higher education policy nonprofits

National College Attainment Network

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Institute For Higher Education Policy

• Washington, DC
• Tax-exempt since June 1998
• EIN: 52-1818907

Organization summary

Type of nonprofit.

Designated as a 501(c)3 Organizations for any of the following purposes: religious, educational, charitable, scientific, literary, testing for public safety, fostering national or international amateur sports competition (as long as it doesn’t provide athletic facilities or equipment), or the prevention of cruelty to children or animals.

Category : Social Science Research Institutes, Services / Social Science Institutes, Services (NTEE)

Donations to this organization are tax deductible.

According to its Dec. 2022 tax filing, this nonprofit: Reported conflict of interest transactions Organizations must report loans, grants or business transactions with interested parties, which may include key employees and officers, their family members and any businesses in which they hold a controlling interest. These transactions must be reported on Schedule L.

Summary charts: organization finances over time

Revenue $4.27m (2022), expenses $4.18m (2022), total assets $12.7m (2022), total liabilities $598k (2022), tax filings by year.

Form 990 is an information return that most organizations claiming federal tax-exempt status must file yearly with the IRS. Nonprofit Explorer has IRS digitized Form 990 data for filings processed in 2012 and later. If this organization filed an amended return, it may not be reflected below. Duplicate download links may indicate a resubmission or amendment to this organization's original return. Form 990 data is from the IRS.

Fiscal Year Ending Dec. 2022

Extracted financial data, extracted financial data from form 990.

Compensation

Document Links

Primary tax return for a nonprofit’s activities, finances, and governance

Fiscal Year Ending Dec. 2021

Fiscal Year Ending Dec. 2020

Fiscal Year Ending Dec. 2019

Fiscal Year Ending Dec. 2018

For unrelated business income from activities not substantially related to the organization's tax-exempt purpose

Fiscal Year Ending Dec. 2017

Fiscal Year Ending Dec. 2016

Fiscal Year Ending Dec. 2015

Fiscal Year Ending Dec. 2014

Fiscal Year Ending Dec. 2013

Fiscal Year Ending Dec. 2012

Fiscal Year Ending Dec. 2011

Fiscal Year Ending Dec. 2010

Fiscal Year Ending Dec. 2009

No extracted financial data.

Extracted financial data is not available for the forms filed in this tax period, but Form 990 documents are available for download.

Fiscal Year Ending Dec. 2008

Fiscal year ending dec. 2007, fiscal year ending dec. 2006, fiscal year ending dec. 2005, fiscal year ending dec. 2004, fiscal year ending dec. 2003, fiscal year ending dec. 2002, fiscal year ending dec. 2001, about this data.

Nonprofit Explorer includes summary data for nonprofit tax returns and full Form 990 documents, in both PDF and digital formats.

The summary data contains information processed by the IRS during the 2012-2019 calendar years; this generally consists of filings for the 2011-2018 fiscal years, but may include older records. This data release includes only a subset of what can be found in the full Form 990s.

In addition to the raw summary data, we link to PDFs and digital copies of full Form 990 documents wherever possible. This consists of separate releases by the IRS of Form 990 documents processed by the agency, which we update regularly.

We also link to copies of audits nonprofit organizations that spent $750,000 or more in Federal grant money in a single fiscal year since 2016. These audits are copied from the Federal Audit Clearinghouse.

Which Organizations Are Here?

Every organization that has been recognized as tax exempt by the IRS has to file Form 990 every year, unless they make less than $200,000 in revenue and have less than $500,000 in assets, in which case they have to file form 990-EZ. Organizations making less than $50,000 don’t have to file either form but do have to let the IRS they’re still in business via a Form 990N "e-Postcard."

Nonprofit Explorer has organizations claiming tax exemption in each of the 27 subsections of the 501(c) section of the tax code, and which have filed a Form 990, Form 990EZ or Form 990PF. Taxable trusts and private foundations that are required to file a form 990PF are also included. Small organizations filing a Form 990N "e-Postcard" are not included in this data.

Types of Nonprofits

There are 27 nonprofit designations based on the numbered subsections of section 501(c) of the tax code. See the list »

Get the Data

For those interested in acquiring the original data from the source, here’s where our data comes from:

• Raw filing data . Includes EINs and summary financials as structured data.
• Exempt Organization profiles . Includes organization names, addresses, etc. You can merge this with the raw filing data using EIN numbers.
• Form 990 documents . Prior to 2017, these documents were obtained and processed by Public.Resource.org and ProPublica. Bulk PDF downloads since 2017 are available from the IRS .
• Form 990 documents as XML files . Includes complete filing data (financial details, names of officers, tax schedules, etc.) in machine-readable format. Only available for electronically filed documents. Electronic data released prior to October 2021 is also available through Amazon Web Services.
• Audits . PDFs of single or program-specific audits for nonprofit organizations that spent $750,000 or more in Federal grant money in a single fiscal year. Available for fiscal year 2015 and later.

The data powering this website is available programmatically, via an API. Read the API documentation »

By Andrea Suozzo , Alec Glassford and Ash Ngu , ProPublica, and Brandon Roberts , Special to ProPublica. Design by Jeff Frankl. Additional development by Ken Schwencke, Mike Tigas, and Sisi Wei.

E-file viewer adapted from IRS e-File Viewer by Ben Getson. Code for scraping audit documents adapated from Govwiki .

Updated May 23, 2024

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Professional Associations

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• Organizations and Associations

In addition to being a way to unite professionals in a profession, professional associations often publish research reports or advocacy papers on topics that fall within their purview. Below are a few examples of professional associations working broadly in higher education. Look for a menu link to research or publications if information on these topics is not apparent. If they publish a magazine or journal, it is likely behind a "Members Only" wall so search the publication title in the  library catalog to get access.

