Alignment, Timing and Support: The Effect of Early Intervention on Student College Readiness

Co-Principal Investigator: Goldhaber, Dan

• TIP reduced DE enrollment in math by 8-10 percentage points in both 2- and 4-year colleges. TIP also increased the likelihood of passing college level math before the end of the first year in 4-year universities by 4 percentage points on average and by 9 percentage points among free/reduced-price lunch eligible students (Xu et al., 2022).
• TIP increased the likelihood that students took at least 15 credits during the first term, a key early momentum measure that predicts college completion. These early effects, however, did not translate into statistically significant impacts on the likelihood of transfers from a 2-year to a 4-year college, or the likelihood of earning enough credits to graduate from college (Xu et al., 2021. forthcoming in Community College Review).
• Evidence suggests several possible explanations for the lack of longer-term benefits. (a) Effects on early college outcomes may not be large enough to move the needle. (b) The increase in transition math course-taking came at the expense of regular HS math courses such as Algebra II, a critical precollegiate milestone for earning a college degree. And (c) The skills that high schools required for students to successful exit from TIP are consistent with the skills needed for placing out of DE math in college, but they are not sufficient for students to succeed in college (Xu et al., 2021. forthcoming in Community College Review).
• The estimated costs of TIP range between $400 and $900 per student. Per student costs vary depending on the number of students who needed TIP services, whether services were delivered during or after regular school time, and whether services were primarily computer-based, teacher-led or blended (Levin et al., 2020).

Because the target student population of TIP overlapped with students who were likely to concentrate in career technical education (CTE), the study also examined whether TIP crowded out CTE course taking and the relationship between CTE fields of concentration and key college outcomes. The study found that

• TIP did not significantly reduce CTE course taking, and that most students who specialized in a CTE area went on to study and earn credentials in something else in college (Xu & Backes, 2022.).

Each intervention cycle starts with a diagnostic pretest to identify specific deficiency areas. Algebraic thinking, math reasoning, math computation, writing mechanics, and writing content were the areas in which students mostly frequently needed help during the study period. Most students received interventions in the form of transition courses, which could be either integrated into an existing course or a stand-alone course. Most transition courses make use of online curricula (such as ALEX, Dreambox, Edgenuity, and IXL) in combination with teacher developed materials. An average intervention session was about 55 minutes long and was delivered four times a week. Around half of TIP participants in our sample were judged by schools to have exited remediation successfully.

The implementation and cost study used administrative data and primary data collected through interviews and surveys to understand intervention types, intensity, delivery modes and setting, staffing, materials, and outcomes. A resource cost model (RCM) was used to support data collection and analyze cost analysis results. In an RCM, every program resource was assigned to a specific resource type category. Researchers used the resource categories as a guide to ensure that all resources were considered. Resource quantities were then multiplied with corresponding unit prices to obtain the total costs.