Why pairing scholarships with student success coaching is so powerful

What does partnering financial support with success coaching look like? Five success stories demonstrate the positive impact.

Financial barriers can significantly impact a student's decision to pursue higher education. Scholarships, loans, grants and other forms of financial aid can make a world of difference. However, it’s clear that money alone isn’t enough. A significant portion of students, particularly those from historically marginalized backgrounds, face additional challenges that can lead to them leaving their studies before graduation. What's more, community colleges, which serve a large population of adult learners and students from diverse backgrounds, often see higher dropout rates. It's clear that additional support systems are crucial to help all students persevere and achieve their academic and professional goals, no matter their pathway.

So while financial assistance is irrefutably critical, it’s just one piece of the puzzle. In order to create systemic change, funding opportunities need to be paired with holistic student support. Having seen firsthand the success of pairing financial support with quality coaching, we wanted to share five success stories of partnerships that pair scholarship, loan and grant funding with InsideTrack’s human-powered, tech-enabled coaching that’s fueled by our mission to remove barriers to success, financial and otherwise.

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Indiana 21^st Century Scholars

Designed to make college more affordable for low-income first-generation students, this early college program provides in-state students who meet the requirements – including graduating from high school with a cumulative 2.5 GPA – a two- or four-year scholarship at eligible Indiana colleges or universities. To retain their scholarship, these scholars need to complete 30 credits per academic year and maintain satisfactory academic progress.

Knowing that the scholarship money alone wasn’t enough to promote student success, the Indiana Commission of Higher Education collaborated with InsideTrack to provide success coaching to all incoming freshmen 21^st Century Scholars at five campuses across three different school systems. Coaching was tailored to address the root causes of attrition among these students, who are often juggling work and family commitments outside of school while striving to meet all the requirements of scholarship eligibility.

Adding coaching to the incredible scholarship opportunity made a measurable difference for these 21^st Century Scholars. Retention gains were seen across all five partner institutions. Ivy Tech, for example, saw a 34 percent increase in the retention rate for 21st Century Scholars. There was also a 77 percent improvement in the two-year completion rate for these students, rising from 13 percent to 23 percent. What does this mean for the students? The stronger likelihood of credential completion means greater economic opportunity and social mobility — opening doors to meaningful employment and the ability to create a brighter future for themselves and their families.  

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Orange County Community Foundation (OCCF)

With the goal of improving the lives of college students in Orange County, California, OCCF administers several scholarships funded by grassroots donations from the community and awarded to in-need learners. OCCF partnered with InsideTrack to include coaching as part of the scholarship package in an effort to ensure learners maximize the educational opportunities afforded by the scholarships. 

InsideTrack coaches work one-on-one with students for 13 consecutive months throughout their first year in college. This first year is especially important, establishing a solid foundation upon which to build persistence and chart a path to graduation. Along with exploring their core values, coaches can help learners feel confident and ready for the challenges ahead by assessing their KSBs: Knowledge, Skills and Beliefs. Not only does this bolster engagement and perseverance, it also helps students feel like they belong and are meant to be in college. Areas of focus during coaching sessions run the gamut from prioritizing their time to maximize their schedule each week and developing strong study habits and techniques to increasing knowledge and skills around financial aid and scholarship requirements — gaining confidence at every turn.

And the numbers show it’s working, with 74.4% of students receiving coaching returning for their second year. While this is similar to the national average for all college students, it’s significantly higher than the average for the populations these scholarships serve. This retention insight, coupled with feedback from appreciative students, underscores that this type of personalized coaching has had a big impact on these scholarship recipients as they transition to college.

As one student wrote to her coach, “I am very grateful for all of your guidance and support during my first year of college. I feel that you have already taught me many new skills that will help me on my college journey, and I look forward to learning more.”

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Minnesota Office of Higher Ed (OHE)

The Minnesota Office of Higher Education is a cabinet-level state agency providing students with financial aid programs and information to help them gain access to, and reach success in, postsecondary education. Starting in 2016, OHE partnered with InsideTrack across multiple programs to provide coaching services to their learners and ultimately deepen their impact.  

Initially, OHE partnered with InsideTrack to boost the number of graduates from the state’s high-demand technical and vocational programs through OHE’s MnSCU Two-Year Occupational Grant Pilot. A steady pipeline of well-trained graduates flowing into critical industries was essential to the economic health of the state, yet too many students were dropping out of their degree programs, leaving their own economic futures — and these industries — at risk. Thus, this partnership provided holistic success coaching to grant-funded students enrolled in two-year occupational programs across 29 Minnesota higher education institutions. 

Coaches supported students along their educational journey using a proven student success methodology, connecting students to their motivation to help them start, persist and graduate with a focus on fiscal responsibility. Thanks to this success coaching (referred to as “mentoring” by OHE), 71.7% of mentored students persisted at or graduated from the school where they started after the first year of mentoring. This amounted to a 33 percent improvement in retention and graduation among mentored students, up from the previous baseline of 54 percent.

A student coached through the OHE partnership excitedly shared, “My plan is to continue my educational career. I’m going to Metropolitan State University next fall to continue my education degree with an emphasis on English studies. Again, thanks for all of your help and support!”

