ReUp announces its official partnership with City University of New York (CUNY) to re-enroll “stopout” students and give them a second chance at earning the most powerful tool for social mobility: an undergraduate degree.
ReUp’s mission is to improve social mobility for underserved populations and help university partners address the “completion crisis” facing America’s higher education system. Over 37 million Americans have some college but no degree, with roughly half of all college students dropping out of school.
“We look forward to partnering with ReUp in this important effort to address the completion crisis in American postsecondary education,” said CUNY Interim Chancellor Vita C. Rabinowitz. “A college degree is a primary driver of social mobility, but too many students end up putting their education on hold indefinitely. We want these so-called ‘stopout’ students to come back, and with this partnership we will learn how best to persuade them.”
ReUp uses a unique blend of proprietary technology, data and personalized coaching to engage and help re-enroll stopout students. Many of the students who benefit from ReUp’s interventions have stopped out of colleges or universities that are public or have low tuition rates. Through a grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, ReUp is able to bring its services to underrepresented populations and develop a scalable, yet personalized, approach to engaging these students.
A core component of the Gates grant process was to identify a university partner aligned with the goal of meaningfully addressing the stopout crisis across a diverse and large population of students. Through a rigorous and competitive application process, ReUp selected CUNY as the ideal partner through which the largest impact could be made. CUNY colleges are among the top-ranked colleges on the social mobility index, with a student population that is one of the most diverse in the country and includes a large proportion of non-traditional learners. “We’re so excited to partner with CUNY to find new, innovative ways to address the stopout issue at scale and guide students back toward degree completion,” said ReUp CEO Sarah Horn.
To maximize the opportunity for learning, ReUp and CUNY have worked together to create a controlled study around the engagement of stopout students. ReUp has been given a list of 20,000 CUNY students who completed some coursework but dropped out before completing their degrees. An additional 20,000 students who match the ReUp criteria are being tracked by CUNY in order to compare results with the ReUp cohort. “We call this ‘The Science of Re-Entry’ and we’re excited to share the best practices with the broader educational ecosystem,” Horn added.
About CUNY
The City University of New York is the nation’s leading urban public university. Founded in 1847, CUNY counts 13 Nobel Prize and 24 MacArthur (“Genius”) grant winners among its alumni. CUNY students, alumni and faculty have garnered scores of other prestigious honors over the years in recognition of historic contributions to the advancement of the sciences, business, the arts and myriad other fields. The University comprises 25 institutions: 11 senior colleges, seven community colleges, William E. Macaulay Honors College at CUNY, CUNY Graduate Center, Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism at CUNY, CUNY School of Labor and Urban Studies, CUNY School of Law, CUNY School of Professional Studies and CUNY Graduate School of Public Health and Health Policy. The University serves more than 275,000 degree-seeking students. CUNY offers online baccalaureate and master’s degrees through the School of Professional Studies.
About ReUp Education
At ReUp, we support students who have taken a break from school, and often face a myriad of challenges – financial, social, and academic – that keep them from finishing. We clear the path for students to go back to school, complete their remaining credits, and graduate. ReUp is the expert in understanding, engaging, and re-enrolling stopout students. Through its unique blend of data, technology, and specialized coaching, ReUp has engaged more than 100,000 stopout students across a wide range of universities, and helped re-enroll over 4,000 students. ReUp is based in San Francisco, and is funded by leading education and social impact investors, including Entangled Ventures, University Ventures, Serious Change Investments, and The Impact Engine. ReUp has also received a grant from the Gates Foundation to create scalable solutions to help increase graduation rates.
