Program, which ran from 2016-23, served as blueprint for Go Blue Guarantee
Study: Degrees of Mobility: Shifting Low-Income Students to Higher Quality Colleges
Study: Degrees of Mobility: Shifting Low-Income Students to Higher Quality Colleges
The University of Michigan’s High-Achieving Involved Leader (HAIL) Scholarship program increased on-time bachelor’s degree attainment rates by 4%, according to a study co-authored by researchers from U-M, Harvard University and elsewhere.
Although attending U-M is associated with greater economic mobility for low-income students, these students remain underrepresented in the undergraduate population. Compared with other public universities across the state, U-M has a pronounced socioeconomic imbalance—only 3% of its undergraduates come from households in the bottom income quintile, while 9% come from households in the top 1%.
To encourage high-achieving, low-income students to apply to and enroll at U-M, researchers piloted the HAIL Scholarship, which guaranteed four years of free tuition to high achieving low-income applicants upon admission. The program ran from 2016-23 and served as the foundation for the Go Blue Guarantee, which provides free tuition to in-state students whose families earn less than $125,000 annually.
HAIL shifted the timing of financial aid guarantees—traditional financial aid programs inform students of their offer upon admission, while HAIL guaranteed financial aid to students upon application. Students, parents and high school faculty members also received targeted outreach communicating the guarantee.
While research previously showed a positive effect on applications to and enrollment in U-M, it did not examine effects on educational and economic outcomes. The new study found that for high school graduates in 2016 and 2017, the HAIL program:
- Increased enrollment at U-M: Students who received the HAIL Scholarship offer were 21 percentage points more likely to enroll at a U-M campus. Of that increase, 4 percentage points came from students who otherwise would have attended community college. The remaining came from students who would have attended four-year colleges less selective than U-M Ann Arbor.
- Accelerated degree completion: Enrollees who received the HAIL Scholarship were 4.1 percentage points more likely to receive their bachelor’s degree in four years than those who did not receive the scholarship.
- Improved degree quality: HAIL students who decided to enroll at U-M because of HAIL were 56 percentage points more likely to earn bachelor’s degrees from highly or most selective colleges compared to their peers who did not receive the scholarship.
- Increased projected earnings: Although the researchers were unable to directly measure the post-graduate earnings of HAIL recipients, they predict the increased degree quality associated with the scholarship will increase annual earnings by 18%-25%.
The study was co-authored by Katherine Michelmore, a professor at U-M’s Ford School of Public Policy, and published by the National Bureau of Economic Research. She and her co-authors say the scholarship’s effectiveness has implications for colleges looking to increase low-income applications and improve degree quality.
“Better information, simpler applications and clearer aid promises can move students toward higher-quality colleges, but they cannot create more high-quality seats,” the authors write in the study. “HAIL reduced undermatch by reallocating access to high-quality colleges. Mobility at scale requires expanding that supply.”
Michelmore’s co-authors included: Elizabeth Burland, associate director of research at Harvard’s Center for Education Policy Research; Nora Delaney, doctoral student at Harvard’s Graduate School of Education; Susan Dynarski, former Ford School professor and current professor of education at Harvard; CJ Libassi, senior research assistant at Columbia University’s Community College Research Center; Stephanie Owen, assistant professor of economics at Colby College; Mary Quiroga, U-M doctoral student in economics and public policy; Katherine Leu, U-M doctoral student in sociology; and Elizabeth Salinas, doctoral student at Harvard’s Graduate School of Education.
The study is the latest in a series of publications examining the HAIL Scholarship’s impact on low-income students.
Written by Margaret Peterman and Rebecca Cohen, Ford School of Public Policy