College Enrollment and Persistence in Rural Pennsylvania Schools

• In Event: Studies of Rural Students' College Enrollment and Persistence in Pennsylvania, Oregon, and Indiana

Abstract

The Pennsylvania Association of Rural and Small Schools (PARSS), a member of the Regional Educational Laboratory (REL) Mid-Atlantic’s Rural College Readiness Research Alliance, is a statewide policy and advocacy organization with 199 member districts and intermediate units. PARSS members receive National Student Clearinghouse reports on college enrollment patterns in their districts through the Pennsylvania Department of Education, but these reports do not show how schools compare with other rural and nonrural schools, nor do they analyze recent college-going patterns in Pennsylvania or investigate the factors associated with those patterns.
Accordingly, the goal of this study is to help Pennsylvania education stakeholders better understand college enrollment and persistence rates in rural schools. Stakeholders wanted both a comparison of rural and nonrural schools and an analysis of factors and characteristics associated with those rates. This information would help stakeholders consider additional research on the rural schools with the highest college enrollment rates.
Through analyses of data from the Pennsylvania Department of Education and the National Student Clearinghouse, the study sought to answer four research questions:
• What are the college enrollment and persistence rates and characteristics of rural Pennsylvania schools, and how do these rates and characteristics compare with those of city, suburban, and town schools and between high school cohorts?
• How do college enrollment rates by type of college vary across rural Pennsylvania schools, and how do these rates compare with those of city, suburban, and town schools?
• What characteristics of rural Pennsylvania districts and schools are associated with higher and lower college enrollment and persistence rates?
• How do college enrollment rates, persistence rates, and the types of postsecondary institutions in which students enroll vary among schools in PARSS districts?
This study analyzed average rates of college enrollment and first- to second-year college persistence among rural and nonrural regular public high schools in Pennsylvania for the 2009/10 and 2010/11 high school graduation cohorts. It describes the association of student-, school-, and college-level factors with enrollment and persistence outcomes.
Key findings include:
• Rural schools had higher average college enrollment and persistence rates than city schools but lower rates than suburban and town schools.
• Rural–fringe schools had higher average college enrollment and persistence rates than rural–distant or rural–remote schools.
• Most graduates of high schools in all locales went to public four-year colleges and in-state colleges.
• Rural schools with a larger population of economically disadvantaged students had lower college enrollment and persistence rates than rural schools serving a smaller population of economically disadvantaged students—even after controlling for other factors.

Authors

• Caitlin Howley, ICF International

• Jerry Johnson, Ohio University

• Aikaterini Passa, ICF International

• Kazuaki Uekawa, ICF International