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Leaks in the College Access Pipeline: Examining Summer Melt in a Large Urban School District

Principal Investigator(s):  View help for Principal Investigator(s) Carrie Miller, University of California-Los Angeles; Meredith Phillips, University of California-Los Angeles; Caitlin Ahearn, Stanford University

Version:  View help for Version V1

Name File Type Size Last Modified
  Syntax-Files 07/09/2024 07:46:PM
Read_Me.pdf application/pdf 68.9 KB 07/09/2024 04:50:PM

Project Citation: 

Miller, Carrie, Phillips, Meredith, and Ahearn, Caitlin. Leaks in the College Access Pipeline: Examining Summer Melt in a Large Urban School District. Ann Arbor, MI: Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research [distributor], 2024-07-30. https://doi.org/10.3886/E207081V1

Project Description

Summary:  View help for Summary Some high school seniors who plan to attend college in the fall following graduation do not enroll. This phenomenon, known as summer melt, contributes to lower educational attainment, particularly among low-income students. We extend the literature on summer melt in two ways. First, we show that melt estimates can be sensitive to measurement decisions and local context, and in particular that estimates based on student-level National Student Clearinghouse data can overstate the extent of summer melt. Second, we show that aspects of students’ behavior and perceptions, such as their attendance rates, FAFSA completion, and confidence about their intended college, predict summer melt. These results suggest ways that school staff and summer melt interventions could potentially target additional support to college-intending students to facilitate their successful transition to college.

This data deposit contains all of the syntax files that are needed to replicate the results presented in the manuscript “Leaks in the College Access Pipeline: Examining Summer Melt in a Large Urban School District.”  For more information, see the Read_Me file.
Funding Sources:  View help for Funding Sources The Mayer and Morris Kaplan Family Foundation (20193515)

Scope of Project

Subject Terms:  View help for Subject Terms summer melt; college access; college enrollment; urban schools; FAFSA
Geographic Coverage:  View help for Geographic Coverage United States, California, Los Angeles
Time Period(s):  View help for Time Period(s) 9/4/2007 – 12/31/2019
Universe:  View help for Universe 2019 Los Angeles Unified School District graduates who attended district-operated schools (i.e., traditional and affiliated charter).
Collection Notes:  View help for Collection Notes The underlying data are from the Los Angeles Education Research Institute (LAERI) – Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) data archive. The data are restricted use, per LAERI’s data agreement with LAUSD. For more information about accessing the data, see the Read_Me file.


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Published Versions

V3 [2024-09-12]

V2 [2024-08-23]

V1 [2024-07-30]

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