Broken Promise: Fixing the Community College Transfer Process

Jessie Ryan, president of Haas Jr. grant partner the Campaign for College Opportunity, has spent the last two decades pushing for policies that not only open the doors to college but ensure students walk out with degrees in hand. We spoke with Ryan about why streamlining the transfer process for community college students seeking to enroll in a four-year college or university is such a critical issue for equity in higher education—and what solutions are within reach.

Why is fixing the transfer process so central to equity in higher education?

Jessie Ryan: When I walked onto a community college campus as a low-income, first-generation student, I believed—like most students—that I would transfer within two years. That’s the promise, right? Open access, affordability, and a clear path to a bachelor’s degree.

But here’s the reality: Only one in five community college students in California transfer within four years. Less than 30 percent transfer within six years. And about a third of those who do transfer stop out before earning a degree.

So when we talk about transfer as an education equity issue, we’re talking about the broken promise of seamless transfer that disproportionately affects low-income students, students of color, and first-generation students. If we fail to meet their needs as transfer-intending students—starting from day one—we are failing in our commitment to create a transparent and accessible pathway to equity and economic mobility. 

What are the biggest systemic barriers standing in students’ way?

JR: Community college transfer is often complex and not student-centered. We’ve made progress to ensure students have a clearer pathway to transfer (see more below)—but more work is needed to ensure that students don’t waste time, energy, and money completing credits that they later learn don’t count. 

And then there’s the inconsistency. Depending on which community college you attend—and even which counselor you happen to meet—your experience can be radically different. Some campuses are barren transfer deserts. Others are transfer oases. But students shouldn’t have to rely on luck to ensure a fair shot at transfer success. 

How has the Campaign for College Opportunity tried to address these challenges?

JR: We’ve been working on strengthening transfer pathways for almost 20 years. One of our big wins was establishing the Associate Degree for Transfer (ADT), which gives students a clear, guaranteed path to transfer to the California State University system with junior standing. We now have over 500,000 students who’ve earned an ADT, and Latino students are the largest group of beneficiaries.

And now we helped establish Cal-GETC, (the California General Education Transfer Curriculum), a unified general education pathway for both CSU and UC students. No more forcing students to choose between two complicated sets of differing requirements. Just one clear track across both systems.

Even with these reforms, what remains the biggest challenge?

JR: Credit loss is one of the most persistent barriers students face. The articulation process—how credits are evaluated—is still too often relationship-driven instead of systematized. It can depend on who knows who, which school you’re coming from, or what kind of assumptions are being made about your learning.

Again, it’s incredibly disheartening for students to find out their credits won’t transfer—not because of the course content, but because of arbitrary decisions. 

What’s next—and what’s the role of philanthropy in moving this work forward?

JR: Tools like CourseWise, the new AI-powered articulation tool, can streamline and systemize course equivalences across tens of thousands of courses. It pinpoints individual courses where experienced counselors, articulation officers, and faculty input is needed to assess course equivalencies, streamline decisions across courses, and provide students with faster, unbiased course articulation decisions. This vital work, supported by the Haas, Jr. Fund, could be a game-changer for students who are currently navigating wild inconsistencies.

We need philanthropy to invest not just in tech—but in people and systems change too. We need to fund new partnerships across institutions and systems, support “lighthouse colleges” that are doing this work well to take their efforts to scale, and hold the laggards accountable. Most importantly, we need to have the fortitude to stay in it for the long haul. Real systems change is a long-term prospect.

And transfer transformation isn’t a one-off. It takes years of policy reform, implementation work, and culture change. However, if we get it right, we’ll unlock opportunity for hundreds of thousands of Californians for generations to come—serving as a model and beacon of light for the rest of the country.