Community college transfer students’ probabilities of baccalaureate receipt as a function of their prevalence in four‐year colleges and departments

Abstract

The present paper determines whether community college transfer students have higher baccalaureate rates when they enroll in four‐year colleges and departments that have larger shares of transfer students. Transfers attending non‐technical campuses with larger shares of transfers have higher eight‐year baccalaureate rates, but within‐campus increases in share transfers do not increase transfer graduation rates. Transfers in departments with large shares of transfer students have significantly lower graduation rates, but natives in such departments do not. Within‐department increases in transfer student presence are positively correlated with transfer eight‐year graduation rates and negatively correlated with native eight‐year graduation rates, indicating an opportunity for efficiency gains if influxes of transfers are separated from natives.