Comment on FR Doc # 2011-10909

Comment on proposed "First in the World" competition: We recommend that one of the competitive preferences should focus on strategies that produce quick results and can complement the long term strategies of recruitment and retention. One such strategy, often called "reverse articulation", focuses on students who have transferred from two-year colleges to four-year institutions but who have failed to completed a credential at either institution. Here at Madison Area Technical College we have studied our students who transfer to the University of Wisconsin-Madison and the data indicates that over 40 percent of them fail to gain a degree from either institution. Yet many of these students have accumulated a significant number of credits, often enough to be awarded a two-year degree. We are working on systems to identify these students and creating new strategies to help them complete a degree. This effort is labor and data intensive and could benefit greatly from grant support in creating the institutional systems and policies to make "reverse articulation" a normal part of the transfer process. We encourage you to make such efforts a priority in the proposed competition.