The majority of community college entrants aspire to earn a bachelor’s degree; yet fewer than a third do. States use several strategies to support community college’s transfer function, including a transferrable core curriculum, a block of pre-major coursework universally accepted at public postsecondary institutions. In this study, we used statewide administrative data from Texas—a state with a transferable core—to examine pre-transfer credit accumulation and how pre-transfer core credits predict bachelor’s degree attainment and time to degree for community college transfer students. Our results illuminate high variation in pre-transfer core credit accumulation among community college transfer students. Each additional pre-transfer core credit improves students’ probability of earning a bachelor’s degree, but only up to core completion status. Soon after students are core complete—at which point universities are no longer required to transfer in additional core credits, students experience a negative relationship between core credits and bachelor’s degree attainment.

Public two-year colleges offer an entry point to postsecondary education for many Americans who might otherwise forgo college. Most students leave college without a credential. A growing body of research examines the returns to higher education among two-year college entrants but primarily focuses on returns to credentials. This study examines the returns to different types of credits, including academic, technical, and developmental credits. In a series of individual fixed effects models, we use state administrative data following a population of public two-year college entrants to understand which college credits yield the greatest returns and how returns to credits vary across degree attainment. Our findings illustrate that average estimates of the returns to credits obscure varied patterns of returns among two-year college students, where sub-baccalaureate credential recipients appear to experience different returns to academic and technical credits compared with their peers.