UW–Madison’s Xueli Wang has authored an article in The Conversation that is titled, “Doing this one thing helps community college students transfer to a four-year university.”
Wang is the Barbara and Glenn Thompson Professor in Educational Leadership with the School of Education’s Department of Educational Leadership and Policy Analysis.
The “one thing” Wang identifies that community college students can do is connecting during their first term with advisers or professors at the school where they want to transfer.
Wang found in her study that the probability of transferring for students who actively connect with someone at the school where they want to transfer is 38 percent, compared with 23 percent for students who don’t connect.
“Some may think these findings show the importance of students taking the initiative to reach out to the college they want to attend,” said Wang.
However, she continued: “I would argue that my findings show the importance of four-year colleges being more intentional about helping community college students transfer. Specifically, I think that officials at four-year colleges should treat community college students as prospective four-year college students.”
Learn more about Wang’s study by reading the full article on theconversation.com, here.