RESEARCH AND EVALUATION

The Community College Research Center’s evaluation research of the concurrent Courses Initiative has two purposes. The first was to examine each partnership’s activities in order to provide real-time feedback, allowing the career Ladders Project to provide useful and relevant technical assistance and assist the sites in making improvements over the life of the project. This portion of the evaluation, completed in December 2010, draws on qualitative data collected from research visits to each site and surveys of participating students.

The second purpose is to evaluate the efficacy of the initiative: Are sites implementing their activities as intended, and are those activities having the intended outcomes for students? This analysis uses district and administrative data from the California Partnership for Achieving Student Success (Cal-PASS), a statewide data system that anonymously tracks students’ educational progress over time and across institutions. This dataset allows us to measure student outcomes longitudinally.

What is participation like across the initiative?

For the 2009–2010 school year, 4,814 students participated in the Concurrent Courses Initiative (that is, participated in a supplemental activity and/or took a dual enrollment course). Of those “participants,” 1,885 students took a dual enrollment course. The following are highlights from this student cohort:

• Analysis of CCI participant characteristics compared to district peers shows that the initiative is reaching the target population of low-income, underrepresented students.
• 75% of the dual enrollment courses students took were taught by college professors.
• Nearly all (99%) of dual enrollment students participated in at least one supplemental activity.
• The most popular activities were orientation to the initiative, orientation to college, and worked-based learning.

Figure 1. Participation in Supplemental Activities for CCI Participants

 

Figure 2. Dual Enrollment Course-taking for CCI Dual Enrollees

Short- and Long-Term Outcomes

Analysis of short-term outcomes reveals that at some sites, participation in dual enrollment is positively associated with improved high school grade point average and likelihood of high school graduation.

The primary intended benefit of the initiative, however, is increased rates of college persistence and success. Analysis of these long-term outcomes is ongoing. At present, we find that graduating dual enrollment students entered the CCI partner college at a higher rate than their district peers (43% compared to 29%). We also have evidence that in most sites, dual enrollment participants who enrolled in college during 2009–2010 made significant gains in college credit accumulation compared to other college freshman.

CCRC will further investigate CCI dual enrollment students’ postsecondary enrollment, achievement, and persistence patterns. Please check back periodically, or sign up for the CCRC mailing list, for updates from this analysis.