AEA Papers and Proceedings
ISSN 2574-0768 (Print) | ISSN 2574-0776 (Online)
A Cautionary Tale about Emergency Financial Assistance without Services: Evidence from a Randomized Controlled Trial Evaluation at a Community College
AEA Papers and Proceedings
vol. 109,
May 2019
(pp. 218–22)
Abstract
Community college completion rates are extremely low, especially among low-income students. One potential explanation is that low-income students have limited capacity to overcome financial shocks, such as large medical, legal, or car repair bills. Some programs offer "emergency financial assistance" (EFA) to prevent these events from curtailing educational progress. We test the efficacy of EFA within the context of a broader randomized controlled trial at a community college in Texas. We find no evidence that access to EFA alone leads to improved outcomes. We speculate that EFA will only be effective if it is paired with additional case management services.Citation
Evans, William N., Melissa S. Kearney, Brendan Perry, and James X. Sullivan. 2019. "A Cautionary Tale about Emergency Financial Assistance without Services: Evidence from a Randomized Controlled Trial Evaluation at a Community College." AEA Papers and Proceedings, 109: 218–22. DOI: 10.1257/pandp.20191014Additional Materials
JEL Classification
- I22 Educational Finance; Financial Aid
- I23 Higher Education; Research Institutions
- I24 Education and Inequality
- I28 Education: Government Policy
- I32 Measurement and Analysis of Poverty
- I38 Welfare, Well-Being, and Poverty: Government Programs; Provision and Effects of Welfare Programs