What Are the College Outcomes for the Metropolitan Nashville Public Schools High School Class of 2007 after Six Years?

In recent years Tennessee policymakers have focused on improving the college outcomes of high school graduates. For example, the Tennessee Promise scholarship established in 2014 offers two years of community or technical college free to eligible high school graduates (Tennessee Promise, 2015). Given such policy developments, it is important to document college outcomes among Tennessee high school graduates and to provide baseline information for future comparisons. The study presented in this report was guided by the following research questions, which examined the cohort of students who graduated from Metropolitan Nashville Public Schools (MNPS) in 2007: (1) What is the cumulative first-time public college enrollment rate, by semester from fall 2007 through spring 2013, for the MNPS cohort; how do the rates differ from those for all students statewide; and how do the gaps between White and Black MNPS students differ from the gaps between White and Black students statewide?; (2) What are the MNPS cohort's most recent public college enrollment and completion rates two, four, and six years after high school graduation; how do the rates differ from those for all students statewide; and how do the gaps between White and Black MNPS students differ from the gaps between White and Black students statewide?; and (3) How many credits did full-time enrollees in Tennessee public colleges accumulate in their first year of college, what was their grade point average, how do the results differ from those for all students statewide, and how do the gaps between White and Black MNPS students differ from the gaps between White and Black students statewide? Among the cohort of high school students graduating from MNPS in 2007, 37 percent enrolled in a public college, a rate similar to that statewide. Among the same MNPS cohort, 15 percent completed a four-year public college degree within six years and 2 percent completed a two-year public college degree within six years without enrolling in a four-year institution--lower than the rates among all students in Tennessee. MNPS students who enrolled in college the first semester after graduating from high school completed a four-year degree within six years at a slightly lower rate (36 percent) than did all comparable students statewide (38 percent). Although a higher percentage of White than of Black MNPS students completed a four year degree within six years, the gap (6 percentage points) was smaller than the gap between all White students and all Black students statewide (8 percentage points). Further, the first-time college enrollment rate in fall 2007 was similar among White and Black MNPS students but higher among all White students than among all Black students statewide.