• American Association of Collegiate Registrars and Admissions Officers (AACRAO) AACRAO works to provide professional development, guidelines, and voluntary standards to be used by higher education officials regarding the best practices in records management, admissions, enrollment management, administrative information technology, and student services.
• American Association of Community Colleges (AACC) The AACC is the primary advocacy organization for community colleges.
• American Council on Education (ACE) ACE works to mobilize the higher education community to shape effective public policy and foster innovative, high-quality practice.
• American Counseling Association (ACA) ACA is dedicated to the growth and enhancement of the counseling profession.
• American Educational Research Association (AERA) AERA is a national research society that strives to advance knowledge about education, to encourage scholarly inquiry related to education, and to promote the use of research to improve education and serve the public good.
• Association for the Study of Higher Education (ASHE) ASHE is a scholarly society dedicated to higher education as a field of study.
• Association of American Colleges and Universities (AAC&U) AAC&U is dedicated to advancing the vitality and public standing of liberal education by making quality and equity the foundations for excellence in undergraduate education in service to democracy.
• Association of College and Research Libraries (ACRL) ACRL is the higher education association for academic libraries and library workers.
• National Association of Student Affairs Professionals (NASAP) NASAP is dedicated to promoting excellence in the area of Student Affairs. It focuses on issues, solutions and professional development opportunities for Student Affairs Professionals who serve minority populations in diverse settings around the country.
• National Education Association (NEA) The NEA is committed to advancing the cause of public education.

Organizations

Research Centers, institutes, and other advocacy organizations often focus on specific issues. They may conduct research studies and publish the results in the form of reports or working papers, or write advocacy papers based on evidence. You may try to learn funded the studies or publications to check for potential bias.

• EDUCAUSE A nonprofit association advancing higher education through the use of IT. The annual Horizon Report profiles key trends and emerging technologies and practices shaping the future of teaching and learning in higher education.
• Institute of International Education (IIE) IIE specializes in the international exchange of people and ideas.
• Community College Research Center (CCRC) CCRC studies community colleges because they provide critical access to postsecondary education and are uniquely positioned to promote equity and social mobility in the United States. They conduct research that helps these institutions strengthen opportunities and improve outcomes for their students, particularly those from underserved populations.
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• Last Updated: May 3, 2024 3:59 PM
• URL: https://guides.nyu.edu/education

What education policy experts are watching for in 2022

Subscribe to the brown center on education policy newsletter, daphna bassok , daphna bassok nonresident senior fellow - governance studies , brown center on education policy @daphnabassok stephanie riegg cellini , stephanie riegg cellini nonresident senior fellow - governance studies , brown center on education policy michael hansen , michael hansen senior fellow - brown center on education policy , the herman and george r. brown chair - governance studies @drmikehansen douglas n. harris , douglas n. harris nonresident senior fellow - governance studies , brown center on education policy , professor and chair, department of economics - tulane university @douglasharris99 jon valant , and jon valant director - brown center on education policy , senior fellow - governance studies @jonvalant kenneth k. wong kenneth k. wong nonresident senior fellow - governance studies , brown center on education policy.

January 7, 2022

Entering 2022, the world of education policy and practice is at a turning point. The ongoing coronavirus pandemic continues to disrupt the day-to-day learning for children across the nation, bringing anxiety and uncertainty to yet another year. Contentious school-board meetings attract headlines as controversy swirls around critical race theory and transgender students’ rights. The looming midterm elections threaten to upend the balance of power in Washington, with serious implications for the federal education landscape. All of these issues—and many more—will have a tremendous impact on students, teachers, families, and American society as a whole; whether that impact is positive or negative remains to be seen.

Below, experts from the Brown Center on Education Policy identify the education stories that they’ll be following in 2022, providing analysis on how these issues could shape the learning landscape for the next 12 months—and possibly well into the future.

I will also be watching the Department of Education’s negotiated rulemaking sessions and following any subsequent regulatory changes to federal student-aid programs. I expect to see changes to income-driven repayment plans and will be monitoring debates over regulations governing institutional and programmatic eligibility for federal student-loan programs. Notably, the Department of Education will be re-evaluating Gainful Employment regulations—put in place by the Obama administration and rescinded by the Trump administration—which tied eligibility for federal funding to graduates’ earnings and debt.

But the biggest and most concerning hole has been in the  substitute teacher force —and the ripple effects on school communities have been broad and deep. Based on personal communications with Nicola Soares, president of  Kelly Education , the largest education staffing provider in the country, the pandemic is exacerbating several problematic trends that have been quietly simmering for years. These are: (1) a growing reliance on long-term substitutes to fill permanent teacher positions; (2) a shrinking supply of qualified individuals willing to fill short-term substitute vacancies; and, (3) steadily declining fill rates for schools’ substitute requests. Many schools in high-need settings have long faced challenges with adequate, reliable substitutes, and the pandemic has turned these localized trouble spots into a widespread catastrophe. Though federal pandemic-relief funds could be used to meet the short-term weakness in the substitute labor market (and mainline teacher compensation, too ), this is an area where we sorely need more research and policy solutions for a permanent fix.

First, what’s to come of the vaccine for ages 0-4? This is now the main impediment to resuming in-person activity. This is the only large group that currently cannot be vaccinated. Also, outbreaks are triggering day-care closures, which has a significant impact on parents (especially mothers), including teachers and other school staff.

Second, will schools (and day cares) require the vaccine for the fall of 2022? Kudos to my hometown of New Orleans, which still appears to be the nation’s only district to require vaccination. Schools normally require a wide variety of other vaccines, and the COVID-19 vaccines are very effective. However, this issue is unfortunately going to trigger a new round of intense political conflict and opposition that will likely delay the end of the pandemic.

Third, will we start to see signs of permanent changes in schooling a result of COVID-19? In a previous post on this blog, I proposed some possibilities. There are some real opportunities before us, but whether we can take advantage of them depends on the first two questions. We can’t know about these long-term effects on schooling until we address the COVID-19 crisis so that people get beyond survival mode and start planning and looking ahead again. I’m hopeful, though not especially optimistic, that we’ll start to see this during 2022.

