Charts of the week: Pell Grants, GDP growth, and attacks by the Islamic State

Click on the links or on the charts to go to the full research.

ISIS AFFILIATES CONDUCTED OVER 90 ATTACKS OUTSIDE IRAQ AND SYRIA IN 2016

In an analysis of how Syria and the Islamic State will move forward after the fall of Raqqa in mid-October, Christopher Meserole explains the concerns surrounding the Islamic State’s surviving ideologues and foreign networks. Between 2013 and 2016, the external operations wing of ISIS carried out more than 180 attacks in almost 20 countries.

FISCAL POLICIES PROMOTE LITTLE GROWTH IN THE THIRD QUARTER

In the latest update to their Fiscal Impact Measure (FIM), experts from the Hutchins Center on Fiscal and Monetary Policy analyze how government taxes and spending have contributed to economic growth in the third quarter of the 2017 fiscal year. The FIM suggests that fiscal policies did little to add or subtract from the GDP which grew at a 3.0 percent annual rate in the third quarter. Click here or on the chart below to open the full interactive.

THERE IS A 7.2 PERCENT GAP IN GRADUATION RATES BETWEEN PELL AND NON-PELL GRANT STUDENTS

In research for the Brown Center on Education Policy, Robert Kelchen, assistant professor at Seaton Hall University, found that the six-year graduation rate for students who receive a Pell Grant was only 51.4 percent compared to 59.2 percent for students who do not receive Pell Grants. Of the 1,266 colleges in Kelchen’s study, only 169 boasted higher graduation rates among students who receive Pell Grants.