Providing More Cash for College: Interim Findings from the Performance-Based Scholarship Demonstration in California

New York: MDRC, 2015

208 Pages Posted: 3 Jul 2015

Date Written: June 30, 2015

Abstract

This report presents early findings from a random assignment evaluation of performance-based scholarships targeting college-bound high school seniors in California. Performance-based scholarships are need-based grants contingent on meeting certain academic benchmarks to receive payment — in this case, a half-time course load with a “C” or better grade point average (GPA). Unlike merit-based scholarships, there are no academic criteria to be eligible for the program at the outset. The CFC-PBS scholarship can be taken to any accredited, degree-granting college or university in the country. The goal of the CFC-PBS Program is to increase the amount of aid available for students while simultaneously providing an incentive for academic achievement.

MDRC randomly assigned over 5,000 students to one of five program groups that were eligible for the incentive scholarship, to a group that was eligible for a scholarship without performance criteria, or to a control group that received their colleges’ standard financial aid packages. This report analyzes three terms of follow-up data from the program in California. Overall, the findings in this report show the following:

•The CFC-PBS Program was largely implemented as designed.

•While few students received the entire amount of the scholarship for which they were eligible, most students received some funding. In this way, the design of the scholarship enabled more students to receive additional financial aid.

•The CFC-PBS Program encouraged more students to matriculate, by about 5 percentage points above the control group rate of 84.4 percent. This increased matriculation largely occurred at community colleges. However, the program had only limited effects on persistence from semester to semester, and only for community college students.

•The program had positive impacts on academic success. These effects extend to numerous subgroups, such as males, females, and students of Latino ethnicity. There is strong evidence that the program affected students with lower high school GPAs more than students with higher high school GPAs.

•The cost to administer scholarships increased as performance requirements were added, but since on the whole, students received only a portion of the scholarship amount they were offered, the decrease in payments to students more than offset the increased cost of administration. All else being equal, scholarships with more performance requirements cost less than scholarships with fewer performance requirements.

Keywords: random assignment, performance-based scholarships, academic incentives, financial aid, college scholarships

JEL Classification: H52, I22

Suggested Citation

Richburg-Hayes, Lashawn and Patel, Reshma and Brock, Thomas and de la Campa, Elijah and Rudd, Timothy and Valenzuela, Ireri, Providing More Cash for College: Interim Findings from the Performance-Based Scholarship Demonstration in California (June 30, 2015). New York: MDRC, 2015, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2625711

Lashawn Richburg-Hayes (Contact Author)

MDRC ( email )

200 Vesey Street
New York, NY 10281
United States

Reshma Patel

MDRC ( email )

200 Vesey Street
10281
United States

Thomas Brock

MDRC ( email )

200 Vesey Street
10281
United States

Elijah De la Campa

MDRC ( email )

200 Vesey Street
New York, NY 10281
United States

Timothy Rudd

MDRC

200 Vesey Street
New York, NY 10281
United States

Ireri Valenzuela

MDRC ( email )

200 Vesey Street
New York, NY 10281
United States

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