Three Ohio community colleges in 2014 began adopting versions of a student success program from the City University of New York. The expanding program, dubbed Accelerated Study in Associate Programs (ASAP), requires community college students to attend full-time while providing them with a wide array of additional supports, including enhanced advising, special first-year courses, cohort course taking, tutoring, career services, a tuition waiver, textbook assistance and a subsidy for public transportation. While ASAP requires more funding up front, it has paid off with big graduation and retention rate gains, which research has shown pays off for colleges as well as students...

...Newly released results from a random assignment evaluation, conducted by the nonprofit group MDRC, found that the three colleges have nearly doubled three-year graduation rates for participating students while increasing transfers to four-year colleges among participants by 50 percent. Students enrolled in the program also had earned 8.5 more college credits on average compared to those in the control group, the new study found. And positive effects were evident for all subgroups of students in the study, including those who entered college with developmental education requirements...

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