The CTC and universal pre-K top my list for 2022, but it’s a long list. I’ll also be watching the Supreme Court’s ruling on vouchers in Carson v. Makin , how issues like critical race theory and detracking play into the 2022 elections, and whether we start to see more signs of school/district innovation in response to COVID-19 and the recovery funds that followed.

Electoral dynamics will affect several important issues: the selection of state superintendents; the use of American Rescue Plan funds; the management of safe return to in-person learning for students; the integration of racial justice and diversity into curriculum; the growth of charter schools; and, above all, the extent to which education issues are leveraged to polarize rather than heal the growing divisions among the American public.

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IHEP Welcomes to Its Board of Directors  Five Advocates of Opportunity and Equity in Higher Education

Talented leaders in higher education research and policy, nonprofit finance, and educational equity join the nonpartisan research, policy, and advocacy nonprofit as it enters its fourth decade of promoting valuable opportunities through higher education.    

WASHINGTON, DC (December 8, 2022)  – The Institute for Higher Education Policy (IHEP) has announced five exemplary leaders are joining its Board of Directors : Denisa Gándara, assistant professor of educational leadership and policy at The University of Texas at Austin ; Mike Krause, senior advisor at John M. Belk Endowment; James Larimore, co-founder and chairperson of the EdSAFE AI Alliance; Robert Olcott, founder of the olcott group; Amanda Tachine, assistant professor of higher education at Arizona State University.   

“We warmly welcome to our board these experienced and dedicated leaders who share our passion for building an equitable and just shared future by ensuring everyone has the opportunity to succeed in postsecondary education, regardless of race, background, or circumstance” said IHEP President and CEO, Mamie Voight. “The five new members bring an impressive and important array of expertise and perspectives that will strengthen our team and serve IHEP’s mission as we enter our fourth decade next year.”   

The five new Board members will support IHEP’s growth as an innovative leader in postsecondary education:  

• Denisa Gándara , Ph.D. is an assistant professor of educational leadership and policy at The University of Texas at Austin. Dr. Gándara’s research examines the development of higher education policy decisions and the effects of these decisions on students who have been excluded from and underserved in higher education. An additional line of her research explores how various approaches to funding colleges and universities might promote or hinder social equity. Her work is driven by a desire to expand postsecondary educational opportunities and outcomes for students from marginalized communities.
• Mike Krause is a Senior Advisor at the John M. Belk Endowment, where he focuses on serving adult learners, particularly in the community college sector. Previously, he was the executive director of the Tennessee Higher Education Commission, serving as the state’s higher education executive officer (SHEEO) and leading THEC to be named as the top higher education agency in the nation. As THEC Director, he focused on expanding access for adult learners, financial aid simplification, and implementation of the state’s first governance change since the 1960s. Prior to his time at THEC, he served on the staff of Governor Bill Haslam as the founding Director of the Tennessee Promise, where he led the creation of the nation’s first statewide free college program and provided advice and counsel on an array of higher education policy matters.
• James Larimore is the co-founder and chairperson of the EdSAFE AI Alliance , a global consortium that brings together educators, researchers, education organizations, ed tech innovators, standards bodies, policy and advocacy experts, and non-profit leaders to create the frameworks and standards we need to ensure the safe, equitable and trusted use of artificial intelligence in education. Mr. Larimore has served as a student affairs leader at campuses across the country and served as deputy director for student success at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation before launching the Center for Equity in Learning at ACT, a non-profit research and assessment organization. He has also served as the Chief Officer for Equity in Learning at Riiid Labs, a startup company founded to use artificial intelligence to improve learning and close gaps in equity and opportunity.   
• Rob Olcott , CAE, FASAE, CIMA, AIF is the founder and CEO of the olcott group , a company he formed to help nonprofit organizations fulfill their fiduciary responsibilities through the governance and management of funds entrusted to them. Mr. Olcott previously served as Regional Director at DiMeo Schneider & Associates, one of the country’s largest independent investment advisors. He brings more than 35 years’ experience working for and with associations and other nonprofit organizations. He is a Certified Association Executive (CAE), an ASAE Fellow and a Certified Investment Management Analyst CIMA) and Accredited Investment Fiduciary (AIF) and has served on the boards of several national nonprofit organizations including The Presbyterian Foundation USA and the TKE Educational Foundation.
• Amanda R. Tachine is Navajo from Ganado, Arizona, and Náneesht’ézhí Táchii’nii (Zuni Red Running into Water clan) born for Tł’izilani (Many Goats clan). She is an Assistant Professor in Educational Leadership & Innovation at Arizona State University and serves as a board member for the Hopi Education Endowment Fund. Dr. Tachine has been an active College Board member since 2009 and has served as both chair and a member of the College Board’s Native American Student Advocacy Institute (NASAI) National Advisory Committee. Her research explores the relationship between systemic and structural histories of settler colonialism and the ongoing erasure of Indigenous presence and belonging in college settings using qualitative Indigenous methodologies.   

These five members join Laura Cronin, senior associate, Booz Allen Hamilton; MaryEllen McGuire, Ph.D., founder and president of PNPI; Ajita Talwalker Menon, president and CEO, Calbright College; and Michelle R. Weise, Ph.D., owner of Rise and Design, LLC in serving on the Board, chaired by Jacob Fraire, director of policy and strategy at the Diana Natalicio Institute at the University of Texas at El Paso, with vice chair Peter O. Nwosu, Ph.D., provost and senior vice president for academic affairs and student success, Lehman College of the City University of New York.  

IHEP sincerely appreciates the contributions of Stella Flores, Ph.D., Kristin Hultquist, and Cheryl A. Oldham, who have now completed their terms on the Board of Directors.    

“We are deeply grateful to Stella, Kristin, and Cheryl for their service to this organization,” said IHEP Board Chair Jacob Fraire. “Their work has bolstered IHEP as a leader in the field and set the organization on strong footing as it enters its next chapter. The entire Board is grateful to them for their contributions to IHEP and continued commitment to our mission.”  

