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partnerships between community colleges and high schools that may make it more likely for students to complete three important milestones on the road to college completion: 1. Enrollment in college – In order for students to complete college, they must first enroll. Colleges work with high schools to increase the likelihood that students will view college matriculation as an option. 2. College readiness at enrollment – Many students enter college in need of remediation; participation in remedial (also called developmental) education is associated with lower rates of degree completion. Colleges and high schools can work together to increase the number of students who are college-ready upon entry. 3. Persistence in college – Students often enter college only to leave before completing a degree, frequently during the first year. Their success can depend on the extent to which they make a smooth transition from high school to college.

Initiatives designed to provide high school students with access to existing and regular college resources and offerings, such as assessments or college courses. • Programs or activities that partnerships develop together specifically for high school students and their needs.

Central to the paper is the structure hypothesis: that community college students will be more likely to persist and succeed in programs that are tightly and consciously structured, with relatively little room for individuals to unintentionally deviate from paths toward completion, and with limited bureaucratic obstacles for students to circumnavigate. Evidence suggests that the lack of structure in many community colleges is likely to result in less-than-optimal decisions by students about whether and how to persist toward a credential.

Among students who begin in a two-year college, only 12 percent of underrepresented minority students and 16 percent of other students transfer to a four-year institution. Among transfers, only 55 percent of the minorities and 61 percent of other students earn a bachelor’s within six years of transferring. In sum, then, only about seven percent of minority students—and 10 percent of nonminority students—who begin in a two-year college earn a bachelor’s degree from any institution in these large systems within 10 years of starting college. These rates are far lower than for students who begin even in nonselective four-year colleges.

We can’t afford to waste this much talent. Indeed, a recent report from the independent, congressionally chartered Advisory Committee on Student Financial Assistance painted a stark picture of the consequences of current attendance patterns. According to the committee’s calculations, the combination of three forces—the increasing cost of college, insufficient need-based grant aid, and an enrollment shift among college-qualified students toward the two-year sector—resulted in a loss of between 1.7 and 3.2 million bachelor’s degrees over the last decade.

Preserving and enhancing the instructional excellence of Virginia's leading universities and of the higher education system as a whole; Increasing significantly the percentage of college-age Virginians enrolling in institutions of higher education and attaining degrees; Attracting and preparing young people for the STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math) areas and other disciplines (e.g., healthcare and advanced manufacturing) where skill shortages now exist and/or unmet demand is anticipated; Forging new effective public-private partnerships and regional strategies for business recruitment, workforce preparation, and university-based research; Making Virginia a national leader in providing higher education opportunities to military personnel and veterans; Crafting a sustainable higher education funding model that will systematically move Virginia toward higher levels of educational attainment and economic competitiveness over the next decade-and-a-half; Developing innovative ways to deliver quality instruction, cost-saving reform strategies, and affordable new pathways to degree attainment for capable and motivated Virginians regardless of income or background; Evaluating strategies to reduce costs through additional college placement testing and accelerated degree completion; and Creating effective workforce development programs through expanded use of the Community College System in coordination with the Commission on Economic Development and Job Creation.