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  • College advisers vow to ‘kick the door open’ for Black and Hispanic students despite affirmative action ruling  – The Hechinger Report

    College advisers vow to ‘kick the door open’ for Black and Hispanic students despite affirmative action ruling  – The Hechinger Report

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    WILMINGTON, Del. — Striding into a packed community center filled with high school seniors, Atnre Alleyne has a few words of advice for the crowd, members of the first class of college applicants to be shaped by June’s Supreme Court ruling striking down race-conscious admissions.

    “You have to get good grades, you have to find a way to do the academics, but also become leaders,” said Alleyne, the energetic co-founder and CEO of TeenSHARP, a nonprofit that prepares students from underrepresented backgrounds for higher education. “In your schools, do something! Fight for social justice.”

    Many of the TeenSHARP participants gathered here, who are predominantly Black or Hispanic, worry that their chances of getting into top-tier schools have diminished with the court’s decision. They wonder what to say in their admissions essays and how comfortable they’ll feel on campuses that could become increasingly less diverse.

    Tariah Hyland joins fellow TeenSHARP alums Alphina Kamara and William Garcia to meet with and advise TeenSHARP co-founder Atnre Alleyne in Wilmington Delaware. Credit: Liz Willen/The Hechinger Report

    On this autumn night, Alleyne and his team are fielding questions from the dozens of students they advise, on everything from early decision deadlines to which schools are most likely to give generous financial aid and scholarships. The changed admissions landscape has only increased the team’s determination to develop a new generation of leaders, students who will fight to have their voices represented on campuses and later on in the workplace.

    “I want them to kick the door open to these places, so they will go back and open more doors,” Alleyne said.

    That goal is shared by successful alumni of the program Alleyne and his wife, Tatiana Poladko, started in a church basement 14 years ago. Several are on hand tonight recounting their own educational journeys, culminating in full scholarships to schools such as the University of Chicago and Wesleyan University, where annual estimated costs approach $90,000.

    Before the Supreme Court’s decision in Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard, highly selective colleges served as a beacon of hope and economic mobility for students like those TeenSHARP advise. Many are first in their families to attend college and lack legacy connections or access to the private counselors who’ve long given a boost to wealthier students.

    Related: Colleges decry Supreme Court decision on affirmative action, but most have terrible records on diversity

    But even before the high court ruling, Black and Latino students were poorly represented at these institutions, while the college degree gap between Black and white Americans was getting worse. For some students, the court decision sends a message that they do not belong, and if they get in, they worry they’ll stand out even more.

    “I felt really upset about it,” Jamel Powell, a high school junior from Belle Mead, New Jersey, who participates in TeenSHARP, said about the affirmative action ruling. “This system has helped many underrepresented minorities get into these Ivy League schools and excel.”

    While the full impact of the ruling on student demographics remains unknown, representatives of 33 colleges wrote in an amicus brief filed in the case that the share of Black students on their campuses would drop from roughly 7.1 percent to 2.1 percent if affirmative action were banned.

    The uncertainty of what the decision means is taking a toll on students and school counselors nationally, said Mandy Savitz-Romer, a senior lecturer at Harvard’s Graduate School of Education. As colleges sort through how they can meet commitments to diversity while complying with the law, students wonder if mentioning race in their essays will help or hurt them.

    TeenSHARP alums Taria Hyland and Alphina Kamara reconnect in Wilmington, Delaware, to share advice on navigating college admissions and financial aid. Credit: Liz Willen/The Hechinger Report

    In his majority decision, Chief Justice John Roberts wrote that race could be invoked only within the context of the applicant’s life story, making essays the one opportunity for students to discuss their race and ethnicity. But since then, Edward Blum, the conservative activist who helped bring the case before the court, has threatened more lawsuits, promising to challenge any essay topic that is “nothing more than a back-channel subterfuge for divulging a student’s race.”

    The Department of Education has published guidelines saying that while schools cannot put a thumb on the scale for students based on their race, they “remain free” to consider characteristics tied to individual students’ life experiences, including race. The National Association of College Admission Counseling issued similar guidance, while the Common App introduced new essay prompts that include one about students’ “identity” and “background.”

