Our research agenda is a living document that reflects, and is responsive to, the Board of Higher Education and agency’s priorities and will be updated regularly as the needs of the field and policy context evolve.
Introduction
The Department of Higher Education (DHE) is committed to building equity-driven research and evaluation capacity to inform policy decisions and program/service improvement. DHE has identified research priorities aligned with broader policy priorities and the overarching equity goal established by the Board of Higher Education:
- Student Success and Financial Aid: Supporting and advancing college affordability and student success through well-designed, sufficiently funded, clear and consistent financial aid and student success program.
- Economic Mobility: Increasing the economic mobility benefits of postsecondary participation.
- Public Good: Improving alignment between public good outcomes and postsecondary higher education opportunities.
- Innovation: Facilitating and fostering high-impact innovation throughout the public higher education system.
The goal of documenting and publicly sharing these research priorities is to spread awareness and align researchers and other interested stakeholders behind some of the most pressing policy questions, efforts, and challenges the Massachusetts Board of Higher Education and DHE confront. Publication is designed to bring greater transparency to gaps in policymaker knowledge and highlight opportunities for further research to impact policy development by DHE and others.
These research priorities are designed to both reflect existing research and evaluation efforts at DHE and future research that could be broached through external research partnerships.
Please contact Mario Delci, Associate Commissioner for Research & Planning, at mdelci@dhe.mass.edu if you have any questions or would like to discuss this further.
Student Success and Financial Aid
Supporting and advancing student access and success through well-designed, sufficiently funded, clear and consistent financial aid and success program funding
Achievement
How much improvement in academic achievement as opposed to academic attainment, is realized at the higher education level overall and at particular institutions?
- How can student academic achievement in postsecondary education be measured consistently across institutions? How does it change over time?
- How does student achievement vary across institutions, programs, and diverse student populations (e.g., by race/ethnicity, income, enrollment status)?
- What institutional practices, academic experiences, and/or program characteristics are associated with improvements in student achievement?
Financial Aid
What is the impact of the state’s investments in financial aid programs, particularly for students who have historically faced barriers to college access and completion? What role does technology play in this effort?
- How do different financial aid funding models and program structures influence student access, enrollment intensity, persistence, and completion?
- How do financial aid programs, including campus-level emergency grants and loans, affect student enrollment intensity, credit accumulation, academic progress, and out-of-school work? How effectively do these programs reach and support historically underrepresented student populations?
- Are there costs not covered by financial aid that remain barriers to student access (e.g., books, supplies, rent, childcare, etc.)?
- To what extent do the programs increase degree completion for participants? Which students benefit most? Do the programs contribute to greater equity in degree attainment?
- In practice, what amount of financial relief do programs provide for students? What is the impact on total cost to attain a degree? In quantitative terms, what would the impact be of increasing aid by X dollars on student access, persistence, and completion? What is the predicted or observed impact when coupled with student wraparound services?
How can financial aid programs better reach eligible students, including improving communication, outreach, and awareness across different subgroups?
- Qualitative: What level of awareness and understanding about financial aid opportunities do high school students and other eligible people have? What beliefs do students of color, low-income students, and historically underrepresented groups have about cost of college and difficulty of obtaining financial aid? What modes of communication, including digital and technology-enabled tools, have been most effective in reaching eligible people?
- Qualitative: For financial aid programs, how do eligible students experience program requirements, processes, and expectations (i.e., are programs “student-ready”)? Among students who begin receiving aid, what factors influence continuation or discontinuation?
Student Supports and Wrap-around
How effectively are wrap-around programs (mentoring, tutoring, basic needs services) reaching the students who could benefit, and how much are the programs improving outcomes?
- What is the landscape of wrap-around programs across the public higher ed system? What are the demographics of students who are taking part?
- Including technology-enabled tools and supports, to what extent are wrap-around programs meeting students’ basic needs and contributing to persistence and degree completion?
- Have wrap-around programs helped non-traditional students (including adult learners and students returning after a stop-out) complete their degrees/certificates?
- What leads students to pursue a degree part time rather than full time? What obstacles could be addressed?
- Qualitative: What factors lead students to enroll part time rather than full time (e.g., choice, class availability, cost, technology-enabled options, flexible scheduling, student time constraints, or other reasons)? What scheduling models work best for part-time students? What practices help part-time students increase their credit load to complete degrees more quickly?
Transfer and Degree Completion
To what extent do existing policies and practices enable credit transfer between institutions?
- When students earn college credits in high school (through Early College, dual enrollment, or other options), what percentage of credits are accepted and applied toward a degree or program of study when they enroll at an IHE? What patterns exist in the types of credits that do or do not get counted successfully?
- Do potential and current community college students have access to timely, high-quality academic and transfer advising? What inequities or structural barriers exist in access to advising, and how do such disparities affect early academic choices and transfer trajectories?
- When students transfer, what percentage of credits are successfully transferring? What are the reasons that credits do not successfully transfer?
