Absence of conflict of interest.
Citation
Pacific Research and Evaluation, LLC. (2017). Saddleback College TAACCCT grant final evaluation report. Portland, OR: Pacific Research and Evaluation, LLC.
Highlights
- The study’s objective was to examine the impact of Saddleback College’s Fast Track to Success program on student education outcomes.
- The study used a nonexperimental design to compare the outcomes of students who were in the Medical Assistant (MA) and Registered Nurse (RN) tracks of the Fast Track to Success program to a comparison group.
- The study found that MA and RN students in Fast Track to Success programming were significantly more likely to earn certificates, degrees, and credentials in the MA and RN areas.
- The quality of causal evidence presented in this report is low because the authors did not ensure that the groups being compared were similar before the intervention or include sufficient control variables. This means we are not confident that the estimated effects are attributable to the Fast Track to Success program; other factors are likely to have contributed.
Intervention Examined
The Fast Track to Success Program
Features of the Intervention
The U.S. Department of Labor's (DOL) Trade Adjustment Assistance Community College and Career Training (TAACCCT) program provided $1.9 billion in grants to community colleges to improve skills and support employment in high-demand industries, notably manufacturing, health care, information technology, energy, and transportation. Through four rounds of funding, DOL awarded 256 TAACCCT grants to approximately 800 educational institutions across the United States and its territories.
Saddleback College’s Health Sciences and Human Services (HSHS) division received a TAACCCT grant in 2013 that targeted dislocated TAA-affected workers and other students. Their program, Fast Track to Success, improved the University’s current health career curriculum, created new healthcare programs, integrated technology-enhanced learning opportunities, and worked with local workforce development systems and employers to facilitate student employment.
Features of the Study
The authors used a nonexperimental design to determine the impact of Saddleback College’s Fast Track to Success Program at a singular campus location in Mission Viejo, California. The treatment group consisted of 113 students in the Medical Assistant (MA) program and 225 students in the Registered Nurse (RN) program in the 2014 cohort. The comparison group included 165 students in the MA program and 227 students in the RN program who enrolled in 2011, before the Fast Track to Success program was implemented. The authors conducted statistical analyses to examine differences in outcomes between the groups using South Orange County Community College District databases. Outcomes included MA students who earned a certificate in less than one year; RN students who earned a certificate in more than one year; MA students who earned a degree; RN students who earned a degree; and number of combined credentials earned by MA and RN students.
Findings
Education and skills gain
- The study found that Fast Track to Success participants were significantly more likely than comparison group students to earn an MA certificate in less than one year (71% vs. 44%), earn an RN certificate in more than one year (84% vs. 22%), earn an MA degree (11% vs. 1%), earn an RN degree (84% vs. 24%), and earn 1, 2, or 3 credentials as an MA or RN (82% vs. 34%).
Considerations for Interpreting the Findings
The authors used MA and RN cohorts from previous enrollment years as the comparison group. Because the outcome data on the two groups were collected from participants at different times, differences in outcomes could be due to time-varying factors and not the intervention. Also, the authors did not account for factors that could have affected the difference between the treatment and comparison groups, such as pre-intervention degree of financial disadvantage and pre-intervention degree of education. These preexisting differences between the groups—and not the Fast Track to Success program—could explain the observed differences in outcomes. Therefore, the study is not eligible for a moderate causal evidence rating, the highest rating available for nonexperimental designs.
Causal Evidence Rating
The quality of causal evidence presented in this report is low because the authors did not ensure that the groups being compared were similar before the intervention or include sufficient control variables. This means we are not confident that the estimated effects are attributable to Saddleback College’s Fast Track to Success program; other factors are likely to have contributed.