    Because of the uncertainty,school counselors need specific training on crafting essays and how or whether to talk about race, Savitz-Romer said during a Harvard webinar last month on college admissions after affirmative action. “We need counselors and teachers to make students understand that college is still for them,” she said.

    It’s a tall order: On average, public school counselors serve more than 400 students each, which offers little time for one-on-one advising.

    Related: Why aren’t more school counselors trained in helping students apply to college?

    That reality is why nonprofit advising groups like TeenSHARP toil alongside students, guiding them through an increasingly confounding admissions system. TeenSHARP’s team of three advisers works intensively with roughly 140 students at a time, including 50 seniors who often apply to as many as 20 colleges to maximize their chances.

    That’s a fraction of those who need help, another reason why the group’s leaders rely on their network of more than 500 “Sharpies,” as alums are known.

    Emily Rodriguez, a TeenSHARP senior who attends Conrad Schools of Science in Wilmington, decided to address race head on in her college essays: She wrote about her determination that she would not “play the role of the poor submissive Mexican woman.”

    “Admissions officers assure us that their commitment to diversity hasn’t changed. But we will have to see. We’ve explained to families and students that this year is a learning year.”

    Tatiana Poladko, co-founder, TeenSHARP

    Hamza Parker, a senior at Delaware’s Smyrna High School who moved to the U.S. from Saudi Arabia as a sixth grader, said he was against writing about his identity at first. “I feel like it puts you in a position where you have to have a sob story for your essay instead of talking about something good, like, that happened in your life,” he told Alleyne and Poladko during a counseling session over Zoom.

    But in the session Alleyne and Poladko encouraged him to draw from his own story, one they know something about from working with his older sister Hasana, now a junior at Pomona College. The family had a difficult move from Saudi Arabia to New York City and later Delaware, where Hamza joined the Delaware Black Student Coalition.

    Hamza decided to revise his essay from one focused on linguistics to describe experiencing racism and then embracing his Muslim heritage.

    “I am my normal social self and my Muslim faith and garb are widely known and respected at my school,” he wrote. “My school even now has a dedicated space for prayer during Ramadan.”

    Related: The newest benefit at top companies: Private college admissions counseling

    Alleyne and Poladko typically work with students who are beginning their first year of high school, so the pair can guide the entire college application process, much as some pricey private counselors do — although TeenSHARP’s services are free; as a nonprofit it relies on an array of donors for support.

    Neither Poladko nor Alleyn attended elite schools. They met as graduate students at Rutgers University and became committed to starting TeenSHARP after helping Alleyne’s niece apply to colleges from a large New York City public high school.

    Astonished by how complicated and inaccessible college admissions could be, the two decided to make it their life’s work, writing grants and getting donations from local banks and foundations so they could serve more students.

    “I felt really upset about it. This system has helped many underrepresented minorities get into these Ivy League schools and excel.”

    Jamel Powell, a high school junior from Belle Mead, New Jersey, who participates in TeenSHARP, about the affirmative action ruling.

    Their work is now largely remote: During the pandemic, the couple relocated from Wilmington to Poladko’s native Ukraine to be closer to her family, leading to a dramatic escape to Poland with their three young children when war broke out. Poladko is taking a sabbatical from TeenSHARP this year, although she still helps some students via Zoom. Alleyne flies from Warsaw to Wilmington to meet with students in person, often at the community center downtown that once housed their offices.

    They also rely on relationships they’ve built over the years with college presidents and admissions officers at schools like Boston College, Pomona College and Wesleyan, along with both Carleton and Macalester Colleges in Minnesota, many of whom have welcomed TeenSHARP applicants.

    “We need more ‘Sharpies’ on our campus,” said Suzanne Rivera, president of Macalester College, in Minnesota, and a member of TeenSHARP’s advisory board. “Their questions are always so smart and so insightful.”

    Sharpies also tend to become campus leaders, in part because TeenSHARP requires that its students develop leadership skills. That’s something William Garcia, who graduated from the University of Chicago last spring, told seniors in Wilmington.

    “If Black high school seniors no longer feel like they are welcomed on predominantly white campuses, they are less likely to apply and even less likely to enroll even if they are offered admission.”