The IHEP Board of Directors manages fiduciary responsibilities and establishes policies that further the organization’s growing research, policy, and advocacy portfolio.   

Supporting the Whole Student Through Holistic Advising: Reflections on ED’s Raise The Bar Summit

Investing in Student Success: IHEP’s Federal Funding Priorities for FY25

• Fundraising

Higher Ed Charitable Giving Up by Double Digits

By  Liam Knox

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The new additions to the Palmer Museum of Art at Penn State’s arboretum were funded largely due to a record-breaking fundraising year for the university. Last fiscal year saw the highest increase in giving to higher ed since 2000.

Pennsylvania State University

Philanthropic giving to higher education increased by 12.5 percent last fiscal year to a total of $59.5 billion, the highest year-over-year increase since 2000, according to the latest Voluntary Support of Education survey from the Council for Advancement and Support of Education. In fiscal 2021, giving rose 7 percent , and the previous year it declined slightly , by less than 1 percent.

The contributions went mostly to restricted endowments, primarily to fund scholarships, and to “operations with restrictions on use”—usually research projects. Together, those areas accounted for nearly 80 percent of total giving. Sixty-one percent of charitable donations to higher ed came from organizations, 22 percent came from alumni and 16 percent came from individuals who were not alumni.

CASE president and CEO Sue Cunningham said the upward trend was a sign that commitment to higher education from alumni and philanthropists alike remains strong, even as institutions face an increasingly tough array of challenges—from the looming demographic cliff and post-pandemic enrollment dips to growing skepticism about the value of higher ed and its increasingly fraught place in political discourse .

“It’s incredibly good news, the impact these philanthropic resources flowing into institutions will have at a time when other revenue streams are being squeezed more and more,” she said.

Ann Kaplan, senior director of the VSE survey at CASE, said most of the giving occurred at the end of 2021—still part of the 2022 fiscal year—when the stock market was bullish after a long pandemic slump.

The numbers line up with what many higher education institutions reported to be a record-breaking fundraising year in fiscal 2022, despite rising inflation and continued fallout from the COVID-19 pandemic. Some big institutions, including Pennsylvania State University and Virginia Tech , shattered previous highs by more than $50 million, but even smaller institutions like Quincy University and Fayetteville State reported historic fundraising totals.

This is the first year CASE used new Global Reporting Standards , which are meant to bring reporting on U.S. philanthropic activity in line with the international community by, among other things, separately tracking new funds committed by donors in addition to funds received. Kaplan said the changes did not have a meaningful impact on the survey results.

This was also the first year that CASE didn’t differentiate between donations from corporations and those from other organizations, the majority of which are nonprofit philanthropic foundations, though Kaplan said corporations continue to make up the smallest portion of this pool.

Amir Pasic, dean of the Lilly Family School of Philanthropy at Indiana University, said the survey results were “very encouraging,” especially as philanthropic giving becomes more vital to a broader array of institutions.

“Double-digit growth is not the norm, so this is a really strong year for giving,” he said. “It’s become, from any institution’s perspective, an important source of revenue at the margin and will continue to be the engine supporting innovations and breakthroughs on things that we need as we struggle with all kinds of challenges, from demographics to polarization to workforce preparation.”

Look Who’s Giving

It’s not just higher education; philanthropic giving to all sectors has been trending upward in recent years. Total charitable gifts in the U.S. hit a record-breaking $485 billion in calendar year 2021, according to the latest report from the Giving USA Foundation and the Lilly Family School.

While philanthropic foundations have dominated the boost in giving to higher education, increased contributions from alumni have also played a big part. Last year was the second in a row in which alumni giving increased by double digits, according to VSE survey data from fiscal 2021.

Pasic said alumni gifts are a relatively small slice of the overall giving pie, and that growth in that area has been “pretty anemic” for decades, but he’s seen an upward trend over the past few years that he hopes continues.

“It’s speculation, but I think the existential experience we went through with the pandemic may have focused people on the salience of institutions that have been important in their lives,” he said.

Cunningham and Kaplan said part of the increase may also be due to a new generation of alumni aging into cohorts with more disposable income, and thus they are more likely to donate. Tied to this, they said, are efforts by alumni relations offices to adapt their fundraising efforts to the sensibilities and technologies of the new generation.

“I heard someone say the other day that we’re no longer in the album generation; we’re in the Spotify playlist generation, and that’s got more people thinking about how we connect and how to effectively engage with people in their crazy-busy lives,” Cunningham said. “Institutions are getting more innovative and sophisticated with their outreach.”

Community Colleges Still Lagging

While giving in general was up 12.5 percent, donations to two-year institutions fell by more than 15 percent from fiscal 2021, a decline that Pasic said was both surprising and discouraging.

“There’s been more attention to the fact that most of our populace experiences higher education through two-year institutions, more of an emphasis on fundraising there and donor attention to how important they are for social mobility and community health,” Pasic said. “Maybe it’ll take a little bit longer for the numbers to reflect that, but it’s disappointing to see that decline.”

Kaplan said much of the decrease was likely a result of a drop-off from the unusually successful fundraising year for community colleges in fiscal 2021, when billionaire philanthropist MacKenzie Scott gifted $2.73 billion to 286 institutions serving underrepresented students—most of which were two-year colleges. She added that CASE has a relatively small sample pool for two-year colleges in its VSE survey, which could also skew the data.

Regardless, community colleges often have less capacity to manage donor relations and much smaller institutional advancement offices, Cunningham said, making it more difficult to sustain the kind of regular gift commitments that more well-resourced four-year institutions receive. CASE founded the Center for Community College Advancement, which focuses on helping two-year institutions build their infrastructure for alumni and donor relations, in 2014 to try to address this disparity.

Kaplan said that as community colleges and smaller regional institutions turn increasingly to philanthropy to fill in the gaps from steadily declining enrollment and stagnating state support, they’re bound to build out their institutional advancement offices accordingly. She also said that foundation interest in giving to two-year institutions is on the rise, stemming partially from Scott’s example.

