With this week’s launch of Degrees When Due, a new three-year initiative by the Institute for Higher Education Policy (IHEP), nearly 30,000 adult learners and college “stop-outs” are expected to complete their degrees within a year.
An inaugural Degrees When Due cohort of more than 25 postsecondary institutions from eight states will partner with IHEP to implement research-based strategies to close educational attainment gaps and push students to finish their degrees. The initiative will advance what IHEP coins as “degree reclamation” for adult learners and other students who have some college experience, but no degree.
“When a college student becomes a graduate, she moves closer to realizing her full potential. But when she pauses her studies, even after earning enough credits, and never receives her degree, that potential becomes much harder to realize,” said IHEP president Dr. Michelle Asha Cooper, in an official launch announcement. “Through Degrees When Due, we’re helping schools build the capacity to help more low-income students and students of color cross the degree-completion finish line.”
Beginning this fall, faculty from participating campuses in California, Michigan, Minnesota, New Jersey, New York, Texas, Utah and Washington will start the initiative with a 9-month online learning experience that entails guided lessons and live coaching from experts working on and employing successful degree reclamation strategies for students.
Institutions will learn how to identify and reengage stopped-out students and students close to completion, how to provide customized supports for student degree completion and how to award associate degrees to students who have already earned enough credits at one or more institutions, IHEP officials said.
Research shows that nearly four million students have completed credits that could count towards an associate degree, according to IHEP. One in five students enrolled in higher education stop out each year due to financial challenges, family, work or other responsibilities.
IHEP’s latest initiative builds off of its Project Win-Win and the national Credit When It’s Due (CWID) initiative on “reverse transfer” programs. As the initiative expands, the organization plans to welcome campuses in 32 states to Degrees When Due within three years and ultimately bring degrees to 500,000 more students as institutions enhance their reengagement and degree completion efforts.
