More Essential Than Ever: Community College Pathways to Educational and Career Success

An evidence-based approach to community college transformation featuring innovative practices that strengthen offerings and foster student success

In More Essential Than Ever, researchers Davis Jenkins, Hana Lahr, John Fink, Serena C. Klempin, and Maggie P. Fay center US community colleges as critical to upward mobility and workforce development in their communities, highlighting new practices these institutions are using to build high-quality programs and support students’ educational and career success.

Drawing on a decade of research on whole-college guided pathways reforms at more than 100 community colleges nationally, they illustrate how colleges have implemented large-scale changes to help students better navigate the journey to completion. They argue, however, that to achieve better and more equitable outcomes—and to recruit and retain more students in a highly competitive market—colleges must not only remove barriers to completion but also strengthen pathways to student goals after graduation, thus making their investment of money, time, and effort worth it.

The book provides compelling case studies of how colleges are achieving this along five frontiers: strengthening program career and baccalaureate transfer outcomes, teaching students to be versatile learners, strengthening recruitment and onboarding, ensuring students complete in as little time and at as low a cost as possible, and building on-ramps to high-opportunity postsecondary pathways from high school. The book also gives practical guidance for college leaders on managing and funding these innovations and for state policymakers on encouraging and supporting them.

Davis Jenkins is a senior research scholar at the Community College Research Center, Teachers College, Columbia University, and a research professor in education and social policy analysis at Teachers College. He is the coauthor of Redesigning America’s Community Colleges: A Clearer Path to Student Success, which helped to catalyze the national guided pathways community college reform movement. Hana Lahr is assistant director of research and director of applied learning, John Fink is a senior research associate and program lead, Serena C. Klempin is a research associate, and Maggie P. Fay is a senior research associate, all at the Community College Research Center, Teachers College, Columbia University.