“I remember a time when public colleges didn’t used to raise nearly as much money from philanthropic sources because they didn’t have to; it wasn’t part of their business model,” Kaplan said. “Now if you look at the top gift-receiving schools, half of them are public … That’s going to happen to community colleges, too. It’s just a matter of time and effort.”

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Non-profit Organizations, Collaborations, and Displaced Student Support in Canada and the USA: A Comparative Case Study

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• Published: 17 February 2020
• Volume 33 , pages 223–242, ( 2020 )

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• Lisa Unangst   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-6478-9333 1 &
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Refugee students are supported not only by federal, state, and local government bodies in receiving countries, but also by non-profit organizations. This paper offers a comparative case study of two such entities located in Canada and the USA: World Education Services (WES) and the Massachusetts Immigrant and Refugee Advocacy Coalition (MIRA). We emphasize possibilities for scaling the work of WES and MIRA in the context of the neoliberal environments within which they operate, as well as the role of national and state policy in guiding organizational priorities. We frame our analysis with the transformative paradigm suggested by Hurtado (in: Martínez Alemán et al . (eds) Critical approaches to the study of higher education: a practical introduction, Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore, 2015), offering a direct link to practice in an effort to improve student experience in the immediate term. We discuss the need for flexible funding, advocacy efforts, and possible avenues for better information sharing among non-profits as well as by the government actors and universities that are frequent collaborators.

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Unangst, L., de Wit, H. Non-profit Organizations, Collaborations, and Displaced Student Support in Canada and the USA: A Comparative Case Study. High Educ Policy 33 , 223–242 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1057/s41307-020-00182-1

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A Planned Death – The National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education

Barbara berreski.

Deaths, Near Deaths, and Reincarnations: Part 2 of 5

Editors’ note: This article is featured in NPQ ’s new, winter 2014 edition, “Births and Deaths in the Nonprofit Sector.” This is the second part of NPQ ‘s mini–case studies on the death, near death, or reincarnation of five organizations. Click here to read part 1 .

How do you spark a national conversation about higher-education policies, gain the attention of legislators and other policy-makers in every state across the country, evaluate the success of higher education in each state, and present the data so that the concepts are easy for people outside the field to understand? You issue a statewide higher education “report card,” and then you call the press.

From 2000 to 2008, the National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education issued five biannual reports titled Measuring Up . States were graded in six areas: preparation, participation, affordability, completion, benefits, and learning. There were many bad grades—Ds and Fs—for many of the states. And, not surprisingly, many people were upset. But it got them talking about higher education.

Establishment of the National Center

The idea for the National Center started in the late 1990s, when Patrick M. Callan, director of the nonprofit Higher Education Policy Institute (HEPI), was approached by Atlantic Philanthropies. 1 Callan was well known in higher-education policy circles, as he had been working in the field since the early 1970s. Atlantic wanted to examine higher-education policies among the states and help them to set their agendas for the future, so Atlantic contacted Callan. The staff and the board of directors of HEPI, under Callan’s leadership, began eighteen months of intensive research. Could Atlantic’s vision be implemented? If so, how?

One idea was a report card on higher education. As Callan described it, his team liked the idea of a report card that would evaluate state performance in higher education regardless of the different policies that had been adopted state by state. In addition, the report card would gauge the success of higher education from the students’ perspective. Quality in higher education had always been measured through accreditation, which is centered on the institution; Callan hoped that the report card would change that focus.

HEPI did a yearlong feasibility study to see if there were enough data that would be relevant to good policy. They concluded that enough data existed and that a report card was an idea worth trying. At the time, Callan told me, they didn’t know if it was going to work or what the response would be.

HEPI had previous experience evaluating the performance of higher education, but not on this scale: HEPI was established in 1992 to conduct nonpartisan analyses and policy studies of higher education and disseminate the results through publications and public programs. From 1992 to 1997, HEPI sponsored the California Higher Education Policy Center, which addressed the future of higher education in California. 2

Callan’s success in California had clearly interested Atlantic, but his experience had taught him that if the report card idea attracted attention there would be controversy. “We never set out to create gratuitous controversy in California, but if you do something with integrity, you are going to piss people off,” Callan said. Atlantic and subsequent funders like the Pew Charitable Trusts and the Ford Foundation knew this was a risk but over the course of the National Center’s existence never wavered in their support nor pressured Callan to “back off.”

The next step was creating an entity to support the report card; that entity, the National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education, was officially announced in March 1998 by James B. Hunt Jr., then governor of North Carolina. Governor Hunt served as the chair of the National Center’s board, and his participation in the endeavor gave it and its products instant credibility. 3

Callan envisioned the National Center as an independent policy forum, much like the Truman Commission in the 1940s and the Carnegie Commission on Higher Education in the 1970s. He also envisioned that, like those two commissions, the National Center would exist for a period of time then cease operations.

Measuring Up and Other Projects

Measuring Up . The first edition of the report card was issued in 2000. The National Center’s goal was to show the states what they were doing well in higher education and what they were not. If a state was not doing something well, policy-makers in that state could look at other states for examples of success. In grading the states, performance was the only measure; the policy of the states was not analyzed, and the states did not get “points” for trying. “The ‘grades’ were just a device to get the message out,” Callan explained. 4

Callan knew that the higher-education establishment would likely not be receptive to the idea and might choose to ignore it; thus, in order to have impact, the National Center would need to get media attention on the report. The center actively sought that attention, and the strategy worked. Callan and his staff members were invited to speak to legislatures around the country, as well as to organizations like the National Governors Association and the National Conference of State Legislatures. Sometimes they were met with enmity, but, according to Callan, they “were happy to be challenged.”

Associates Program . In 2000, the National Center established an associates program designed to foster the professional growth of individuals in higher education. As Callan put it, “If an organization is going to be sustained, it is all about developing people.” The program’s purpose was to give early-career and mid-career individuals an opportunity to meet with senior people in the field to share knowledge and consider broad policy issues.

