Keeping Students on Track to College Graduation

You may have encountered recently the inspiring story of Hope Chicago, an innovative college scholarship program committed to investing $1 billion in scholarships to Chicago's students and their parents over the next decade. The surprise announcements this past February in Chicago’s high schools made national news as Hope Chicago awarded 4,000 secondary students and their parents the opportunity for a debt-free college education, as well as the possibility of improved financial stability for themselves and their families for generations to come.

The cost of college is daunting for most American families. The National Center for Education Statistics reported the average tuition and fees at public 4-year institutions in 2019-20 was $9,400. Coupled with the costs of books, supplies, and room and board, the total cost of attending a public university is on average just over $25,000 per year. Given that the median earnings of workers aged 15 and over for the same time period was $41,535, it’s impossible to imagine how the average American family can pay for college. Not surprisingly, the average debt among bachelor’s degree completers is almost $30,000.

Programs like Hope Chicago remove the financial barrier of entering college. But do scholarship programs alone enable students to succeed in college and graduate? One of the few studies that considers the relationship between scholarship and graduation, by Page, Kehoe, Castleman, and Sahadewo (2017), investigated the effectiveness of the Dell Scholars Program. The research team found that there was a higher probability that students receiving scholarships would graduate (from 6 percent to 13 percent). Similarly, an evaluation of the impact of the Florida Student Access Grant (FSAG) on long-term outcomes including college persistence and degree completion rates also found effects: financial aid positively affected student persistence and credit accumulation while increasing the likelihood of students earning a bachelor’s degree (Castleman & Long, 2016).

While financial support is important, keeping students on the path to a college degree is ideally supported by multifaceted support programs, which may combine a proactive, holistic coaching or advising model with financial support, enrollment messaging, and other supports (Ratledge & Wavelet, 2021). Holistic coaching models, such as the evidence-backed

InsideTrack model (What Works Clearinghouse, 2012), are used to assess students’ lives inside and outside of school and help them overcome barriers to academic success. Coaches and mentors proactively and frequently reach out to students, maintaining engagement across the student’s time at college. Universities have also invested in sophisticated CRM (Customer Relationship Management) software to track and engage students from pre-enrollment through graduation, often employ innovative engagement strategies such as digital messaging. Financial support is essential, but it is one of several tools available to support college student success.

Shaffer Evaluation Group works with higher education clients to evaluate the effectiveness of interventions to support students on their pathways through college. We have supported community colleges and universities receiving National Science Foundation and U.S. Department of Education grants to implement student support programs, ranging from CRM to holistic coaching and scholarships. To learn more about how we can help your institution evaluate student support programs, please contact us at seg@shafferevaluation.com.

Tips for Writing SMART Educational Grants

Many educational institutions seek discretionary grant funding to undertake major initiatives. Program evaluators often assist with the grant writing process by providing feedback on a grant application’s goals, objectives, and outcomes. Here are some tips for writing grant goals, objectives, and outcomes that are logical, based in research evidence, and SMART – specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound.

Goals present the final impact or outcome that your project is designed to produce. The grant writing process began with recognizing and defining a problem or needs, and the goals should be directly related to solutions to the problem/needs. Goals are usually expressed in broad terms and visualize a desired outcome that solves or alleviates the problem/needs. Most grant applications will have one goal; larger projects may have more than one goal. Here is a sample goal for a Balanced Literacy curriculum redesign project:

• The Balanced Literacy curriculum initiative will improve 3rd through 5th grade students’ achievement in language arts.

Objectives represent major steps or actions taken to accomplish your goal. These steps or actions may be based on best practices for implementing a specific educational program or intervention. In contrast to goals, objectives are presented in SMART format; that is, objectives should be specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound. Thinking about our Balanced Literacy curriculum redesign project, here are a few SMART objectives:

• By the end of the first quarter, at least two teachers from each target grade (3rd-5th) will be recruited to participate in a Balanced Literacy curriculum writing team.

• By the end of the second quarter, all members of the curriculum writing team will complete at least 24 hours of professional development in Balanced Literacy.

Outcomes are often required components of a grant application. Outcomes represent the measurable results associated with the accomplishment of a goal; they are also written in SMART format. Funders may use project outcomes as the basis for evaluating the success of your grant, so they should be chosen carefully. Here are two outcomes associated with our Balanced Literacy curriculum redesign project goal:

• By the end of the project, the percent of 3rd through 5th grade students scoring proficient on the state’s standardized language arts assessment will increase to at least 80%.

• By the end of the project, 90% of 3rd through 5th grade students will read on grade level.

More Grant Writing Tips:

• When writing objectives, include all relevant groups and individuals in your target population. While the beneficiaries of most educational initiatives are students, some objectives may focus on engagement and training of teachers and administrators as part of project implementation.

• When writing objectives, establish reasonable timelines for accomplishing objectives. If permissible according to grant guidelines, focus on project planning during the grant’s first year instead of rushing to implementation.

• Review existing research on your educational intervention before writing objectives and outcomes. Inquire about which specific outcomes are associated with your selected intervention and what degree of improvement can be expected if the intervention is fully implemented.

• Funders may define goals, objectives, and outcomes differently. When writing a grant application, always use the language and definitions of the funder.

Introducing Gaston-Shaffer, Facilitating Strategic Planning for Educational Agencies

Gaston-Shaffer is the integrated consulting team from two Virginia-based firms: Gaston Educational Consulting and Shaffer Evaluation Group. Gaston-Shaffer offers to school districts and higher education institutions comprehensive strategic planning services, i

ncluding community stakeholder consultation, planning facilitation, and performance measurement planning.

As Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Gaston Educational Consulting, LLC, David Gaston develops and executes strategic initiatives to improve organizational and academic achievement, team building, and organizational culture.

As Founder and President of Shaffer Evaluation Group, Patricia Moore Shaffer works with partners — school districts, colleges and universities, government agencies and nonprofits — to develop and evaluate programs that address and correct long-standing inequities in education so that all children and youth can excel.

Shaffer and Gaston regularly combine their expertise to collaborate on evidence-based strategic plans and how to implement them to fully benefit students and the entire communities where they reside. They have successfully collaborated on multiple projects,

Strategic planning at Caroline County Public Schools

including strategic plans for school divisions in Charles City and King George County in Virginia.

Currently, Gaston-Shaffer is facilitating strategic planning for Caroline County Public Schools in Virginia. Business and industry partners, students, school board leadership, faculty and staff recently participated in stakeholder focus groups and online surveys, where they identified their vision of student success at CCPS. This thorough community engagement process yielded prominent themes, which a steering committee is currently into strategic goals and objectives that the entire learning community can get behind. An accompanying measurement framework will provide performance indicators and metrics that are measured each year to gauge plan progress and success.

To learn more about Gaston-Shaffer's approach to strategic planning or to request a proposal, please contact seg@shafferevaluation.com.