For performance funding to truly have
a positive impact on student success,
college personnel must not regard
performance measures as punitive.
Educators should not feel they are
being punished for not meeting
prescribed goals. Rather they should
look at performance funding as an
opportunity to help colleges improve
by way of data-based decisionmaking.
Every stakeholder involved in the
process needs to clearly understand his
or her role in student success. To build
support from the ground up, two-year
college presidents and chancellors want
the process for determining measures
to be as inclusive as possible. In Arkansas, we appointed a diverse working
group that includes academic affairs,
student affairs, finance, research, and
faculty to work with AATYC staff.
Align With Mission
Data-based decisionmaking is nothing
new for Arkansas—performance
Amount of base funding
that will be allocated to
Arkansas community
colleges relative to
performance in 2013–14.
funding is an addition to the state’s
student success agenda. The working
group began with the concept that the
model should complement the goals of
existing student success initiatives in
Arkansas such as Achieving the Dream
and the AATYC Center for Student
Success. The center recently received
a $650,000 grant from The Kresge
Foundation to improve institutional
research capacity and was a lead partner along with North West Arkansas
Community College in acquiring a $14.7
million grant from the U.S. Department
of Labor to improve graduation and job
placement rates.
The working group met weekly for
nearly three months, researching other
states’ performance funding models and
reviewing thousands of pages of data.
Source: Act 1203
Group members wanted measures to
accurately reflect the two-year college
mission and student population as
well as relate to the existing student
success agenda in Arkansas. In order
to accomplish this, colleges needed to
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