    Chelsea Holley, director of admissions at Spelman College in Atlanta

    At first, he felt isolated in Chicago, reticent to talk about his experiences as a Hispanic man. “I was in your shoes five years ago,” Garcia said. He later realized his background could be an asset, and drew on it to turn an ingredient for one of Mexico’s most popular liquors into a business venture for his own agave beverage company.

    “Embrace your story; tell your story,” Garcia said. “I would tell my story and people would be really interested and would start to help me.”

    Alphina Kamara, a 2022 graduate of Wesleyan University, urged seniors to aim high and look beyond state schools and local community colleges that have lower graduation rates and fewer resources — campuses she might have ended up at it not for TeenSHARP.

    “I would have never have known that schools like Wesleyan existed, and that I, as a first-generation Black woman, had a place in them,” said Kamara, the child of immigrant parents from Sierra Leone.

    Related: Beyond the Rankings: College Welcome Guide

    Still, there will always be some TeenSHARP students who don’t want to be on campuses that had terrible track records for diversity, even before the court’s decision.

    Tariah Hyland, who in high school co-founded the Delaware Black Student Coalition, knew she’d be more comfortable at one of the country’s more than 100 historically Black colleges and universities, or HBCUs. She told the Delaware audience that she’s thriving in her junior year at Howard University, where she is studying political science.

    Powell, the New Jersey junior, is eyeing both Howard and Atlanta’s Morehouse College and said he’ll likely only apply to HBCUs.

    “When I was in public school, I was the only Black boy in my classes,” said Powell, who now attends Acelus Academy, an online school. “I was always the minority, and so by going to an HBCU, I would likely see more people who look like me.” 

    That’s no surprise to Chelsea Holley, director of admissions at Spelman College in Atlanta, who said she’s expecting “more interest from Black and Brown students, now that the Supreme Court has made what I believe to be a regressive political decision.”

    HBCUs like Spelman — whose graduates include Children’s Defense Fund founder Marian Wright Edelman and author Alice Walker — are already seeing more applications and are becoming even more competitive.

    “If Black high school seniors no longer feel like they are welcomed on predominantly white campuses, they are less likely to apply and even less likely to enroll, even if they are offered admission,” Holley said, adding that students may be worried about further assaults on diversity and inclusion on college campuses and believe they will be more comfortable at an HBCU.

    Still, not everyone predicts the court ruling will precipitate a permanent drop in Black and Hispanic students at predominantly white, selective colleges. Richard Kahlenberg, an author and scholar at Georgetown University predicts the drop will be temporary, and that the affirmative action ban will eventually lead to a fairer landscape for low-income students of all races.

    Kahlenberg, who served as an expert witness for Students for Fair Admissions, said he wants to see an end to legacy preferences as well as athletic recruiting, so that colleges can give “a meaningful boost” to “disadvantaged students of all races” and “you can get racial diversity without racial preferences.” Challenges to legacy admissions are mounting: The Education Department has opened an investigation into Harvard’s use of the practice, and a recent bipartisan bill calls for colleges to end it.

    As mid-December approaches, Alleyne and Poladko are anxiously waiting to see how the handful of TeenSHARP students who applied for early decision will fare.

    “Admissions officers assure us that their commitment to diversity hasn’t changed,” Poladko said. “But we will have to see. We’ve explained to families and students that this year is a learning year.”

    Until that time, both Poladko and Alleyne will continue pushing students to help those who come after them.

    “Our goal is to figure out the game of admissions and give our students an advantage,” Alleyne said. “And our job is to teach them how to play the game.”

    This story about TeenSHARP is the first in a series of articles, produced by The Hechinger Report in partnership with Soledad O’Brien Productions, about the impact of the Supreme Court ruling on race-based affirmative action. Stay tuned for an upcoming documentary and part II. Hechinger is a nonprofit, independent news organization focused on inequality and innovation in education. Sign up for the Hechinger newsletter.

    The Hechinger Report provides in-depth, fact-based, unbiased reporting on education that is free to all readers. But that doesn’t mean it’s free to produce. Our work keeps educators and the public informed about pressing issues at schools and on campuses throughout the country. We tell the whole story, even when the details are inconvenient. Help us keep doing that.

    Join us today.

