Phân tích chính sách Tennessee Promise: Phản hồi và kế hoạch tiếp nhận sinh viên chuyển trường

Western Kentucky University TopSCHOLAR® Dissertations Graduate School Fall 2017 A Narrative Policy Analysis of the Responses to Tennessee Promise and Plans for Transfer Receptivity by Six Tennessee Public Universities' Presidents and Provosts Lori Elliott Buchanan Western Kentucky University, buchananl@apsu.edu Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.edu/diss Part of the Educational Sociology Commons, Education Policy Commons, and the Higher Education Administration Commons Recommended Citation Buchanan, Lori Elliott, "A Narrative Policy Analysis of the Responses to Tennessee Promise and Plans for Transfer Receptivity by Six Tennessee Public Universities' Presidents and Provosts" (2017).edu/diss/130 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by TopSCHOLAR®. It has been accepted for inclusion in Dissertations by an authorized administrator of TopSCHOLAR®. For more information, please contact topscholar@wku. A NARRATIVE POLICY ANALYSIS OF THE RESPONSES TO TENNESSEE PROMISE AND PLANS FOR TRANSFER RECEPTIVITY BY SIX TENNESSEE PUBLIC UNIVERSITIES’ PRESIDENTS AND PROVOSTS A Dissertation Presented to The Faculty of the Educational Leadership Doctoral Program Western Kentucky University Bowling Green, Kentucky In Partial Fulfillment Of the Requirements for the Degree Doctor of Education By Lori Elliott Buchanan December 2017 To my parents who inspire and encourage me to follow my dreams To my grandchildren who bring me great joy To Tennessee Promise community college student transfers who strive for more ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I appreciate this opportunity to express special thanks to: Dr.

Kristin Bailey Wilson, my dissertation chair, who enthusiastically shares her passion for research and challenges us to think deeply about the issues we examine, thank you for your guidance and encouragement. You inspired me to pursue the qualitative research and to keep on writing. Thank you for sharing the research opportunities. Regina Garza Mitchell, Dr.

Brian Meredith, and Dr. Tony Norman, who served as my dissertation committee, thank you for the advice that strengthened my research design, data collection and analysis, and the dissertation. The Western Kentucky University Educational Leadership faculty with whom I engaged, thank you for the challenging and rewarding experiences. I will use what I learned to inform my research and practice each day.

My fellow Cohort 13 students who shared Friday night and Saturday classes, online discussions, and group project assignments, thank you for sharing this experience. We worked hard and learned much more together than we would ever have learned alone. The eight university leaders who shared time out of their busy schedules, thank you for taking the time to meet with me and share your stories. The excellent postsecondary education leaders I have observed, and those with whom I have been privileged to work, thank you for working within shared governance that is on full display; communicating institutional priorities effectively; leading change with compassion and empathy; and allocating resources wisely so that the faculty and staff who work directly with students are able to help them succeed.

iv My sister, Linda Elliott, who knows graphic design, as well as how to address hardware and software issues, thank you for your assistance, which allowed me to stay more focused on the dissertation content and for the encouragement to finish the task. Finally, Austin Peay State University, my university home, thank you for providing the benefit which helped defray the education costs and for offering faculty professional development assignments. I was honored to be awarded the assignment, which allowed me to dedicate ample time for collecting and analyzing the richly detailed qualitative information needed to complete this dissertation. I also appreciate this opportunity to pursue a new higher education research agenda moving forward.

v CONTENTS CHAPTER I: INTRODUCTION. 1 Background and Context. 9 Statement of Purpose. 10 Central Research Question and Subquestions.

11 Research Design Overview. 11 Rationale and Significance. 12 The Researcher’s Perspective. 13 Definitions of Key Terminology.

15 CHAPTER II: REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE. 17 Tennessee Promise and Free College Scholarship Programs. 18 Background and Context. 22 Postsecondary Enrollment Trends.

22 Individual States and Their Role in College Completion. 24 Community College Student Transfers and Baccalaureate Degree Completion. 25 Transfer Receptivity at the Universities. 29 Policy Innovation and Diffusion.

