ASAP and Volatility

By Matt Reed. When the Atlantic decided to tell us how to escape the “community college trap,” I had to look. It’s the same part of my mind that makes me smell the milk even though I know it’s spoiled.  Nothing good is likely to come of it, but curiosity is a force in itself. The article wasn’t nearly as awful as its title suggested. It was largely a profile of the ASAP program at the Borough of Manhattan Community College. ASAP has improved student retention rates by being remarkably prescriptive about what students do. They have to enroll full-time, for example, and every student gets an “intrusive” advisor who functions as something between a truant officer and a personal trainer. Read more...