennsylvania       South Carolina
Texas            Virginia               Washington

Funders
 
Lumina Foundation for Education provided funding for the initiative's startup, funds the 2004 colleges, and is providing ongoing funding for other participating colleges as well as other elements of the initiative.

Additional funding is provided by The Boston Foundation (Massachusetts), College Spark Washington (Washington state), The Heinz Endowments (Pennsylvania), Houston Endowment, Inc. (10 Houston-area colleges), The Irene E. & George Davis Foundation (Massachusetts). Kamehameha Schools (Hawaii), KnowledgeWorks Foundation (Ohio), The Kresge Foundation (Michigan), The Lloyd G. Balfour Foundation (Massachusetts), Lumina Foundation for Education (Florida, New Mexico, North Carolina, Texas, and Virginia Colleges), Nellie Mae Education Foundation (Connecticut), Office of Hawaiian Affairs (Hawaii), Oklahoma State Regents for Higher Education (www.okhighered.org), Palmetto Institute (South Carolina), South Carolina Technical College System (South Carolina) TERI (Massachusetts), The University of Hawaii Community Colleges (Hawaii), Winthrop Rockefeller Foundation (Arkansas), and W.K. Kellogg Foundation (Michigan).

For additional information, contact:
(anyone from Lumina?)
Bonnie Gordon at MDC, bgordon@mdcinc.org, 919.968.4531
Richard Kazis at JFF, rkazis@jff.org, 617.728.4446