Many community colleges offer supports to new students in their first year, but it is often through piecemeal activities rather than a coordinated comprehensive approach.
All 174 of mostly two-year public colleges participating in a survey funded by the Jack Kent Cooke Foundation offer at least some type of first-year support, but only 40 percent of them had a stand-alone first-year experience program, office or department specifically dedicated to helping students in the first year of a two-year degree program. (Ithaka S+R and Two Year First Year conducted the research for the study.)
The most common first-year student supports include orientation, first-year seminars, career services, proactive intervention based on early alerts and social networking opportunities. Fewer colleges offer guided pathways, first-year advising and mentoring, learning communities or cohort classes.
An accompanying study noted that it did not assess the impact of first-year experience (FYE) programs — which offer the more comprehensive approaches — but survey results did indicate that colleges with FYE programs had evidence that they are working.
“Institutions that report offering first-year experience programs offer more activities to their students on the whole, have stronger career support offerings and are especially likely to target supports to subgroups of underserved students,” according to the study.
They also helped to change the culture of colleges, it added.
“This distinction is valuable,” the study said. “By virtue of its reach across varied departments and staff members, such holistic coordinated programming can also promote an institutional culture that prioritizes first-year supports and subsequently contributes to sustainable systems change.”
Despite offering first-year student supports, none of the participating colleges offer programming that specifically targets first-year, high-achieving students with financial need, the study said. (The Jack Kent Cooke Foundation focuses on advancing the education of exceptionally promising students who have financial needs.)
That’s especially important for community colleges. One in four high school students in the nation’s top academic quartile from families in the bottom socioeconomic quartile will enroll in a two-year or less-than-two-year college out of high school, it said.
Community colleges and other public two-year institutions have an opportunity to identify and nurture their potential, according to the study.
“These students have the academic readiness to complete not only associate but also bachelor-level degrees, if given the right supports,” it said. “There is significant opportunity for institutions serving two-year students to better cultivate the aspirations and talents of their higher-achieving students.”