32 State Merit-Based Scholarship Programs. 35 Transfer Receptivity for Community College Transfer Students. 54 vi CHAPTER III: METHODOLOGY. 55 Qualitative Narrative Research Design.

57 Narrative Policy Analysis. 64 The Role of the Researcher. 66 The Research Sample. 67 Information Needed to Conduct the Study.

68 Research Design Implementation. 68 Data Collection Methods. 69 Phase I: Publicly-Accessible University Documents and Local News Articles. 70 Phase II: Interviews with University Presidents and Provosts.

73 Data Analysis and Synthesis. 76 Issues of Trustworthiness. 77 Delimitations and Limitations. 79 CHAPTER IV: FINDINGS.

81 The Universities, Their Leaders, and the Universities’ Enrollment Context. 84 The Universities’ Enrollment Context. 85 Counter Stories and the Meta-Narratives Told by Leaders. 87 University Leaders Respond to Tennessee Promise.

95 vii Leaders’ Concerns. 104 Leaders’ Responses to Offset the Impact. 107 University Leaders Plan to Provide Transfer Receptivity. 121 Committing to Receive and Support Student Transfers.

122 Expanding Retention Efforts to Include Student Transfers. 132 Assessing Policies, Practices, and Programs. 137 University Leaders Plan for Future Transfer Receptivity. 139 Integrating Student Transfers into the Universities.

140 Sustaining the Efforts. 149 Discussion of Findings. 150 How Did the University Presidents and Provosts Respond to Tennessee Promise?. 151 How Did the University Leaders Prepare to Provide Transfer Receptivity?.

152 How Did the University Leaders Plan to Ensure Future Transfer Receptivity?. 154 Implications for Further Study. 155 Recommendations for Ensuring Future Transfer Receptivity. 157 Recommendations for University Leadership Practice.

165 APPENDIX A: APPROVED IRB INFORMED CONSENT DOCUMENT. 176 APPENDIX B: CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK. 178 APPENDIX C: RESEARCH SAMPLE. 179 viii APPENDIX D: TYPES OF INFORMATION NEEDED.

180 APPENDIX E: RESEARCH QUESTIONS AND DATA SOURCES. 181 APPENDIX F: INITIAL INTERVIEW PROTOCOL. 182 APPENDIX G: REVISED INTERVIEW PROTOCOL. 183 APPENDIX H: INTERVIEW QUESTIONS AND RESEARCH QUESTIONS.

185 APPENDIX I: CODE MAPPING STRATEGY WITH RESEARCH QUESTIONS. 187 APPENDIX J: FINDINGS AND SOURCES FOR DATA TRIANGULATION. 188 APPENDIX K: AUDIT TRAIL EXCERPT. 189 APPENDIX L: LIST OF PUBLICLY-ACCESSIBLE DOCUMENTS AND SOURCES CONSULTED, ARRANGED BY UNIVERSITY AND CHRONOLOGICALLY 192 ix A NARRATIVE POLICY ANALYSIS OF THE RESPONSES TO TENNESSEE PROMISE AND PLANS FOR TRANSFER RECEPTIVITY BY SIX TENNESSEE PUBLIC UNIVERSITIES’ PRESIDENTS AND PROVOSTS Lori E.

Buchanan December 2017 214 Pages Directed by: Kristin Wilson, Regina Garza Mitchell, Brian Meredith, and Tony Norman Educational Leadership Doctoral Program Western Kentucky University The Tennessee Promise scholarship and mentoring program broadened access and affordability to postsecondary education in Tennessee. This policy innovation increased the number of students seeking to engage in postsecondary education. It also shifted some of the state’s students to the more affordable community colleges and colleges of applied technology for their first two years of college. Equally important, Tennessee Promise incentivized the presidents and provosts of the six public universities under review to expand existing transfer receptivity efforts as their universities prepared to receive and support Tennessee Promise community college student transfers.

