We finally received results for Year 3 college enrollment district-wide, and unfortunately, the percentage of HPS graduates starting college the fall immediately after graduation remained unchanged at 56%. The following data tables give a picture of the recently updated data from the National Student Clearinghouse: 

% of Hartford students enrolled FALL after graduation

2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019
55% 57% 62% 62% 56% 56%

% of Hartford students enrolled YEAR after graduation

201420152016201720182019
59% 61% 66% 66% 60% ?%

% of freshman to sophomore persistence

201420152016201720182019
74% 79% 79% 80% * *
*Persistence for a given cohort not available until the second academic year of study has concluded 

% of students completing any degree within 6 years

200820092010201120122013
24% 27% 24% 22% 24%* 25%
*Revised upward from 23% in most recent NSC report 

As a result of the lackluster change in enrollment percentage, we want to expand the Summer Melt program to ensure our summer intervention makes a measurable difference. While last year’s Summer Transition action team had a cohort of almost 200 students across five campuses, this year’s cohort is 280 students across just Capital and Manchester Community Colleges. Most of HPS students attend those colleges, so we feel focusing on these students with full support of the community college leadership will make the biggest impact.

Achieve Hartford  hired three college students at Capital Community College and two at Manchester to be our summer outreach specialists, and they now have several  weeks under their belts. Our partners at the two community colleges were fantastic in helping identify strong student applicants and in co-facilitating the training for them. Each of the five summer outreach specialists has a caseload of 50-60 students to call/email/text all summer, and with the expected response rate, the real ratio is more like 1:40 max.  

While some students will need a lot of support to finish the enrollment process, others will not. Regardless, the staff at the colleges stands ready to take referrals and make sure every student who  asks for support gets it – especially as it relates to successfully completing the FAFSA and course registration. We will keep you abreast of progress over the summer.