One of the most important goals of the program was diversity of all types: “demographic, professional, and geographic.” To that end, the first group consisted of ten individuals from different parts of the country, who met for three extended weekends throughout the course of a year. The program operated for seven years, and nearly one hundred people completed it. The participants evaluated the program annually, and high levels of satisfaction were reported. 5

National CrossTalk . National CrossTalk was the National Center’s periodical between 1997 and 2011. Published three to four times annually, it was designed to be a vehicle for exploring the possible solutions to the higher-education issues brought to light in Measuring Up . As Callan described it, “Those of us in social science, we can be good analysts but lousy storytellers. I knew a good story would help people connect with and understand the issues.” This approach was all part of the National Center’s strategy to help make higher-education policy issues part of a national discussion.

Callan was clear that the purpose of CrossTalk was not to promote the National Center; it was to examine how policy issues impacted real people. To that end, he hired a former Los Angeles Times education reporter to be the senior editor of CrossTalk , and CrossTalk hired freelance reporters to examine higher-education stories from both sides. The reporters were never told what position to take. National CrossTalk was very successful, in large part because, said Callan, “if you make it about the issues, and less about ‘me versus you,’ the more likely you are to be listened to.” 6

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Closing the Center

When the idea of the National Center was set forth in a concept paper in 1998, one of its missions was “to conduct public policy research and studies in areas relevant to the higher-educational needs of the nation over the next 15 to 20 years.” When the National Center announced its closing in a Cross-Talk editorial in December 2010, Callan declared that at its inception, “we expected the National Center to operate for about ten years.” 7 When asked about this apparent discrepancy, Callan acknowledged that although he had not announced a specific time frame for the National Center’s existence, it was always understood that it would have a finite life of about a decade—notwithstanding the fifteen to twenty years of public policy and research the center originally intended to conduct.

To that end, Callan kept the staff relatively small—fifteen employees at the most. Although there was enough funding to double the staff, Callan felt that “smaller is good.” Not only did the small staff allow the National Center to be nimble in response to changes, it also enabled all employees to be part of the conversation. And, because the center was not a large organization, it would need to reach out to other groups involved in higher-education research and use them as resources, helping to overcome the “us versus them” mentality that sometimes pervades higher-education research.

The question that begs to be asked is, Why create a nonprofit organization with an expiration date? Callan’s response was simple: “No one asked me to create a center for the ages.” But the reasons are a little more complicated than that.

First, Callan has done this before. When he helmed the California Higher Education Policy Center, he announced at the outset that it would operate for five years only—and it did. In retrospect, he regretted the specificity with which he had stated its demise (indeed, he admitted to feeling that the deadline had been a little too rigid and thus had been intentionally vague about how long the National Center would operate when it first opened). But he stayed focused on his mission and successfully completed it in the five-year time frame. Callan is, clearly, comfortable working on time-restricted projects (of course, undertaking policy research in a discrete subject area like higher education lends itself more easily to a finite time frame than some other nonprofit goals, such as, for example, ending world hunger).

Second, the impermanence of the National Center gave Callan a lot of freedom. For Callan, an organization that is not created to be permanent can take more risks, and “you need to take prudent risks to change policy.” A permanent organization might be worried about losing funding if it takes certain policy positions. Callan did not have that pressure. Callan’s funders were 100 percent supportive of the National Center’s mission, but, he said, “if the funding hadn’t been there, I would have just closed the place.”

Third, the National Center’s most visible product, Measuring Up , was a victim of its own success. This report card on the states got a lot of attention, especially in its first year. By the time the fifth edition was published, in 2008, it had, according to Callan, become part of the landscape. Politicians and other policy-makers, who at first reacted with anger and suspicion, eventually learned to use Measuring Up for their own purposes. 8 In addition, much of the shock was gone after the first edition, since people knew what to expect. Callan opined: “Are you going to keep doing [something like the report cards] until no one reads your reports? Or until no one funds you?”

Unlike many nonprofits, the National Center did not close because of lack of funding—it was well funded at its inception and throughout its life. The National Center began with a grant from Atlantic Philanthropies, and in 2002 and 2003 Atlantic gave the National Center grants totaling $6.5 million and $2 million, respectively. 9 Even at the end of its life, the National Center was still being funded. In 2011, the year it closed, it received $330,290 in grants and contributions. 10

Callan has said that the National Center operated longer than expected so that it could produce the 2008 edition of Measuring Up , which was its last report card. The decision to close in 2011 was made at the same time as the issue of the final report card (most of the center’s funding was structured as three-year grants, so the board of directors had agreed to stop seeking funding three years prior to the center’s closing.) Staff were also fully aware of the anticipated closing and thus were able to make plans for subsequent employment.

After Closing

At the time of the National Center’s closing, Callan hoped that the report card would be continued by another organization. He acknowledged that the report card would have to be reformulated, in part because there are better data now. Although several foundations were approached with the idea, however, none accepted the challenge. Callan believes the country suffers without the report card, not only because it fueled public discourse about the issues but also because it gave people at the state level leverage to advocate for changes in policy. Callan similarly hoped the Associates Program would be adopted by another entity, but to date it has not.

Although the National Center was closed in June 2011, its umbrella organization, HEPI, filed a Form 990 with the IRS for 2012. 11 When asked about this, Callan said that he has kept the National Center alive as a legal entity in order to “house” projects for individuals who have funding but do not have a nonprofit in which to “park” their endeavors. He made it clear that he’s not looking for business and that the National Center will likely “go away someday.”