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    Liz Willen

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  • Roslynn Alba Cobarrubias, media entrepreneur and pillar of Filipino community, dies at 43

    Roslynn Alba Cobarrubias, media entrepreneur and pillar of Filipino community, dies at 43

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    Roslynn Alba Cobarrubias, a media entrepreneur, radio DJ and music promoter who advocated for Filipino American artists and was instrumental in growing the MySpace Music platform, died Sunday evening, according to family members.

    Cobarrubias died in her hometown of Walnut, according to the Los Angeles County Medical Examiner-Coroner’s office, which has yet to determine a cause of death pending further tests. She was 43.

    “She was passionate and dedicated to the Filipino American community worldwide, and would spend both her personal and professional life celebrating and uplifting it wherever she could,” her family said in a statement shared with The Times. “She played a pivotal role in collaborations between acclaimed international artists and rising Filipino talent, helping guide them into the music industry spotlight.”

    Cobarrubias was born March 12, 1980, at Hollywood Presbyterian Medical Center in Los Angeles. While growing up in Walnut in the east San Gabriel Valley — a short drive from the music studios and venues of central L.A. — she developed a love for music. In elementary school, she played her favorite songs for classmates, calling herself “the lunchtime DJ,” she recalled during a TEDx talk in 2017.

    Later, she buzzed between record stores and hip-hop clubs, finding new artists and their music and playing them for friends at parties. She was devoted to the music channels that dominated TV in the 1990s and 2000s, including VH1 and MTV. Her dream was to become a video jockey, hosting the shows she’d religiously watch and traveling the world to promote new music and interview her favorite artists.

    But her family had other plans. Feeling the pressure as a child of immigrants from the Philippines, Cobarrubias enrolled in 1999 at UC Irvine with plans to study political science and become a lawyer.

    Still, she held onto her dream job.

    Without telling her family, Cobarrubias drove to Hollywood for a video jockey audition while still a freshman in college. She stood in line for three hours before ultimately landing a spot as a finalist.

    “And at the last casting agent’s office, she looked at me and she said, ‘You’re too short. What are you gonna do, hold the microphone over your head? You’ll never be on television; you should try radio,’” Cobarrubias recalled of the agent’s suggestion that she instead be a radio DJ.

    Crushed, she hopped back in her car and while sitting in traffic on the 10 Freeway pondered the agent’s words.

    “I thought, OK, I’m just gonna go back to UCI, study political science, be a lawyer my mom from the Philippines will be proud to tell her brothers and sisters about. Coming from a third-world country, you want a lawyer, not a DJ in your family,” she said.

    But eventually, Cobarrubias took the agent’s advice to heart. She started working at KSAK-FM 90.1, a station based out of Mt. San Antonio College in Walnut. Soon after, she transferred to the community college from UCI and started a hip-hop show, Third Floor Radio. There, she interviewed acts who influenced her, such as A Tribe Called Quest and Talib Kweli.

    As her show’s popularity grew, she started promoting it and other artists on the then-new social media site MySpace.

    After graduating from Cal State Fullerton with a bachelor’s degree in communications, she caught the attention of MySpace co-founders Chris DeWolfe and Tom Anderson, whom she met through a colleague, Cobarrubias said in a blog post. DeWolfe and Anderson wanted to grow the site as an online music platform, filling a void left by file-sharing site Napster, which had dissolved several years earlier.

    Cobarrubias eventually became a marketing head and led artist relations, growing the MySpace Music platform and making it easier for artists to share music and connect with fans on the site — a novel idea at the time. The music feature became a staple on the site as users delighted in customizing their profiles, which included compiling playlists of their favorite music. Major artists such as as Sean Kingston, Adele and Calvin Harris owed the launch of their careers to MySpace.

    “The people that really launched MySpace were the … artists,” Cobarrubias told iHeart Media podcast “Main Accounts: The Story of MySpace” earlier this year. “You start with the artists; they bring their fan bases. You start with the DJs; they bring their fan bases. The way we created was for creators.”

