A large body of research documents the
barriers faced by first-generation, low-income (FGLI) students as
“hidden minorities” onelite college campuses. Although existing
studies show brief psy-chological interventions can help mitigate
some of these obstacles,universities are investing in more intensive
interventions that try toboth shift mindsets and mitigate structural
disadvantages in FGLI stu-dents’ academic preparation. In
collaboration with the administratorsat a highly selective
university, we conducted the first randomizedcontrolled trial of a
summer bridge program targeted at FGLI students.During summers
between 2017 and 2019, we randomly selected 232out of 418
first-generation or low-income students and invited themto attend an
intensive, six-week long residential summer programfeaturing courses
for academic credit. Students randomized to thecontrol group either
interacted with online content offering no aca-demic credit or had
no summer intervention. Our pre-registeredanalysis shows that the
program encouraged FGLI students to pursuea more ambitious
first-year program, increasing the proportion ofnon-introductory
courses by 7 percentage points. The program alsoincreased the
proportion of courses taken for a grade rather than aspass-fail by 6
percentage points. These improvements were accom-panied by no
discernible impact on first-year GPAs and academicwithdrawal. The
findings show the ability to academically integrateFGLI students
into selective university communities. |