• Unless otherwise specified, all direct and indirect quotes from Patrick Callan are from an interview with the author.
• The National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education, “Reports and Publications: Other Higher Education Reports and Resources,” accessed October 8, 2014, www.highereducation.org/reports /reports.shtml.
• Doug Lederman, “(Not Really) Measuring Up,” December 3, 2008, Inside Higher Ed , www.inside highered.com/news/2008/12/03/measuring .
• William Chance, The National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education’s Associates Program (San Jose, CA: The National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education, May 2009), 3, www.highereducation.org/reports/associates/associates_report.pdf .
• Patrick M. Callan, Concept Paper: A National Center to Address Higher Education Policy (San Jose, CA: The National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education, 1998), 5, www.highereducation.org /reports/concept/concept.shtml.
• James B. Hunt Jr. and Callan, “Editorial,” National CrossTalk (San Jose, CA: The National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education, December 2010).
• See, for example, Lederman, “No Grades for States This Year,” Inside Higher Ed , December 1, 2010, www.insidehighered.com/news/2010/12/01/measuring_up .
• The Atlantic Philanthropies, “National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education: Grantee Summary,” accessed October 15, 2014, www.atlanticphilanthropies.org/grantee/national-center-public-policy-and-higher-education .
• “Form 990: Return for Organization Exempt from Income Tax, FY2011, Higher Education Policy Institute,” filed December 14, 2012, accessed October 8, 2014, www.guidestar.com/organizations/77-0313194/higher-education-policy-institute.aspx#forms-docs .

Barbara Berreski is director of Government and Legal Affairs of the New Jersey Association of State Colleges and Universities (NJASCU) and a graduate student in the Nonprofit Leadership program in the Penn School of Social Policy and Practice at the University of Pennsylvania.

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Getting smart collective, impact update, smart list: 50 organizations boosting college access & success.

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College access is a pressing issue facing education equity today. In today’s Smart List, we’re recognizing 50 organizations spreading college awareness, boosting college preparation, and encouraging college completion—with a special focus on low-income and first-generation students.

College Awareness & Success

• College Success Foundation : Supports and scholarships in District of Columbia and Washington State
• Graduation Alliance : Supporting pathways from school to college to career
• The College Board : Access supports ( Big Future ) and assessments
• National College Transition Network : Supports college transitions programs
• National Association for College Admission Counseling : Global organization made up of 16,000 counselors
• Gear Up : Department of Education’s early awareness program
• College Navigator : Department of Education funded program to provide college data
• Beyond 12 : Academic and social supports for college completion
• uAspire : Financial aid advice
• Families in Schools : Helps families explore college options
• Complete College America : Works with states to boost college completion
• Princeton Review : Supports to help find the best school
• Naviance : Helps schools and students align strengths and interests to postsecondary planning

College Access

• AVID : Advancement via Individual Determination, supporting college readiness to close access gaps
• College Summit : Uses a peer support approach to launch students from over 500 high schools
• College Advising Corps : Placing college advisors in 600 high schools
• National College Access Network : Supports and advocates for low-income students
• The Opportunity Network : Career awareness and college advising in NYC
• The Posse Foundation : Leadership development & college access in 10 cities
• iMentor : Mentors promoting high school and college graduation
• College Forward : Advising and test prep based in Austin, Texas
• Genesys Works : Internships and college prep in five cities
• Juma Ventures : Youth development and college preparation
• College Track : Supports students from middle school through college
• CollegeSpring : Helping low-income students prep for and apply to college
• Summer Search : Mentoring, advising and supporting college success
• Strive for College Collaborative : Mentors help students make best college choices
• QuestBridge : Connects high-performing low-income students with top universities
• College for Every Student : Works with 200 communities in 30 states to raise the academic aspirations and performance of underserved youth to improve college access and success
• First Scholars : Teaches business mindset and provides holistic supports
• Gateway to College : Supports high school completion and college success, advocates for disconnected youth
• TheDream.us : National college access and success program for DREAMers

Scholarships & Supports

• Jack Kent Cooke Foundation : Supports exceptional students from elementary school to graduate school through scholarships, grants, direct service and knowledge creation and dissemination
• 10,000 Degrees : Awareness, access and giving back
• Rotary : We would bet there’s a club near you supporting access and scholarships
• Fastweb : Access to search 1.5 million scholarships, along with financial aid and college info
• Cappex : College scholarship search, along with college searches and reviews
• StudentScholarships.org : Free and comprehensive list of searchable scholarships
• Scholarship Points : Students earn points through rewards system to become eligible for dollars

Regional Access Orgs

• College Spark Washington : Funds programs that help low-income students become college-ready and complete their degrees
• Choose Your Future : A project of Chicago Public Schools
• The Bottom Line : College access and success in NYC, Boston and Chicago
• College Possible : 2-year coaching on college access in 6 cities
• OneGoal : 3-year college prep program in Atlanta, Boston, Chicago and Houston
• Students Rising Above : Provides full support services to low-income first generation students in the Bay Area
• Take Stock in Children : Provides college prep coaching across Florida
• Florida C.A.N.! : Provides statewide support for college and career preparation, access, and completion for all students
• Future Foundation : Provides college preparation and access support students in metro Atlanta
• Breakthrough Greater Boston : Provides college prep tutoring for students and coaching for teachers in metro Boston
• Teen Sharp : Provides leadership development and college prep coaching in New Jersey and Delaware

For more great local programs, see FirstGEN Fellows .

Who did we miss? Who would you add? Share in the comments section below, and don’t forget to check out our other recent Smart Lists at our Smart List Series Page .

Our Sma rt Lists are some of our most popular posts, and upcoming sponsorship opportunities are still available. Interested in learning more? Contact Megan: [email protected] .

This Smart List is sponsored by Getting Smart Services , Getting Smart’s consulting division that helps schools, districts, networks and impact-oriented partners create, implement and amplify thought leadership campaigns, education initiatives, powerful learning experiences and forward-leaning strategies. Learn more about what they can do to support your education initiatives here .

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18 comments, marcy stengel.

Check out Capital Region Sponsor-A-Scholar, a 20 year old college success program working in Albany, Schenectady and Troy, NY.

Eric Z. Williams

TRIO College Awareness (Talent Search), Readiness (Upward Bound & McNair), Access (Educational Opportunity Centers & Talent Search) & Success (Student Support Services) Programs. Contact U.S. Department of Education's Office of Postsecondary Education at [email protected] for more information about these federally-funded educational opportunity programs across the U.S. We have a TRIO Talent Search Program in the Chicago Public Schools and many others in local postsecondary partner institutions supporting our schools and students.

