More Tennessee students are moving straight from high school to college

The Tennessee Higher Education Commission (THEC) announced Thursday that the state is seeing the largest increase in students going straight from high school to college since the Tennessee Promise launched in 2015.According to the THEC report, Tennessee’s statewide college-going rate for the class of 2022 is 54.3 percent, an increase of 1.5 percent from the year prior.  The college-going rate indicates the portion of public high school graduates who seamlessly enroll (i.e., immediately after high school) in postsecondary education. “This achievement reflects the collective efforts of our state's students, families, educators, and policymakers. By fostering a college-going culture and ensuring equitable access to higher education, we are empowering Tennessee's future workforce and strengthening our communities,” said Interim THEC Executive Director Dr. Robert M. Smith.The THEC report also found the college going for the class of 2022 is up across all races and genders, but those gains weren’t evenly distributed.Black/African American students of both genders, Hispanic/Latino females, and white males saw growth in college-going rates above the statewide average according to the report but white females, Hispanic/Latino males, and students of either gender in the “other” race category did not. The report also broke down college-going rates by county.  Middle Tennessee saw both the highest (Williamson County 82 percent) college-going rate and the lowest (Robertson County 37 percent). Sixty-four of Tennessee’s 95 counties have a college-going rate below the state average, including Davidson (49 percent) and Shelby (52 percent). One factor helping improve the college-going rate according to the report is Tennessee’s Dual Enrollment Grant.  The grant is a state scholarship that pays for high school students to take college-level classes. Dual Enrollment Grant participants at any point in their high school career had consistently higher college-going rates than their graduating peers.Following the report’s release, education advocates with the State Collaborative on Reforming Education (SCORE) credited the 1.5 percent increase with being important but still lagging college-going rate highs from just a few years ago.SCORE provided six strategies to improve moving forward including:

• Expanding high-quality advising for students in both high school and postsecondary so that students are aware of the financial aid, postsecondary programs of study, and other opportunities available to them as they graduate high school and enter the workforce.
• Increasing access to early postsecondary opportunities (EPSOs), like Dual Enrollment, in high school to build momentum toward college going and expose students to college opportunities while still in high school.
• Strengthening the state’s Ready Graduate measure to hold high schools accountable for increasing the college-going rate and for students earning credentials in high school aligned to workforce needs.
• Strengthening postsecondary finance in Tennessee, including improving financial aid opportunities to support students to attend college and examining the state’s outcomes-based funding formula to reward workforce readiness for students.
• Reimagining the state’s community college programming to include an increased focus statewide on workforce-informed programs.
• Using the state’s longitudinal data system to increasingly evaluate and inform state leaders on how to strengthen the connections between K-12, postsecondary, and work.

“It’s clear that Tennessee is beginning to recover from the impacts of the pandemic on college going, but we can and must do more to ensure every Tennessee student reaps the economic benefits that a postsecondary credential offers. Years of college-going declines followed by a modest increase solidifies the need for immediate, bold, and sustained action,” said David Mansouri, SCORE president and CEO.