Multi-College Initiatives

CAGP supported participating community colleges in guided pathways implementation to substantially increase the number of students who earn postsecondary credentials and/or transfer with junior status. In 2016, College Futures Foundation partnered with NCII to select 20 colleges for CAGP 1.0. Additional support for this initial cohort came from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Teagle Foundation, and James Irvine Foundation. In 2020, College Futures and NCII launched CAGP 2.0 with 37 colleges, including 18 from the inaugural group and 19 new colleges, carried out in partnership with the Success Center for California Community Colleges and the California Community Colleges Chancellor’s Office.

NCII helped participating colleges approach guided pathways reforms in ways that facilitate short-term academic success and long-term economic security and mobility for each student. We served colleges through multi-day institutes, coaching, professional learning, and peer-to-peer support. In addition, we provided teams with safe, facilitated spaces to share aspirations and address challenging elements of their redesign priorities. Find strategies, resources, examples, and action steps – organized by CAGP 2.0 institute and webinar themes – in the California Guided Pathways Playbook.

This initiative seeks to scale IEBC’s Caring Campus approach to all five institutions in the Alamo Colleges District (TX). NCII is specifically supporting integration of Alamo’s ongoing guided pathways work with IEBC’s Caring Campus implementation. Our efforts focus on key challenges students face in their first two weeks of class, given the opportunity to strengthen retention at this early and important juncture. NCII is facilitating a design process to identify solutions to these issues, including work with design teams that will recommend changes to students’ experiences and/or institutional policies, practices, systems, and structures.

This project builds on the 2005 return on investment (ROI) modeling work originally conceived by NCII’s founder and president, Rob Johnstone, while working with the Research and Planning Group for California Community Colleges (RP Group). In its current form, we use the ROI framework and associated resources to help colleges model the potential impacts of guided pathways investments as well as noncredit-to-credit transitional career programs.

The Academy involves mid-level faculty, staff, and administrators (below the vice president level) in building their leadership capacity and supports colleges with succession planning. Through this year-long experience, participants strengthen leadership skills in the context of guided pathways redesign and work on a team-based project to apply those skills in practice. Combined, the training, ideas exchange, and peer support positions participants to drive transformation at their institutions focused on improving student experiences and outcomes.

Originally launched in 2019 through a partnership with the Ohio Association of Community Colleges’ Success Center (OACCSC) and the Aspen Institute’s College Excellence Program, NCII expanded this effort in 2023 with support from the Ascendium Education Group, ECMC Foundation, and the Kresge Foundation. The Academy now involves cohorts in Ohio, Michigan, New York, and Texas, serving more than 150 Student Success Fellows each year.

Funded by the ECMC Foundation and led by the Michigan Center for Student Success, this project helped the state’s community colleges understand the wraparound service needs of their students and community; systematically integrate holistic supports into existing student services, with a focus on students experiencing financial insecurity; and share best practices across Michigan.

Working in partnership with the Michigan Community College Association, NCII provided student financial stability professional development, coaching, and resources. NCII helped guide colleges through periodic self-assessments so they could design, implement, and reflect on strategies to support students’ non-academic needs.

NCII is partnering with the Michigan Community College Association and the Ohio Association of Community Colleges to help college leaders work on issues critical to their students’ post-graduation success. We are providing continued support to alumni of NCII’s Leadership Academy for Student Success, offering new training and resources to foster a post-graduation success mindset in institutional reform, and creating opportunities for college leaders to learn from each other. The Ascendium Education Group is funding this initiative.

Working in partnership with the North Carolina Community College System’s Student Success Center (NCSSC), NCII provided hands-on sessions focused on operationalizing the ideas of equitable guided career pathways at participating colleges. Support emphasized designing for post-graduation success and making substantive changes in systems, structures, and practices that lead to improved economic mobility for more students and communities. NCII developed customized living-wage occupational data for regional markets across the state and consulted with nearly 20 individual institutions on applying this information to move from the status quo to redesigning students’ experiences at scale.

NCII launched “Rural Pathways” Phase 1 (2022-2024) with a national cohort of 16 rural community colleges. The initiative is the first of its kind in two ways: It is the only pathways institute structure focused specifically on the needs of rural institutions, and it is the first time community partners are deeply embedded in pathways implementation.

Phase 2 (2025-2027) expands Rural Pathways to 28 colleges, including all but one from Phase 1. Participating colleges will work with each other — and community partners in their regions — to implement evidence-based, institution-wide reforms grounded in the guided pathways framework. They specifically commit to:

• Designing and implementing a better student experience at their colleges.
• Ensuring that more students earn credentials and move on to living-wage jobs or transfer to a four-year institution with junior status.
• Collaborating with key stakeholders to increase economic opportunity in their region through a cross-sector approach to guided pathways.
• Implementing evidence-based reforms that will lead to improved educational and workforce outcomes.

NCII is directing this multi-year project with support from the Ascendium Education Group, the Ford Family Foundation, and the Margaret A. Cargill Philanthropies as well as a group of additional national and regional funders. Learn more about the Rural Guided Pathways Project.

The RLLC involved a cohort of rural community college leaders who engaged in professional development opportunities and explored innovative solutions to concerns that are unique to rural student success. Established in 2020, the RLLC engaged a cross-functional group of 26 rural community college senior administrators from 25 states with deep on-the-ground expertise and a shared understanding of the rural context.

NCII hosted regular convenings and webinars through which members explored common challenges and collectively addressed issues related to their redesign and institutional improvement efforts. The RLLC also created a series of briefs that explain rural colleges’ imperative to regain control of their regions’ talent pipelines, serve as engines of economic improvement, and thus provide opportunities for both individual upward mobility and regional stability. The Ascendium Education Group supported this initiative.

NCII collaborated with WestEd’s Center for Economic Mobility to support its national Skills Builder initiative. This effort elevated the experience and outcomes of community college students who enroll for a short period, complete a limited number of career-oriented courses, and translate this coursework into additional earnings.

NCII provided technical assistance to colleges to identify common course combinations for specific career technical programs and determine what these courses position students to do next – both educationally and occupationally. This approach helps colleges with (1) program (re)design to better serve this important and often misunderstood population, and (2) advances efforts to articulate the value proposition for enrollment in these discrete course combinations as well as engagement with full programs of study.