Boosting graduation rates ASAP

MDRC has released a randomized assignment study of the City University of New York's (CUNY) Accelerated Study in Associate Program (ASAP) for students needing remedial courses to complete community college requirements. Although community college students needing remedial courses have low graduation rates, results of this study showed that students who participated in the three-year-long ASAP program were almost twice as likely to graduate than the control group who did not participate in the program. This is the largest finding of any community college reform in MDRC's history.
 

A total of 896 community college students at three of CUNY's seven campuses participated in the study, 451 receiving the ASAP program and 445 receiving the usual college services. Students were matched on being low-income, the need for one or two remedial courses, credits earned, residency, willingness to attend college full time, minimum GPA, and major. 

The ASAP program included components such as:

• Required students to attend college full time, take remedial courses early, and graduate in three years
   
• Provided students with tutors specific to the ASAP program
   
• Gave students a tuition waiver covering the difference between what financial aid provided and the cost of tuition and fees

Although ASAP's total cost per student was initially $14,000 more than for students using the usual college services, MDRC calculated that at the third-year point, the cost of earning a degree was lower for ASAP students than for the controls because so many more students graduated through the ASAP program than did students using the usual college services.

ASAP is now being implemented in six of CUNY's seven colleges.

Johns Hopkins University 

Research in Brief

News Blast