Document Category: Research Study

“When Someone Cares About You, It’s Priceless”: Reducing Administrative Burdens and Boosting Housing Search Confidence to Increase Opportunity Moves for Voucher Holders (2023)

Using in-depth interview data from families and service providers, we examine the success of the Creating
Moves to Opportunity (CMTO) program in Seattle, focusing on how it reduced many of the learning, compliance, and psychological costs of using housing vouchers so that participants could expand their residential
choices. CMTO’s approach of combining information and flexible financial resources with personalized
high-quality assistance bolstered participants’ confidence, agency, and optimism for their housing searches
in high-opportunity neighborhoods. Accessible, collaborative, pertinent communication from program staff
was central to addressing both the psychological costs of the federal Housing Choice Voucher program and
families’ experiences in housing and social services. These results provide evidence to inform housing policy
as well as to enrich broader scholarship on program take-up, implementation research, and the role of Navigators and service quality in addressing administrative burdens low-income families face while using other
social programs.

Financial Stress Among College Students: New Data About Student Loan Debt, Lack of Emergency Savings, Social and Personal Resources (2024)

We provide updated results about the link between student loan debt and emergency savings with financial
stress, and after conditioning for differences in social
and personal resources. We use the stress process
model framework and data from the 2020 Study on
Collegiate Financial Wellness (N = 25,310) to estimate
ordered probit regression models. The 2020 data confirm that students report higher levels of stress if they
hold more loan debt and have lower emergency savings. Students with higher levels of financial socialization and financial self-efficacy experience less financial
stress and experience more stress when they report
both positive and negative financial management
behaviors. Among student-borrowers, the role of social
and personal resources is weakened. The data confirm
ongoing financial stress among college students and
points to the important role of financial socialization
through parents and financial skill in students’ ability
to cope with financial stress.

Advancing Equity in Attainment for Black Single Mothers in College: Understanding Their Needs and Supporting Their Success (2024)

As part of its broader Student Parent
Success Initiative, IWPR conducted
original research focusing specifically on
Black single mother students. This report
summarizes findings from 25 interviews
IWPR conducted with Black single mother
community college students, consisting of
both students who were enrolled at the
time of the interview and those who had
been enrolled in the prior five years. These
interviews provide insight into how college
settings promote or inhibit the success of
Black single mother community college
students, how Black single mother students
engage with institutional resources, which
of these resources they find beneficial, and
how institutional resources can better serve
their needs.

Homelessness and Housing Insecurity Among Community College Students: A Longitudinal Evaluation of a Housing Choice Voucher Program (2024)

Housing insecurity and homelessness among American community college students are widespread
problems that reduce the odds of college attainment and undermine students’ health and well-being.
In 2014 Tacoma Community College and the Tacoma Housing Authority launched the College Housing
Assistance Program (CHAP) to address this challenge by offering housing choice vouchers to local community college students experiencing or at serious risk of experiencing homelessness. If students could
successfully navigate the application process and local housing market, the vouchers offered a short-term
subsidy to reduce their rent and hopefully promote degree completion. Over the next several years, CHAP
received national and regional awards and became a model for affordable college housing programs. This
evaluation examines its effects on students before the housing authority ended the program in 2022.

Marginal Returns to Public Universities (2024)

This paper studies the causal impacts of public universities on the outcomes of their marginally admitted students. I use administrative admission records spanning all 35 public universities in Texas, which collectively enroll 10 percent of American public university students, to systematically identify and employ decentralized cutoffs in SAT/ACT scores that generate discontinuities in admission and enrollment. The typical marginally admitted student completes an additional year of education in the four-year sector, is 12 percentage points more likely to earn a bachelor’s degree, and eventually earns 5-10 percent more than their marginally rejected but otherwise identical counterpart. Marginally admitted students pay no additional tuition costs thanks to offsetting grant aid; cost-benefit calculations show internal rates of return of 19-23 percent for the marginal students themselves, 10-12 percent for society (which must pay for the additional education), and 3-4 percent for the government budget. Finally, I develop a method to disentangle separate effects for students on the extensive margin of the four-year sector versus those who would fall back to another four-year school if rejected. Substantially larger extensive margin effects drive the results.

