Certified B Corporation
Graduation Alliance is a Benefit Corporation, a status obtained through a rigorous evaluation process by the non-profit entity B Lab. B Lab announced Graduation Alliance as one of the “Best for the World” in July 2021 for its focus on “services that support the greater good…focusing on underserved populations.” Practices evaluated and independently verified included “ethical marketing, data privacy and security, and use of feedback channels to add value to customers while supporting the greater good.”
Cognia
Graduation Alliance is accredited by Cognia, and we invest heavily in maintaining our accreditation. In 2021, based on the review of Cognia’s trained evaluators, Cognia awarded Graduation Alliance an Index of Educational Quality of 374.69 (out of 400), compared to a Cognia Institution Network five year average of 278.34 – 283.33.
In order to earn accreditation through Cognia, we have to document compliance with all of Cognia’s standards in areas ranging from curriculum, instruction, and leadership to student services, facilities and finance, and continuous improvement.
Regional accreditation is a way to validate that the credits or diploma earned through Graduation Alliance will be recognized (at their discretion and according to their admission policies) by schools, colleges and universities, employers, and the U.S. military.
Mission Measurement’s evaluation of Graduation Alliance’s dropout recovery programs in 2021 found a 46% efficacy rate. Graduation Alliance’s dropout recovery programs significantly outperformed the national benchmark for dropout recovery programs established by the Impact Genome Project on both efficacy and cost per outcome, providing 27% more outcomes for 33% less cost.
Graduation Alliance’s work over the past decade and a half has focused on supporting the nation’s most vulnerable youth and adults through a data-driven online program that include wraparound support services, including student outreach teams, state certified teachers, academic coaches, local advocates, and tutors.
The American Council on Education (ACE)
ACE engaged a team of subject matter experts to review Graduation Alliance career technical courses and first year college course work against industry expectations. Thirty courses were submitted; twenty nine courses were approved and have been recommended for college credit.
More than 440 member colleges and universities are part of the ACE Credit College & University Partnerships Network, which was established to provide a list of member institutions that had articulated policies for accepting prior learning for credit. As such, students who complete a Graduation Alliance course, in many cases, simultaneously earn a substantial number of college credits as part of an effort to create early college pathways that allow students to complete first-year general education and elective requirements.
Net Promoter Score
Graduation Alliance has partnered with an external organization to measure student/parent satisfaction utilizing Net Promoter Score (NPS). We are proud to announce our score has reached 79, well over the industry benchmark for education, which is 69. This invaluable tool helps us gauge the quality of our service across all of our programs and ensures we are delivering on our mission from every member of our student support team! Graduation Alliance strives to build meaningful connections with students and their families, generating a new sense of trust and making a difference for students – academically and emotionally.
The curriculum used in Graduation Alliance’s programs is the result of a student-centered, continuous quality enhancement instructional design process comprised of certified teachers, subject matter experts, instructional designers, and experienced practitioners of online-, blended-, and classroom-based modalities. The result is a differentiated, balanced curriculum that is hyper-aligned to state and relevant learning standards and research-based best practices for all learning modalities. Our curriculum has also received external validations from the following organizations:
Quality Matters
Quality Matters is a national third-party validator of best practices in online learning. Quality Matters external evaluators reviewed and evaluated Graduation Alliance’s approach to instructional design and individual courses for accuracy, completeness, freedom from bias, and quality of content delivery. All courses scored between 98-100% of points possible.
Since 2017, Graduation Alliance has been engaged in a process of continuous curricular improvement through the application of the Quality Matters K12 Online/Blended Rubric, which are mapped to the National Standards for Quality Online Learning, and are published by the International and North American Council for Online Learning.
National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA)
The NCAA Eligibility Center is committed to ensuring that students seeking to compete in college sports are academically prepared for the rigors of university-level coursework. To that end, the NCAA’s review process for online courses and programs includes a review of policies, curriculum, and instructional practices, resulting in the approval of more than 25 of our core curriculum courses.