We had another reader suggest TRIO as well, noting that Student Support Services alone helps that specific demographic of students graduate from college at a 10% rate higher than their peers.

Brian Dever

Let's Get Ready is doing really good work throughout the Northeast - providing college access and success support. Thanks for highlighting all of these organizations!

Denise Trionfero

You should also check out the HEOP program (Higher Education Opportunity Program) that has been in existence for 47 years through the state of New York!

Two more great organizations: Say Yes to College and On Point for College. Also, in addition to the federal programs, state grant agencies provide over $10 billion in grants and scholarships to students pursuing higher education - and help fill out the FAFSA!

There are so many great organizations working in this space - thank you for beginning to compile a list! If you're in Tennessee, check out the Tennessee College Access and Success Network - a non-profit member organization that is committed to increasing the number of Tennesseans with college degrees. Also, anyone can use the website The TalentED Project - it is a free resource that connects college access programs with admissions recruiters at selective colleges in order to increase the pipeline of first generation and/or low income students at these schools.

N2College® Nationwide PreK12 Admissions ,Scholarship Prep, & Pre-Career Consulting Is The Home Of The $cholar$hip Jump$tart™ PreK12 Program & Has Been Assisting Future College-Bound Students & Families Since 2005 In All (50) States & (28) Countries Create, Develop, Revise, & Implement A Personal $cholar$hip RoadMap™ That Results In The Student Receiving The MAXIMUM Amount Of All Main Categories Of Merit-Based Scholarships PRIOR To High School Graduation. Working With Families|K12 Schools|501(c)3s|Federal TRiO|State/County DHR Programs. Over $22,000,000 Awarded To Our Student-Clients To Date! Doing Our Part Daily 2#MakeCollegeCostLess™!

Since 1981 the non-profit Council for Opportunity in Education (http://www.coenet.org/) in Washington, D.C. has helped expand college opportunities throughout the U.S. for low-income, first-generation students, and students with disabilities. It works primarily through its 900 member colleges, universities, and community agencies that host the federal TRIO outreach programs that help almost a million students each year to enter and graduate from college. COE also houses the Pell Institute for the Study of Opportunity in Education, which conducts and publishes research and policy analysis for policymakers, educators and the public to improve educational opportunities and outcomes for low-income, first generation and disabled college students.

Princeton University Preparatory Program; Harvard Crimson Academy; Elon Academy; Collegiate Scholars @ the University of Chicago; Washington U St. Louis College Prep Program; Northwestern Academy for Chicago Public Schools... and many more - free, university-based, comprehensive college preparation initiatives! And - throughout the country - there are affiliates of the National College Access Network; regional "CAN's" and College Prep Roundtables

Nankya Senungi

College Possible is a College Access and Success program that supports students to and through college graduation. We operate in six cities across the country, and support students on college campuses across the entire country.

Caroline Clu

You should include SEO Scholars! It's a free eight-year academic program that gets underserved public high school students to and through college with a 90% college graduation rate. SEO Scholars serves more than 1,500 students in NYC and SF, from 9th grade through college graduation. And SEO was just rated as a top charity with a 100% perfect score by Charity Navigator! www.seoscholars.org

Alexis Allison

As a college counselor, I find myself more and more in need of the resources you've provided — thank you for them.

I also direct a web-based program called The Matchlighters Scholarship ( https://www.collegeessayguy.com/matchlighters), which awards high-achieving, low-income students with 6 hours of free college counseling. We serve transfers, international students, gap-year kids, grad and undergrad, etc. of all shapes and sizes, from any location with internet access, and we're a branch of an essay revision organization called College Essay Guy.

I would love love love to add Matchlighters to your list!

Thank you for all you do.

Great resource, Megan. We appreciate you putting together the comprehensive list of college access resources for current and prospective college students. The mix of government-sponsored programs and private entities should prove useful to college-seekers far and wide. Since cost is often a substantive barrier for many high school graduates and young adults, the addition of the scholarship sites is well placed. Keep up the great work & helping to provide valuable resources for students of all ages and abilities. Continued success!

The TEAK Fellowship in NYC. The TEAK Fellowship believes that motivation and potential, not economic circumstances, should determine a student’s future. TEAK unlocks access to outstanding education and transformative experiences for exceptional NYC students, who use these opportunities to change their lives and the world around them.

TEAK is a free program that helps talented students from low-income families achieve their potential. Through intensive after school and summer classes, TEAK prepares middle school students to get into the nation’s most selective high schools and colleges. TEAK’s strong support system ensures that students thrive in their independent (day and boarding) high schools and graduate from college, ready to pursue their professional goals and positively impact the world.

https://teakfellowship.org/

Thanks for sharing, Tara! Looks like TEAK is doing great work.

Micah Stoudemire

College Now Greater Cleveland aka Cleveland Foundation

Yasna Vismale

A few great programs include the LEDA (Leadership Enterprise of a Diverse America) which selects 100 students from low income backgrounds to spend 7 weeks at Princeton. Another one is Johns Hopkin's CTY Scholars which is located in a few regions and offer students 25K in funding to prepare them for college throughout highschool.

Nina Kellner

College Boarding Pass (CBP) awards travel scholarships to level the playing field for academically qualified, low-income juniors and seniors to visit their dream schools at no cost to learn if they are a good fit. We welcome regional and national college access non-profits to partner with us so we can expand our reach to help students from all over the US go to attend college, graduate, and becoming successful members of their communities. Join us to break the chain of poverty!

California Transfer Support Network (CTSN) in California does some excellent work on targeting minority and disadvantaged community college students who demonstrated an interest in transferring to a university. Many students intent to transfer from community college to university, but most fail to do so. The nonprofit provides various services to students across California that are free of charge. I had a nephew who used them after a referral from a school counselor, and they went above and beyond to help him out. He transferred to a UC school only one year after high school.

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