@EdWorkingPaper{ai26-1594,
title = "Non-traditional Student Advising Before College: Lessons from Navigate Reconnect",
author = "Celeste K. Carruthers, Emily Pratt",
number = "1594",
year = "2026",
month = "September",
URL = "http://www.edworkingpapers.com/ai26-1594",
abstract = {Prospective college students benefit from tailored advising and guidance about whether, where, and how to enroll. Support for college planning drops sharply after students leave high school, however, leaving non-traditional students largely on their own. We study Navigate Reconnect, a Tennessee advising program that intends to fill this gap. We evaluate how Navigate Reconnect access and participation relate to post-secondary enrollment, credential completion, and short-term workforce outcomes. First, we link expansion of the Reconnect model across Tennessee to growth in non-traditional student enrollment at colleges and universities in or near a Tennessee Reconnect Community. Then, we use a matched difference-in-difference framework to estimate the effect of Reconnect participation on individual post-secondary and workforce outcomes. Reconnect participation coincides with a spike in applications for unemployment benefits and a small decline in earnings. Relative to matched non-participants, Reconnectors earn 53% more post-secondary certificates over the three years following program intake, along with more than 4.5 times as many associate’s degrees and 22% more bachelor’s degrees. At the end of three years Reconnectors are 3% more likely to have in-state employment.},
}