In 2020, OHE and InsideTrack expanded the partnership to include the OHE SELF Loan program, a long-term, low-interest loan available to Minnesota residents attending any eligible institution and nonresidents attending eligible institutions in Minnesota. Through this program, OHE and InsideTrack launched a comprehensive 5-year success coaching and capacity building partnership, with the goal of directly coaching students, while training program staff to use InsideTrack coaching methodology in their interactions with students. 

The first two years of the partnership included direct coaching by InsideTrack for first-time SELF Loan borrowers. Students included in coaching were entering their freshman or sophomore year, were attending a Minnesota school or were Minnesota residents attending an out-of-state school, and had no previous SELF Loan. Over the course of two years of coaching, InsideTrack Success Coaches served nearly 1,400 learners across 99 different institutions — and the in-depth capacity building and training partnership is still underway. This innovative support service offered directly from the student loan provider is the first of its kind across the nation focusing on the comprehensive success of each student and their overall academic experience, not on the student loan or repayment. Students have the opportunity to form a partnership with a success coach who is not directly affiliated with any particular higher education institution. Rather, coaches work to supplement the important campus resources available to students and provide navigational support to ensure students are taking full advantage of the tools available to them.

While the SELF Loan program has progressed, the OHE + InsideTrack partnership expanded once again in 2023 to include another program — OHE’s Get Ready program. Designed to improve the postsecondary outcomes for students from low-income backgrounds, Indigenous Communities and Communities of Color, OHE’s Get Ready program provides access to essential information and resources that help students and families make an informed decision about life after high school. Students served by the Get Ready program – including a cohort of Get Ready Scholarship Recipients – gain access to a success coach who can help them navigate their postsecondary experience. In tandem, staff involved in the Get Ready program received extensive training and certification in InsideTrack’s holistic coaching methodology, so they can carry on the impact long-term.

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Ohio National Guard Scholarship Program (ONGSP) 

The Cuyahoga County Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) launched a pilot program in 2023 to improve educational success and career outcomes for members of the Ohio National Guard. HHS partnered with InsideTrack to provide a scholarship that covers 100% of tuition for Ohio Guardsmen attending a 2- or 4-year public institution or the average public school tuition for those attending a private university. Scholarship recipients also receive up to four years of one-on-one success coaching to help them complete a certificate or degree.

The personalized coaching provided by InsideTrack is more than just a service. It's a support system that has helped to improve scholarship utilization, reduce debt, and increase enrollment, persistence and completion rates for over 230 ONGSP recipients who have opted into coaching. The coaching helps the guardsmen set and achieve goals, balance family, education, finances, guard duties, and work commitments, and develop individual plans for program completion. They also learn skills and techniques for handling academic challenges.

For example, a guard member pursuing a Bachelor of Arts in Business from Cleveland State University wrote to his coach: "Because of your advice when we talked, I was able to reach out to my professors to get help on the courses I wasn't doing so hot on and they helped me get my grades up... I passed all my courses. Thank you."

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Latin American Education Foundation (LAEF)

The Latin American Education Foundation was founded 75 years ago to create more accessible and equitable educational pathways for the Latino community in Colorado. In an effort to help them reach their highest potential, LAEF supports approximately 120 Colorado residents of Latino heritage each year. LAEF scholarships are available to learners regardless of documentation or citizenship status, with an average scholarship size of $2,500-3,000 per academic year. The scholarship application is open to Colorado residents with a minimum 3.0 cumulative GPA planning to pursue postsecondary education at the undergraduate level — which includes trades and certifications, as well as 2-year and 4-year programs. 

As part of their commitment to developing support services for Latino students pursuing their college degree, LAEF is partnering with InsideTrack to offer personalized, one-on-one student success coaching to these students. Scholarship recipients have an InsideTrack coach available to them for each academic year they receive the scholarship, with most receiving scholarship funding for every year through graduation. Though the partnership is too new to have produced measurable results yet, past experiences with similar programs indicate that the coaching support is helping to advance and enhance learner progression toward program completion and career readiness.

Nick Lopez, president and CEO of LAEF, says, “For 75 years, our foundation has been a guiding light in the Colorado Latino community, inspiring generations toward brighter futures. Over the next three years, LAEF commits to awarding $1.3 million in new scholarships, opening new doors of possibility for deserving Latino students across Colorado. Yet, we cannot achieve these goals alone. We need collaborative community partners like InsideTrack that share a commitment to empowering dreams, breaking down barriers, and building bridges to a brighter tomorrow for our scholars.”

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Fueling impact by supporting the whole student

As evidenced by the five programs featured here, loans and scholarships are undeniably critical to making higher education possible for many students. Incorporating holistic coaching helps ensure that scholarship students persist and complete, receiving the full benefit of their degree.

As Steve Ast, senior vice president of partner success at InsideTrack, has astutely pointed out, “Why put money into a learner if you’re not also going to provide them the support for them to be successful? The goal of a coaching program is not to say, ‘Show up on campus the first day and good luck.’ It’s about setting the foundation appropriately for long-term results.”

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