The University of Wisconsin-Madison is going to be part of a massive new effort in which 130 public universities and systems will work together to increase college access, close the achievement gap, and award hundreds of thousands more degrees by 2025.
The Association of Public and Land-grant Universities (APLU) is organizing the collaborative effort, known as Powered by Publics: Scaling Student Success. It represents the largest ever collaborative effort to improve college access, advance equity, and increase college degrees awarded. In addition to committing to those goals, participating institutions have pledged to share aggregate data demonstrating their progress to help spur lasting change across the higher education sector.
“The creation of UW–Madison as a public state university has made a college degree accessible to all state residents for more than 150 years. The spread of public universities has been clearly linked with U.S. economic growth,” said UW–Madison Chancellor Rebecca Blank in a statement. “UW–Madison has launched a series of recent initiatives to ensure that the state’s flagship remains accessible for all those who are qualified to attend. Participation in this effort should further that goal.”
According to a press release from the UW, the participating institutions will work within “clusters” of four to 12 institutions to implement innovative and effective practices to advance student success on their campuses. Collectively, the institutions enroll 3 million students, including 1 million students who receive Pell Grants. UW-Madison is working with the Big Ten Academic Alliance cluster, along with seven other Big Ten schools. It is represented by Jocelyn Milner, vice provost of academic affairs, and Steve Cramer, vice provost for teaching and learning.
“Over the past few years, we’ve witnessed a real and growing enthusiasm among public university leaders to advance college completion nationally,” said APLU President Peter McPherson in a press release. “We have to seize the moment and mobilize institutions to improve not just college access, but also equity in student outcomes and the number of students who earn degrees. That’s what Powered by Publics is all about and why we’re thrilled to work with our member institutions toward such an important national goal.”
