Laura Perna, the James S. Riepe Professor and chair of the higher education division in Penn’s Graduate School of Education and executive director of Penn AHEAD, has received a $600,000 grant from the Institute of Education Sciences with project partners Robin LaSota of Development Services Group and Joshua R. Polanin of the American Institutes for Research. Their two year project, “The Effects of College Aid Programs: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis,” aims to estimate the relationships between different types of financial aid programs and student progress through postsecondary education.

Dr. Perna has also received a $300,000 subcontract from Research for Action, funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. The grant will support the project “Evaluating free college programs,” which is designed to advance understanding of design, implementation and effects of selected state and local free community college programs.