Transition: High School to College

College- and Career-Ready: Using Outcomes Data to Hold High Schools Accountable for Student Success

This report examines the need for improving high school accountability for preparing students for college and careers. The report also provides examples of how states use outcomes data to track student success beyond high school and how that data is used to hold schools accountable. 

Considerations for Collaborations to Support College and Career Readiness: A Facilitator’s Guide

This resource includes guiding questions and key considerations designed to help states explore the complex challenges inherent in facilitating cross-systems alignment through ongoing collaboration. Each question borrows from the systems research base derived from within and outside the field of education. The key considerations that accompany each question are designed to help users frame their own efforts within the conditions that the research base links to collaborative success.

Early College, Early Success: Early College High School Initiative Impact Study

This report includes findings from an impact evaluation of the Early College High School Initiative, launched by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. The study compared the educational outcomes of students who applied and received admission into Early College through a lottery system to the outcomes of students who participated in the lottery system but did not receive admission. The study sample included 2,458 students and included data from 2004 to 2012.

A Path to Alignment: Connecting K-12 and Higher Education Via the Common Core and the Degree Qualifications Profile

This report  describes the gap in the alignment between K-12 and higher education learning objectives and outcomes. The authors argue for the coordinated adoption and alignment of the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) and the Degree Qualifications Profile (DQP) as a solution to this problem.

Mystified by Jargon? Defining College and Career Readiness

If you picked out random Americans on the street and asked them if they know what public-school teachers are and what they do, you would almost certainly receive universally affirmative responses. Everyone knows what a teacher is—it’s practically self-evident. Teachers teach students, of course.

The Condition of College & Career Readiness, 2011

Using American College Testing (ACT) data, this study assessed whether students have the knowledge and skills necessary to enroll and succeed in a first-year course at a postsecondary institution. The report presents the percentage of students meeting the benchmarks in each area, alignment of student aspirations and workforce demands, graduates exposed to college entrance tests and students pursuing a core curriculum, overall academic achievement and behavior, and policies and practices to improve college readiness. 

Helping Students Get a Head Start on the "Real World": State Strategies for Early High School Graduation

This brief challenges the need for a fourth year of high school, addressing the controversy around “senior year” and its tendency to draw out the high school experience. In proposing the topic of early graduation, the document outlines a number of policy approaches and their successful implementation in various states. Among these programs are scholarship incentives, dual enrollment, virtual classes, and proficiency-based credits.

Rewarding Dual Enrollment in Performance-Based Funding Formulas

Dual enrollment and early college high schools have been shown to have a positive association with college completion rates. However, these programs are often among the first to be cut when state funding gets tight. This report outlines how performance-based funding that rewards outcomes such as graduation rates or annual student growth goals is a promising answer to state funding challenges.

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