Thread by @DrewMAnderson

🚨 New working paper on financial aid for college! 🚨

Link:
rand.org/pubs/working_p…

A quick summary in this #thread...

This paper looks at two-year college students who have the greatest financial need, and finds that a grant of around $1,000 increased rates of degree completion over the following three years by about 1-2 percentage points, from a baseline of 19% completion.

The research design is a regression discontinuity using a cutoff in the date of filing the FAFSA. Wisconsin allocates aid first-come first-served among financially eligible applicants. More details on this and supplementary strategies, in the paper.

How does this add to our knowledge of #finaid? Studies don't always find strong positive effects, especially for "aid only" and especially at two-year colleges.

See:
cepa.stanford.edu/content/impact…

and:
sciencedirect.com/science/articl…

But we know college students are struggling to make ends meet.

See:
hope4college.com/college-and-un…

Often researchers' strategies to assess effectiveness of aid rely on smaller experiments, or on program cutoffs at the upper end of the income range. That leaves out a large group of students receiving public aid who are very poor, for whom the findings might be different.

My findings show that the poorest students, who already get support from maximum #Pell grants, still benefit from additional aid.

Generally the aid appears to support completion of college more than it induces enrollment. This makes sense, since this aid has so much uncertainty with complicated eligibility and funding shortages. It helps people who get it rather than attracting applicants.

Shout outs to @hope4college, @Spencer_Fdn, and Ascendium Education Group for financial support.

The paper is under review and would benefit from your comments, questions, and suggestions!