NEBHE: Sustaining College Transfer Pathways in New England

NEBHE convenes leaders to sustain the New England Transfer Guarantee, ensuring streamlined transfer pathways and student success across six states beyond grant funding.

Participants explained just how the effort has enhanced transfer pathways and streamlined the transfer landscape for trainees in their particular states. “I simply wish to claim how much we value it,” Nate Mackinnon, executive director of the Massachusetts Association of Area Colleges, told the group. “From the neighborhood university point of view, we’re continuously interested in ensuring our trainees shed as few debts as possible on their path.”

There are questions that remain unanswered for the time being; nevertheless, this conference attested that the region’s higher education leaders are committed to making sure that the guarantee can continue to offer trainees for many years ahead.

Planning and implementation of this campaign in the 6 states pointed out above has actually been implemented via financing from the Arthur Vining Davis Foundations, the Davis Educational Structure, the Lloyd G. Balfour Structure and the Teagle Foundation.

Maintaining Transfer Pathways Beyond Grant Funding

While the convening prospered in describing system-level stakeholder top priorities, there are still details that need to be straightened out. Provided each state’s distinct higher education landscape, a one-size-fits-all version for community university transfer consultant involvement would certainly be inefficient, highlighting the demand for even more nuanced state-by-state strategies. Outreach to student success organizations to discover opportunities for partnership is another choice that the transfer campaigns group at NEBHE have to completely explore in the coming months.

NEBHE will likewise continue to solicit any updates to the eligible programs that each four-year organization open up to ensure trainees. Participants recommended that NEBHE ought to involve the web designers to whom they send such updates annually– to see what will be needed for them to continue to maintain these trainee websites updated with info that area university student require to review their transfer selections via the warranty.

NEBHE’s Ongoing Role and Future Sustainability

Those who went to consisted of people that lead public two- and four-year systems however likewise those that represent four-year independent colleges. The conference was focused on establishing NEBHE’s recurring role in carrying out the warranty beyond the life of the give, and participants discussed what kind of coalition-based governance framework would assure that the program adapted to future fads in the college landscape in a manner that maintained its durability for future generations of students.

Student Success and Transfer Statistics

As was highlighted in a previous column and more contextualized in the longer-form “3rd Yearly Assurance Registration Record,” trainees who have transferred via this effort are doing well above the minimal grade point average requirements receiving organizations set for their admission.

Guests also shared an interest in NEBHE’s ongoing participation in promoting the effort to community university transfer advisers often by integrating the guarantee right into existing statewide conferences and occasions that focus on transfer. In addition, attendees saw possible in partnering with third-party pupil success companies to get to pupils and guarantee that they understand all the choices available to them when it pertains to gaining a baccalaureate credential.

Exactly how does an initiative achieve sustainability beyond the life process of the grants that moneyed its application? This is the inquiry that the transfer campaigns group at the New England Board of Higher Education (NEBHE) set out to respond to earlier this month throughout a convening of college leaders from throughout the New England region.

With the grant-funded stage of this work pertaining to an end in December 2025 (March 2026 for the grant from the Balfour Foundation), the time is ripe for creating a strategy to maintain the warranty for future generations of trainees. NEBHE collected state college system leaders from throughout all six New England states for a hybrid conference at the Eagle Mountain House in Jackson, N.H.

New England Transfer Guarantee: Expansion and Impact

Launched in Connecticut, Massachusetts and Rhode Island in 2021 and scaled to Maine, New Hampshire and Vermont in 2024, the New England Transfer Assurance is NEBHE’s site transfer campaign. There are no application charges or essay needs for trainees transferring via this program. Participants defined exactly how the initiative has actually enhanced transfer pathways and streamlined the transfer landscape for trainees in their respective states. Outreach to student success organizations to discover chances for collaboration is one more alternative that the transfer efforts group at NEBHE must completely explore in the coming months.

Next, the conference’s facilitator involved individuals in a discussion regarding the functions called for to sustain the initiative in the long term. In addition to accumulating and evaluating student-level registration information on an annual basis, NEBHE has dedicated to remain to release the annual enrollment record for the New England Transfer Guarantee.

Launched in Connecticut, Massachusetts and Rhode Island in 2021 and scaled to Maine, New Hampshire and Vermont in 2024, the New England Transfer Warranty is NEBHE’s landmark transfer campaign. Associate level– holding community university grads can transfer effortlessly to getting involved four-year colleges in the same state with assured admission, supplied they fulfill a minimal GPA set by the receiving establishment. There are no application charges or essay requirements for pupils moving through this program. As of October 2025, there are 53 getting involved four-year establishments throughout all six New England states.

Past that, guarantee trainees are maintained at their transfer destination at an excellent rate of 94 percent. Analyzing this annual data has actually also exposed that a lot of the pupils that move via this effort are from typically underserved backgrounds, with over 47 percent of students that have enlisted via the initiative being Pell Give receivers.