What We Still Need to Learn About Re-Engaging Adult Learners

New America recently released a report titled “Strategies for Re-Enrolling Adult Learners at Community Colleges,” which shares the results of a year-long landscape analysis of efforts from community colleges, nonprofit organizations, businesses, and states aimed at increasing re-enrollment for adult learners. The report highlights three different types of strategies community colleges and third-party vendors are using: 1) outreach, recruitment, and coaching; 2) academic support and flexibility; 3) financial incentives and support.

But while developing this report, the project team encountered a striking gap: there is limited research and rigorous evaluation on which strategies are most effective for re-engaging adult learners who have stopped out of higher education. The work is underway, but there are structural challenges in how it is studied and documented. As investment in adult learner re-engagement continues, states, community colleges, and other actors in the space still do not have the answers they need as to which strategies are most effective, under what conditions, and for which students.

New America convened a distinguished group of leaders from across policy, practice, research, and philanthropy to shape a forward-looking research agenda on re-engaging adult learners. The convening brought together community college leaders and state agency officials from across the country, alongside leading research and policy organizations and philanthropic partners deeply invested in this work. Guided by New America, participants built on an existing landscape of research questions while identifying critical new areas of inquiry, helping define the field's most pressing, unanswered questions. At the end of the day, the group coalesced around the following questions for future exploration:

1. What data (credit and non-credit) elements should institutions track to identify, contact, and monitor adult re-enrollees effectively? How should cross-sector teams at colleges and states use this data and transform it into actionable information? Community colleges often face a demand for data that exceeds their capacity to collect it, let alone analyze it. Data practitioners and data users at institutions need assistance in deciding which data points are most valuable for improving outcomes for adult re-enrollees.
2. What models of financial incentives are effective for reenrollment, completion, and job placement? What are the differences in return on investment (ROI) for these models? While financial barriers are consistently cited as a key reason adults stop out, there is still limited evidence on which models of financial support are most effective for promoting completion and job placement, or how their returns on investment compare. Understanding how eligibility for financial aid targeted to returning adult learners–and the size of these financial aid awards–will be important to better understand how to bring this population back to higher education and support their success.
3. Which outreach methods and types of messages most effectively engage potential re-enrollees? What are students searching for to find programs, and how is this changing in the age of AI? While states and institutions invest significant resources in contacting potential re-enrollees, there is still limited evidence on which outreach methods and message types are most effective. This inquiry should include how prospective students learned about programs in the first place: were they searching for programs unprompted, or did marketing about returning to college inspire them to connect with a navigator or college? What keywords, questions, and signals are driving adults who return to college to do so? How is this behavior changing in the age of AI-driven search and advising tools?
4. What are the most effective and intentional ways to bring faculty into the adult learning re-enrollment, persistence, and completion conversation? Too often, efforts to re-enroll adult learners focus only on outreach, advising, and financial support, but leave faculty out of the picture. Future research should explore how institutions can intentionally involve faculty in conversations about adult learner persistence and completion, including course design, flexible scheduling, and recognition of prior learning that acknowledges adults’ experiences and leverages faculty’s frequent interaction with adult learners to offer support and build trust.
5. What do advisors need to better support returning adult learners? Which advising models work best from pre-enrollment to completion? Returning students often balance school with work, family, and financial responsibilities. The type of advising they need may look very different from an advisor’s norm. Understanding what an advisor needs to support returning students effectively–and which advising models work best during various parts of an adult learner’s return to school–is key.
6. What partnerships are beneficial? Who are they with? What do they look like? How do we strengthen them? Successful partnerships–whether with vendors, state agencies, system offices, or community organizations–can help institutions increase their capacity to welcome adult learners. Collaboration can expand their outreach, reduce barriers for students, and connect adult learners to academic, financial, and wraparound supports that influence enrollment, retention, and completion. But more research is needed to define what types of partnership work best, what they entail, and how to grow and maintain them.

As the momentum around adult learner re-engagement continues to grow, so too must the commitment to understanding what works and for whom. New America is grateful for the thought partnership of the researchers and leaders from community colleges, state and public agencies, policy organizations, and philanthropy in the creation of this agenda. We look forward to exploring these questions in the future.