    While promoting the work of high-profile artists such as Drake and Justin Timberlake, Cobarrubias also promoted up-and-coming Filipino American artists during her work with Philippines-based media giant ABS-CBN and through her marketing brand, 1587. According to her family, the company’s name stems from the year a Spanish galleon with Filipino crewmembers arrived in Morro Bay — widely accepted by historians as the first Filipinos, and Asians, to set foot on what is now the continental U.S.

    Cobarrubias’ projects stretched beyond Los Angeles and music. She helped build basketball courts with the Clippers and the Manny Pacquiao Foundation throughout the Philippines, including in her family’s ancestral home, Olongapo.

    “I love our 1587 family so much because not only do we push each other in the entertainment and music industry — but we constantly remind each other how we have to always give back and move in mission and purpose,” she wrote in a social media post. “We worked hard to be blessed with these opportunities by the universe and God that sometimes it feels like a dream.”

    Cobarrubias also sponsored Filipino American heritage nights at Clippers, Dodgers and Kings games. Her company promoted Filipino American acts at the events, including rappers P-Lo and Guapdad 4000, Power 106 radio DJ E-Man, Real 92.3 DJ Nico Blitz, as well as Saweetie and EZ Mil, both of whom threw first pitches at Dodger games in the last two seasons.

    Oakland rapper P-Lo and L.A.-based indie artist Yeek were among those who expressed condolences Tuesday as news of Cobarrubias’ death spread online. Both shared an old photo of them posing with Cobarrubias and other Filipino artists.

    “RIP Tita Ros,” P-Lo said in his Instagram story.

    “Thank you for always believing in me. You were such an impactful & influential person in our community,” said Yeek.

    Filipino American YouTube singer AJ Rafael shared a musical tribute to Cobarrubias, “to bring comfort through music, something she loved so dearly.” He added: “You truly cared for me as a person and not just an artist.”

    Notable Filipino American figures outside the music industry also mourned Cobarrubias’ death. Author and professor Anthony Christian Ocampo wrote in a tweet that he was “in complete disbelief,” calling Cobarrubias “an iconic figure in the Filipino American community.”

    Jason Lustina, who is behind the popular Instagram account SoCalFilipinos, said Cobarrubias was among the first supporters of his platform. “The community is mourning your loss but you have left your mark and will always be remembered,” he wrote.

    Alba Legacy, a clothing brand founded by Cobarrubias’ cousin, celebrity fashion designer Jhoanna Alba, said in a statement on Instagram, “Ros made an immense impact in our community and worldwide. She loved intensely while enduring unfair suffering. Her presence in our family is irreplaceable, and her absence is unimaginable.”

    Black Eyed Peas member apl.de.ap praised Cobarrubias as a humble advocate throughout his career. On Wednesday, he was struggling to find photos of her.

    “And that’s because Ros was always there — around — but almost never in front of the camera,” he said in a statement shared on his Instagram account.

    Apl.de.ap, who was born Allan Pineda Lindo Jr., credited his well-documented love for Honda Civics to Cobarrubias, who would drive him and bandmate will.i.am, when they were both still young up-and-comers, around L.A. in her own Civic.

    He credited her with boosting his group’s career during her time at MySpace.

    “I never gave her the flowers she deserved for putting us on MySpace when it was at its peak and helped propel us,” he said. “[Black Eyed Peas] is made up of more than the guys you see onstage, and it’s people like Roslynn who made this all possible.”

    In 2016, he took Cobarrubias and other Filipino American entertainment figures, including comedian Jo Koy, on a trip to the Philippines to get in touch with their culture.

    “It did something for her that I had always hoped,” apl.de.ap said, “and from that trip on she spent a considerable amount of her time giving back and wielding her power to help our community grow.”

    Cobarrubias is survived by her mother, Maria Evelyn Alba; three sisters, Rheeza Alba Cobarrubias McMillan, Rachelle Alba Cobarrubias and Chrystal Alba Fujimoto; and several nieces and nephews, whom her family described as “the loves of her life.”

    Times Assistant Editor Ada Tseng contributed to this report.

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    Jonah Valdez

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  • Community college-to-UC pipeline gets a boost as California ‘guarantees’ transfers

    Community college-to-UC pipeline gets a boost as California ‘guarantees’ transfers

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    Editor’s note: This story led off this week’s Higher Education newsletter, which is delivered free to subscribers’ inboxes every other Thursday with trends and top stories about higher education. 