Structure and flexibility: systemic and explicit assignment extensions foster an inclusive learning environment (2024)

Many educators strive to create inclusive classrooms where students receive not only knowledge but also empathy from their instructors. When students face unexpected challenges due to illness, academic pressure, or exhaustion, they often seek extensions on assignments. Instructors insert their own biases when they decide who is eligible for an extension. An explicitly communicated penalty-free extension system can eliminate this bias, create an inclusive learning environment, and disinter extension requests from the hidden curriculum. Students used an “extension without penalty” system (EWP) in a large introductory biology course. Mid-semester qualitative data collection helped design an end-of-the-semester quantitative survey about students’ perceived benefits. Assignment submission data, EWP use frequency and grades were directly extracted from the learning management system. Students preferred a two-tier extension system with ideal and extension due dates. The EWP system was used by 78% of the students, but half of them only used it once. Students reported benefits in stress reduction, handling of sickness and emergencies, and improved performance in other courses. Exploratory results indicate there were additional benefits in some areas for first-generation college students. Using the extension due dates did not impact student grades. This study uses evidence to debunk common misconceptions about assignment extensions.

Nutrition Knowledge, Food Insecurity, and Adverse Childhood Experiences Among Underserved College Students A Pilot Study (2024)

An online, cross-sectional survey examined food insecurity, adverse childhood experiences, academics, health status, dieting, and associations with nutrition knowledge among 83 freshmen Educational Opportunity Program university students in California. Mean (SD) nutrition knowledge was 13.6 (5.0) out of a perfect score of 29. Most students (84%) reported being food secure. The median adverse childhood experiences score was 1.00 (interquartile range, 0.00-3.00), an indication of intermediate risk for toxic stress, and the mean (SD) high school grade point average was 3.62 (0.38) out of 4. More adverse childhood experiences were associated with higher nutrition knowledge (P = .005). High school grade point average predicted nutrition knowledge (P = .003). The results may be helpful in designing larger, more representative studies of the Educational Opportunity Program population and finding helpful interventions.

Examining prevalence and predictors of food insecurity for transition-age youth transitioning out of foster care (2024)

Transition-age youth with foster care involvement (TAY) face significant risks for food insecurity and other hardships in early adulthood. Using representative survey data of youth transitioning out of foster care in California, we examine the prevalence and predictors of food insecurity. We find that about 30% of study participants were food insecure at ages 19, 21, and 23. We also identify multiple risk and protective factors associated with being food insecure, such as TAY’s sexual identity and receipt of public benefits. The results of our study offer life-stage-specific recommendations for policy and practice to address food insecurity among TAY.

A Systematic Review Examining Multi-Level Policy and Practice Recommendations, and Calls for Research, on Food Insecurity at American Community Colleges (2024)

Purpose: The purpose of this systematic literature review is to examine policy and practice recommendations, along with calls for future research, aimed at addressing food insecurity for community colleges across the U.S. Argument/Proposed Model: This article will provide a detailed methodology for the systematic literature review, as well as the findings gathered from a range of peer-reviewed articles on this topic. The authors analyzed six significant themes that surfaced from the current literature related to policy and practice at the federal, state, local, and institutional levels. Conclusions/Contributions: Six chief themes are discussed in-depth, including but not limited to: important tools and approaches for marketing and communications, data-driven decision-making, and the augmentation of food support with other public benefits and institutional resources. These thematic findings address the issue of food insecurity on community college campuses, and also offer a range of techniques and areas for consideration. This systematic literature review offers a compilation of policy and practice recommendations steeped in actionable strategies for researchers, policymakers, campus leaders, and practitioners alike. The strategies can be implemented and/or tailored to meet the needs and nuances of any community college population.

“The struggle bus is full.”: How College Faculty Interpreted and Navigated Institutional Policy Shifts Amid COVID-19 (2024)

Perhaps no other time in United States higher education’s history did institutional policies change as quickly as they did during the COVID-19 pandemic. However, no studies have emerged from the pandemic era that address how faculty members navigated these changing policies, many of which were meant to increase safety and student success. This study examines weekly meetings of eight faculty teaching a course for students on academic or financial aid warning during spring 2021. In meetings, faculty reflected on institutional policies as it impacted safety and student success, and findings suggest policy intent was good, but the impact of the policies was not conducive to faculty mental health or student success. Additionally, many COVID-era policies conflicted with existing policies, especially financial aid, placing faculty in difficult situations as policy interpreters. Finally, many new policies had no precedent, therefore, faculty had no guidance on policy interpretation or implementation. Implications for research, policy, and practice are addressed.