3 Strategies for Improving Upward Transfer

Upward transfer from a community college to a four-year bachelor’s degree–granting institution is a complicated process that leaves many students behind—particularly those from historically underrepresented backgrounds.

Last month, the Community College Research Center at Columbia University’s Teachers College and the Aspen Institute College Excellence Program published the second edition of the Transfer Playbook, a guidebook for colleges and universities seeking to eliminate barriers to transfer and increase the number of students who start at a community college and complete a bachelor’s degree.

The report details how colleges and universities can implement three evidence-based strategies that improve transfer and includes examples of institutions that are successful in this work.

By the numbers: Previous surveys have shown that a majority (80 percent) of community college students aspire to a bachelor’s degree, but only 16 percent earn a bachelor’s degree within six years of starting college.

Transfer rates are even lower for some student groups, including those from low-income backgrounds, adult learners and Black and Hispanic students, according to the report.

With the cost of higher education climbing, many students consider community college an affordable route to a postsecondary credential. However, little progress has been made over the past decade in increasing transfer rates from two-year to four-year institutions, according to the report’s authors.

“Transfer and bachelor’s attainment rates for students who start in community colleges have remained virtually unchanged since we started tracking transfer in 2015,” they write.

The playbook identifies colleges and universities that have achieved better outcomes for various groups using some of the recommended practices. None of the institutions or partnerships exhibited all the practices. “However, we hypothesize that by combining the exemplars’ efforts into a comprehensive, idealized framework, higher education leaders and practitioners can adapt it to meet their students’ needs and achieve strong outcomes for all—and at scale,” the report says.

Put into practice: Researchers identified a few consistent themes that set innovative institutions apart, which include:

• Leveraging proximity. Research shows students are more likely to enroll in college based on proximity, so creating local pathways between community colleges and four-year universities can support students who want to stay in the region.

• Providing empathy in high-stakes decisions. Missteps in course, major or transfer destination selection can have financial and opportunity costs for a student, which can impede their attainment or push them to stop out entirely. Effective colleges offer personalized support through staff or create tools that provide guidance in a timely manner.
• Establishing universal systems and initiatives. Some programs provide strong outcomes for historically underrepresented groups but are not large enough to reach students at scale. Exemplars instead use these programs as pilots to test effective measures and then scale them.
• Achieving support from leaders. Grassroots efforts can help move the needle, but recognition, elevation and investment by senior leadership allow work to scale in sustained ways, regardless of staffing turnover.

According to the report, the most effective strategies for creating sustainable transfer student success at scale are:

• Prioritizing transfer at the executive level. A key driver in systemwide change was community college and four-year presidents who understand the central role of transfer student success in their respective institutional missions and business goals. This top-down approach allows for allocation of resources, division mobilization and partnerships across colleges, which often benefit the local community and workforce. This also allows for end-to-end redesign of the transfer student experience, and establishment of systems and processes.

• Aligning programs and pathways. Colleges that create and regularly update term-by-term, four-year maps for each degree program can promote learning and ensure students are making significant progress toward a bachelor’s degree, such as completing college-level math and English and major-related courses. These maps should also prioritize accessibility and flexibility, understanding that student needs and priorities may shift and the way they complete courses may change. Some students may need exploratory curricula to help them identify their educational and career goals, so embedding this instruction early is also paramount.
• Tailoring advising and nonacademic supports. “Research indicates that about half of the community college students nationally who intend to transfer do not access transfer services,” the report says. Instead, institutions should put in place inevitable advising, engaging transfer students before, during and after their transition to a university. Advisers should receive professional development and training that centers the student experience and equips them to engage with individual students and their respective circumstances. Once students land at their four-year institution, creating systems and supports that uplift the transfer experience and inspire feelings of belonging is also critical.

Researchers call out a variety of campuses for their work, including George Mason University and Northern Virginia Community College’s ADVANCE program, Tallahassee State College’s transfer pathway work, and Arizona Western College and North Arizona University’s strategy to increase bachelor’s attainment in their two-county region.

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