New survey data from employers and community college students raise important questions about the state of online education today. Both groups remain skeptical about the value of this fast-spreading mode of learning. Important findings from this research include the following:(1) Most employers would prefer a job applicant with a traditional…

Efforts to improve student learning and success at community colleges are in the national policy spotlight. Colleges around the country are reviewing their institutional practices and gathering groups of education stakeholders to design and then implement changes in advising, developmental education, programs of study and curricula, student…

"Building Institutional Capacity for Data-Informed Decision Making" 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. Though the authors…

This is the second guide of the Cutting Edge Series and is designed to help colleges apply strategies that will allow successful institutional change and student achievement initiatives to reach more students. Section 1 of this guide lays out the most common obstacles to successful scaling and serves as a sobering reminder of the complexity of the…

In an effort to gauge receptiveness to Achieving the Dream, a major initiative to close achievement gaps at the nation's community colleges, the authors chose three participating colleges for an exploratory study. In each of the three communities, they conducted focus groups with relatively understudied stakeholders: full-time and adjunct faculty…