The purpose of this narrative policy analysis based on Roe’s (1994) four-step process is to document and describe how presidents and provosts at six Tennessee public universities responded to Tennessee Promise and prepared to provide transfer receptivity for Tennessee Promise community college student transfers. Employing the theoretical lens of policy innovation and diffusion, I engaged with the leaders’ stories, including interview transcripts, local news articles, and publicly-accessible documents found on the universities’ websites. The study’s findings indicate the majority of university leaders responded to the policy innovation’s broadening of access and affordability to postsecondary education by preparing their universities to receive and support Tennessee Promise community college student transfers. They did so while working within a difficult enrollment context, i., x declining university headcounts since Fall 2011; declining numbers of high school graduates; lifting of University of Tennessee’s enrollment cap; and shifting from the use of a performance-based funding model targeting enrollment to the use of an outcomes- based model that primarily rewards student progression and degree completion.

The university leaders simultaneously sought to offset Tennessee Promise’s impact on enrollment while moving their universities’ enrollment growth agendas forward. The leaders responded by revising scholarships; extending community college partnerships; committing to receive student transfers; expanding retention efforts to include student transfers; and assessing policies, practices, and programs. Future plans include integrating student transfers and sustaining efforts. Working within shared governance, a majority of the leaders communicated institutional priorities, administered available resources, and led institutional change, all of which resulted in diffusion of transfer receptivity for Tennessee Promise community college student transfers.

xi CHAPTER I: INTRODUCTION The Tennessee Promise scholarship and mentoring program broadened access and affordability to postsecondary education in Tennessee. This policy innovation increased the number of students seeking to engage in postsecondary education. It also shifted some of the state’s students to the more affordable community colleges and colleges of applied technology for their first two years of college. Equally important, Tennessee Promise incentivized the presidents and provosts of the six public universities under review to expand existing transfer receptivity efforts further as their universities prepared to receive and support Tennessee Promise community college student transfers.

This narrative policy analysis documents and describes how the presidents and provosts of six Tennessee public four-year universities responded to the Tennessee Promise scholarship and mentoring program during its staging and implementation years. Of interest were their narrative stories about this policy innovation and how the innovation contributed to the diffusion of transfer receptivity for Tennessee Promise community college student transfers. Employing the theoretical lens of policy innovation and diffusion (Rogers, 2003), I engaged with the leaders’ storied interviews, local news articles, and publicly-accessible documents and other information that were found on the universities’ websites. Using Roe’s (1994) narrative policy analysis four-step process, the data were analyzed and reported on Tennessee Promise and the diffusion of transfer receptivity for Tennessee Promise community college student transfers.

Legislated in 2014, the Tennessee Promise scholarship and mentoring program is a component of Tennessee Governor Haslam’s Drive to 55 Initiative. The overarching Drive to 55 goal is for 55% of Tennessee adults to hold a postsecondary degree or 1 certificate by 2025. Tennesseans needed to earn 210,000 additional degrees by 2025, so that Tennessee reaches the national average point (Wright & Deaton, 2012).3% of Tennessee adults held a postsecondary credential compared with 45.3% of adults in the United States (Tennessee Higher Education Commission, n. Work remains in order to gain the nearly 16 percentage points needed to achieve the Drive to 55 goal by 2025.

Beginning in Fall 2015, high school graduates who pursue associate degrees or certificates are eligible to receive the Tennessee Promise scholarship award for up to five semesters in which they are enrolled as full-time students. In order to participate, they are required to attend mandatory mentoring sessions in which they receive assistance in applying and enrolling in college from mentors arranged through partner organizations. The students are required to complete the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) as well. They also are required to complete eight hours of community service each semester and hold a 2.0 GPA while progressing through college (Tennessee Promise, 2014).

Tennessee Promise is called a last-dollar free community college program because the scholarship funds the tuition and fee dollars not covered by the Pell grant, the Tennessee HOPE lottery merit-aid scholarship, or Tennessee Student Assistance Award. Students are able to use the award to attend any state’s eligible institutions, including community colleges, colleges of applied technology, or those universities offering associate degrees (Tennessee Higher Education Commission, 2017b). Through the Tennessee Reconnect Act of 2017, Tennessee added a similar last dollar scholarship for adult residents (Tennessee Reconnect, 2017). Tennessee Reconnect is beyond the scope of this dissertation.