Effective Practices for Promoting the Transition of High School Students to College

As a follow-up to the initial summary of literature contained in Basic Skills as a Foundation for Success in California Community Colleges (Center for Student Success), this report reviews effective practices for the successful transition of students from high school to college entry as documented in research-based literature. A significant body of literature has addressed various aspects of the high school to college transition. Much of the research has centered on  defining the barriers or obstacles impeding successful transitions, with corresponding recommendations for strategies for overcoming these obstacles. The effective practices tend to be programmatic as opposed to isolated interventions; therefore, it is difficult to assess the impact of any single aspect within a program. Instead, the research implies that a combination of strategies working together tend to have the greatest impact. Practitioners should view the interventions as “packages” when considering implementation and weighing which strategies are most useful.

The effective practices identified in the body of this report represent a synthesis of consistent findings and recommendations identified through the analysis of the published literature. While the collective wisdom of practitioners and/or expert opinion is occasionally referenced in this document, the general standard applied in selecting practices for inclusion is that they are supported by evidence gathered through rigorous, controlled research methods, and that claims of significant impact or correlation are well-substantiated.

Community college practitioners, the primary audience for this report, need a deep understanding of the factors affecting the college-going and readiness of incoming high school graduates. This same body of knowledge affects our understanding of delayed-enrollment adults who exited the preparatory pipeline in high school, many of whom later present themselves for college entry through adult education transition points. Moreover, this paper seeks to inform the development of crosssegmental practitioner dialogues at many levels, to address the issues that impede the successful college transition of nearly two-thirds of California’s high school students.