- Qualitative: How well do students understand and trust the credit transfer system?
- To what extent can students identify the courses needed at a 2-year institution to support a future transfer to a 4- year institution? What tools, resources, or guidance are most helpful? What else is needed?
To what extent are students successfully transferring from 2-year to 4-year institutions?
- How should success of transfer be defined? How do outcomes for student groups differ based on those definitions? To what extent can programs designed to support transfer pathways be identified, and what coursework patterns or supports are associated with successful transfer?
- What differences can be observed between students who successfully transfer and earn a degree vs. those who do not? Are there patterns of coursework or supports that are important to supporting successful transfer?
Early College
How is Early College programming impacting matriculation and degree completion overall and for subgroups such as students of color, low-income students, and historically underrepresented groups?
- To what extent has the roll-out of Early College programming had a causal impact on the rates of matriculation and degree completion, overall and by subgroup? For different IHE segments (private vs. public, 2 year vs. 4 year)?
- To what extent does Early College lead to students reaching higher levels of college attainment, overall and by subgroup? Do students go directly to 4-year schools or begin in 2-year and transfer?
- What is the cost-effectiveness of Early College as a state policy intervention for increasing college access and completion for students, overall and by subgroup?
Economic Mobility
Increasing the economic mobility benefits of postsecondary participation
Measures of College Success
To what extent does higher education contribute to greater earnings or other measures of job quality post-degree?
- What is the impact of specific IHE attendance and degree completion on future earnings? What specific IHEs, degree types or majors contribute most to socioeconomic mobility and future earnings?
- What is the impact of occupation and employment stability on student perspectives of success? What measures of job quality (e.g., earnings, benefits, workplace culture, career development) influence student perceptions of success?
- To what extent are students of color, low-income students and historically underrepresented groups in public higher ed, including adult learners, first-generation students, students with disabilities, and LGBTQ+ students, reaching the most highly compensated career paths?
- How do employment outcomes differ for students who transfer between institutions or earn stackable credentials, compared with those following a single-institution pathway?
- How do employment outcomes differ for students who earn stackable credentials, compared with students without stackable credentials?
- How do transfer pathways, program participation, and credential stacking relate to earnings and long-term economic mobility?
Return on Investment
What is the ROI for students participating in higher education?
- What is the debt-to-earnings ratio for students by institution, program of study, and/or student group? How does financial aid change that ratio?
- Beyond debt-to-earnings, what other indicators (e.g., reduced unemployment, improved job quality, financial stability) describe the ROI of higher education for students?
What ROI does the state see from the investment in financial aid programs?
- What is the estimated long-run cost savings from the improved degree completion resulting from financial aid programs? Accounting for increased tax revenue, decreased social services and other costs, what is the ROI for the state?
- How does the ROI vary by institution, region, and local labor market? Are there bright spots that offer lessons for improving the ROI statewide?
Public Good
Improving alignment between public good outcomes and postsecondary higher education opportunities
Non-Career Outcomes
To what extent does higher education improve outcomes for individuals and communities?
- What is the impact of IHE degree completion on non-career measures such as homeownership, children attending high-quality schools, health outcomes, reduced involvement with criminal justice system, and civic engagement (e.g. voting and community participation?
- What is the impact of IHE degree completion on self-reported measures of well-being and life satisfaction by MA public IHE graduates?
Economic Impact
What is the economic and workforce impact of Massachusetts public higher education on the Commonwealth?
- How many students who complete credentials at Massachusetts public IHEs reside in Massachusetts following graduation?
- How does in-state retention vary by credential type, institution, and field of study?
- What share of the Massachusetts labor force are Massachusetts public IHE graduates by industry?
- In health care and other priority industries, how does the location where individuals obtained their degrees relate to licensure and practice in Massachusetts?
Innovation
Facilitating and fostering high-impact innovation throughout the public higher education system supporting all students
Meeting All Students Where They Are
To what extent do students of color, low-income students and other underrepresented students report a sense of belonging and positive experience at public IHEs?
- How can we use existing disparate student experience surveys across campuses to create a valid measure across the system?
- If campuses are willing to include certain standardized survey questions, what are the validated questions/items that would be most important to include across all public IHEs?
To what extent are IHEs supporting non-traditional learners (e.g. adults with some college, no degree; adult immigrants arriving to MA)?
- How well are IHEs creating on-ramps for non-traditional students, including awarding credit for prior learning and leveraging technology-enabled model programs?
- What program models have proven to be effective in reaching non-traditional students and supporting students through to completion?
- Are these approaches leading to degree completion among non-traditional learners?
- To what extent does participation in cooperative education (i.e., co-op program at MA public IHE) affect student success (e.g., persistence, graduation time-to-degree)?
- Are there effective new program models for post-traditional students (e.g. accelerated degree programs, programs for post-traditional learners, non-degree credentials) that increase student success?
Last Updated: Fall 2026
