The policy vision of our Foundation's College Access & Success area is to provide Ohio with universal postsecondary educational opportunity at all levels -- apprenticeship, certificate, associate or bachelor's degree -- that will enable any Ohioan to achieve postsecondary success.

The Governor's Commission on Higher Education and the Economy (CHEE) offers multiple recommendations that are aligned with KnowledgeWorks Foundation's initiatives to offer college access to all Ohioans. Specifically, these recommendations are aligned with the following initiatives: Early College, the Ohio Bridges to Opportunity Initiative, the Ohio College Access Network, Achieving the Dream, and Project GRAD.

The following recommendations are included in the report Building on Knowledge, Investing in People: Higher Education and the Future of Ohio's Economy.
Download the executive summary
Download the full report

Recommendation #1: Establish a private-sector led Ohio Business Alliance for Higher Education and the Economy to serve as a catalyst, mediator, and advocate for an enhanced and more strategic role for Ohio's colleges and universities as contributors to the state's economic growth.

This recommendation supports a higher, more organized level of collaboration between businesses and higher education at the most powerful level, the state level. With vested interest in the education and skill level of Ohioans, businesses are able to generate the financial and political support to advance the most effective initiatives, such as those supported by our Foundation, which will create higher education opportunities for all Ohioans.

Recommendation #2: Increase the number and proportion of Ohioans who participate and succeed in higher education.

The goal of this recommendation is to increase undergraduate and graduate enrollment in Ohio's public and private postsecondary institutions by 180,000 (over current enrollment of approximately 600,000) by 2015. This would be a 30% increase.

• The first goal under this recommendation is to increase awareness with a marketing campaign advertising the accessibility and benefits of higher education to potential students. As mentioned in the report, the campaign would be coordinated with advising services offered by the Ohio College Access Network, an initiative partly supported by the Foundation.
  
• The second goal is to improve academic preparation for all of Ohio's high school students. This recommendation has the potential to support partly Foundation-funded initiatives such as Project GRAD and Early College high schools, that are focused on improving learning opportunities for Ohio's students, and ensuring a seamless progression of academic expectations, connected coursework, and credit transfer among education systems, from pre-kindergarten to postsecondary academic work. Within the current system, contradictory or unstated academic expectations and disconnected coursework can leave students feeling completely academically unprepared when they transition from elementary school to middle school, from middle school to high school, and from high school to college.
  
• The third goal under this recommendation is to reduce financial barriers to higher education. The Early College high schools initiative, supported by KnowledgeWorks Foundation in partnership with other foundations, has the potential to cut college tuition in half by granting students an associate's degree, or 60 hours of college credit, up on high school graduation.

Recommendation #3: Create a more user-friendly network of postsecondary institutions that will make it easier for students to apply to transfer among Ohio's colleges and universities.

This recommendation aims to remove unnecessary barriers to the transfer of coursework between state institutions of higher education by fully implementing new transfer and articulation policies and systems. The Ohio Bridges to Opportunity Initiative's Articulation and Transfer Policy, which advocated for articulation and transfer of industry-recognized coursework and credentials between public adult workforce education centers and two-year campuses, is one policy that supports this recommendation. By strengthening the connections between these institutions, the Articulation and Transfer policy will make higher education and training shorter and less expensive for low-income students.

Recommendation #4: Require Ohio's two-year public colleges and university branch campuses, adult workforce education full-service centers, local workforce policy boards, and One-Stop Regional Workforce Advisory Councils to work as partners in improving the skills of Ohioans already in the workforce.

The purpose of this recommendation is to align funding and resources available for the development of Ohio's workforce, so that learning is continuous and does not result in a dead end for Ohio's low-wage working adults who are seeking education. The Ohio Bridges to Opportunity Initiative's 50-member state-level stakeholder group supports this recommendation with policy advocacy and programs, including Career Pathways that connects adult educational programs with student and employer needs, to create flexible training and degree programs that target working adults.