Improve College Readiness by Creating a Class

By:  Patrick O'Connor  Ph.D

If you’re helping kids find ways to pay for college, there’s brand new data to help your efforts. A study spearheaded by The Common Application, in conjunction with researchers at University of Virginia, Harvard, and University of Pittsburgh, shows that more students are inclined to complete the government-based FAFSA financial aid form if they receive a series of systematically designed texts urging them to do so.

The study finds that the most important part of the texts is the message. Rather than focusing on how much money the student can receive for college, the texts are most effective when they tell the student what they should specifically do, and when they should do it. Supported with a message that urges students to set up their own set of reminders on their phones or planners, these step-by-step texts lead to increased FAFSA completion. (Full disclosure: I sit on Common App’s board of directors.)

These results support a long-standing string of discoveries about college access that date back to the original Know How2Go campaign. Low income students are well aware of the importance of college, and most have a desire to attend. Study after study reveals the help they really need is understanding the concrete steps required to prepare, apply, and pay for college, and what to do to avoid summer melt.

This is an awful lot of information for counselors to pass along to students through newsletters, parent meetings, and informal conversations in the hallway. That’s why a growing number of high schools are offering an elective class in getting ready for college. They still create the Websites, assemblies, and reminders needed to keep students focused on the college selection process, but they take all of the vital college information and put it in a semester course that helps students stay focused, organized, and on task.

There isn’t a lot of data available on the effectiveness of these classes, but counselors know they are making a difference. By putting college access information into one course, counselors are able to introduce ideas with a consistency and sequence they often can’t achieve through newsletters, or even as guest presenters in academic classes. This sequencing reinforces the ability to tell students what they should do, and when they should do it, the success that’s reported in The Common Application study.

In addition to being a consistent source of information, a college readiness class gives students two other commodities they seem to be lacking—the time to apply to college, and a focused space to do so. This allows students to use the counselor’s expertise at the right moment, when they get stuck on a college application question. They don’t have to put the application off; instead, they ask the question, get the answer, and move forward.

This also creates a space for students to craft well thought-out essays, instead of trying to find time to cobble them together between work, studying, and other after-school commitments. And if they need to talk to a teacher about a letter of recommendation, the teacher is right down the hall.

Students from all walks of life have benefited from the organized, supportive atmosphere a college readiness class offers them, and school counselors appreciate the opportunity focusing part of their day on college application conversations that are sometimes hard to develop in the midst of other duties. In a time when it seems to be getting harder to get student’s attention, the structure of the classroom is proving to be a tremendous ally in the campaign for increased college readiness.