A Step toward College Success: Assessing Attainment among Indiana's Twenty-First Century Scholars

The Twenty-first Century Scholars Program is an early-intervention program intended to improve college enrollment among low-income students in Indiana. The Scholars program provides support services--plus a guarantee of grant aid equivalent to public college tuition--to students who pledge in eighth grade to meet five criteria: (1) complete high school (2) maintain at least a C average (3) remain drug- and crime-free; (4) apply for college and student financial aid; and (5) enroll in an Indiana college within two years of high school. This study traces the 1999 cohort of Twenty-first Century Scholars. It examines the impact that a Scholars award had on students' attainment status four years after enrollment in a public college (i.e., at the end of the 2002-03 academic year). Among low-income students, those who took the Scholars pledge and enrolled in college had equal or better odds of academic success than did their non-Scholar peers. Thus, the program has had a limited but positive effect on persistence and attainment. The following are appended: (1) The 1999 cohort: database design; (2) Attainment analyses for the entire cohort; and (3) Attainment analyses for low-income students. (Contains 10 endnotes.)

A Step toward College Success: Assessing Attainment among Indiana's Twenty-First Century Scholars Book