Start to Finish: Examining the Impact of the El Dorado Promise Program on Postsecondary Outcomes

Swanson, Elise; Ritter, Gary W.

doi:10.55504/0884-9153.1703

Cited by 16 publications

(11 citation statements)

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“…Some research evidence exists on the individual effects of place-based scholarships; that is, do these programs boost educational attainment? This research evidence suggests that indeed these programs can boost educational attainment (Bartik et al, 2021; Carruthers et al, 2020; Swanson & Ritter, 2020).…”

Section: Research Question 4: How Do Local Labor Supply Policies Affe...mentioning

confidence: 99%

Seize the Time: Needed Research on Local Economic Development in an Era of Increased Attention to Problems of Place

Bartik

2022

Economic Development Quarterly

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Within the policy area of local economic development, this paper identifies five research needs: 1) better definitions of local labor markets; 2) policy know-how on how local economic development’s benefits can be spread to distressed neighborhoods; 3) evidence on what types of jobs have both good growth prospects and also provide long-run job opportunities for U.S. workers who lack a bachelor‘s degree; 4) estimates of how local worker skill-upgrading programs, or worker attraction programs, affect local labor market outcomes; and 5) more rigorous evaluation of both customized business services provided to individual firms and more comprehensive regional economic development strategies.

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Section: Research Question 4: How Do Local Labor Supply Policies Affe...mentioning

confidence: 99%

Seize the Time: Needed Research on Local Economic Development in an Era of Increased Attention to Problems of Place

Bartik

2022

Economic Development Quarterly

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“…Bell, 2020; Bell & Gandara, 2021; Miller-Adams, 2021; Perna & Leigh, 2018). There is growing evidence on the positive impact of Promise programs on college access and completion (Swanson & Ritter, 2020) and workforce outcomes (Carruthers et al, 2020). However, little examination exists beyond Bell and Gandara’s (2021) analysis of the Tulsa Achieves program noting positive impacts on transfer rates and bachelor’s degree completion for Latinx and Native American students, about how the race neutrality of most Promise programs unfolds differently by racial group.…”

Section: Promise Programs and Combatting College Access Inequitiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

A promise kept for whom? College access, success, and the limits of race-neutral tuition-free programs.

Martinez¹,

Collier²,

Byrd³

et al. 2023

Journal of Diversity in Higher Education

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The cost-prohibitive nature of higher education continues to hinder higher education's benefits for individuals and society. Promise programs such as the Kalamazoo Promise (KPromise) decrease fiscal barriers familes face but there are looming questions about how a race-neutral policy ameliorates existing barriers to higher education persistence for Black, Indigenous, and People of Color communities. The present study expands on previous literature by focusing on possible differences among minoritized student groups to measure how KPromise influences higher education success and retention, not solely access. Guided by a critical race theory framework to problematize the interrelated structural inequities informing minoritized student experiences in the schooling pipeline, our study uses multiple group structural equation modeling to examine first-year stop-out for first-time enrolled Black, Latinx, and White KPromise students from the 2011-2017 cohorts. We find KPromise decreased socioeconomic barriers related to college enrollment, performance, and persistence for Black and Latinx students. However, White students continue to benefit from cumulative racial privileges resulting from a combination of higher socioeconomic advantage and precollege educational experiences that maintain racial inequalities along students' degree pathways.

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“…The results of KP's early imitators are mixed. The El Dorado Promise increased postsecondary enrollment by 14 percentage points and degree completion by 8 percentage points (Swanson & Ritter, 2020). Say Yes to Education, a last-dollar scholarship contingent only on longer-term residency and applicable at 4-year colleges, improved enrollment in Syracuse and Buffalo schools, and increased college matriculation by 8 to 10 percentage points (Bifulco et al, 2019).…”

Section: Conceptual Framework and Prior Researchmentioning

confidence: 99%

Do Community College “Promise” Programs With Low-Bar Merit Criteria Improve High School Performance?

Monaghan

Coca

2023

Community College Review

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Objective/Research Question: Community college “Promise” programs have proliferated recently, particularly in areas with many low-income, academically struggling students. Many Promise programs restrict eligibility by high school performance but set eligibility thresholds quite low. As such they function as “low-bar” merit scholarships, and merit scholarships are often believed to incentivize improved academic performance. But do such “low-bar” merit scholarships boost high school attendance and grades? Methods: We investigate impacts of one such program, the Milwaukee Area Technical College Promise, on high school students in Milwaukee Public Schools, exploiting program design features to identify treatment effects through a differences-in-differences strategy. Results: The program appears to have marginally improved high school grades while slightly lowering attendance. These effects cancel each other out in terms of meeting combined GPA and attendance eligibility thresholds. Estimated positive impacts on GPA were statistically significant but very small for males, Black students, free lunch eligible students, special education students and current English language learners, while impacts on attendance were negative for most subgroups. The positive GPA effect was restricted to the program’s second year. Conclusions: We do not find strong evidence that low-bar scholarships are effective at improving academic performance. Policymakers should reconsider conventional wisdom underlying inclusion of merit criteria in broad-based scholarships.

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Start to Finish: Examining the Impact of the El Dorado Promise Program on Postsecondary Outcomes

Cited by 16 publications

References 0 publications

Seize the Time: Needed Research on Local Economic Development in an Era of Increased Attention to Problems of Place

Seize the Time: Needed Research on Local Economic Development in an Era of Increased Attention to Problems of Place

A promise kept for whom? College access, success, and the limits of race-neutral tuition-free programs.

Do Community College “Promise” Programs With Low-Bar Merit Criteria Improve High School Performance?

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