Community colleges play a major role in workforce and economic development, and at the Richmond Fed, we’re committed to understanding the economic impacts that important institutions like these have across the Fifth District. Unfortunately, existing data collected across states do not fully describe the range of positive outcomes achieved by community college students. Individual community colleges use many metrics to gauge their success, but these can vary from school to school, and from state to state, which makes it hard to compare across institutions and track outcomes consistently over time.

The Richmond Fed’s Survey of Community College Outcomes (SCCO) is a quantitative, consistent system for measuring community college outcomes that provides a fuller view of what success looks like for community college students — all community college students, including part-time students, high school enrollees and other non-traditional students—and will allow for better analysis on how student success contributes to local workforce and economic development.

The SCCO launched with a limited pilot in 2022, with results from the extended pilot released in November 2023. Visit the About the Survey page for more information on the survey and participating institutions, and bookmark the Community College Insights blog for regular updates and insights from the survey team.