    For every two freshmen enrolled in a college in the University of California system, administrators say they would like to enroll one transfer student from a California community college. 

    Whether they succeed depends on the campus and the year and the community college enrollment – but that’s the goal all nine undergraduate campuses strive toward, said Gary Clark, the associate vice chancellor for enrollment management at the University of California, Los Angeles.

    To reach that goal and also diversify the transfer population, university leaders announced a new program at UCLA designed specifically for students at community colleges that have historically sent few transfers to the University of California. UCLA will give these students’ applications special consideration, and if they don’t get in, they’ll be guaranteed admission to another campus in the UC system, which should boost the overall number of students transferring into the University of California.

    Students walk on the UCLA campus. Credit: Iris Schneider

    University administrators have not yet selected the community colleges that will participate in the pilot program, but will choose from a list of schools identified as “high need” because they have larger proportions of students from low-income families.  

    The new program, which won’t begin until the fall of 2026, was developed by university leaders, the state legislature and the governor, as part of what they say is a general commitment to students coming from California community colleges.

    “If it opens up a pathway to the University of California and to graduate from this incredibly distinguished university, it will mean a great deal to all California families, because it will enable young people to come to a university that will propel them in terms of social mobility,” said Katherine S. Newman, the University of California System’s provost. “We have a common commitment to making UC education as affordable as possible, and the community college transfer program is definitely a part of that.”

    The pilot program will begin with at least eight majors and will expand to 12 within the first two years, including at least four in the science, technology, engineering and math fields, according to UC system administrators. Students enrolled in the program will be advised about which courses they need to take to be able to transfer into those majors in the UC system, which Newman said will help ensure they’re fully ready to enter the university campuses as juniors and be successful.

    Related: How the college transfer process derails students’ plans

    Across the nine colleges that make up the University of California system, 27 percent of undergraduates had transferred from a community college, according to an August 2023 report from the University of California’s Office of Institutional Research and Academic Planning.

    These transfer students typically began their education at a California community college, and walked onto a UC campus, credit-wise, about halfway to earning their bachelor’s degrees. 

    Academically, these students are ready to be significant contributors in the classroom, Clark said. Often, the challenges they face outside the classroom pose greater threats to their education. 

    “A large state university, like us, needs to be committed to maintaining access. And in spite of the fact that we’ve gotten quite competitive from an admissions standpoint, we still want to ensure that students have more than one path to UCLA.”

    Gary Clark, associate vice chancellor for enrollment management, University of California, Los Angeles

    “These are students who may be two years out of high school. These are students who may be 22-plus years out of high school,” Clark said. “They might be parents. They might be veterans. They might be former foster youth.” 

    The transfer students are more likely to be from low-income families, or the first in their family to attend college, Clark said. 

    To ensure the students thrive in the classroom, the universities need to provide support with whatever their challenges may be. Each UC campus has a transfer student center, though the names vary and, in some cases, they also target returning students and veterans. UCLA’s Transfer Student Center offers students a chance to connect with each other and receive transfer-specific advising on a drop-in basis, Clark said.

    UCLA students also have access to the Bruin Resource Center, which has programs that cater to students of several different identities and life experiences, Clark said. The targeted support services include programs for students who are struggling to meet their basic needs, students who are in recovery from substance abuse disorders and undocumented students, among other groups.

    Related: STUDENT VOICE: Poor and first-generation transfer students often don’t feel welcome on college campuses

    Clark does not expect that students coming from this new transfer program will have vastly different needs than the transfer students the university is already serving. And he doesn’t expect to have to scale up the existing resources, because the total number of transfer students at UCLA is likely to stay the same. The main difference for the transfer student population at UCLA will be which community colleges these students are transferring from. 

    Community college students who transfer to UCLA often go on to graduate, data shows. About 75 percent of transfer students earn a bachelor’s degree within 2 years, 90 percent within three years, and 93 percent within four years, according to data from the university’s website.

    Still, they won’t all get in – UCLA accepted just 24 percent of transfer applicants in the fall of 2022 – but those who don’t will be guaranteed admission to another University of California campus, which administrators hope will increase the number of transfer students.

    “If it opens up a pathway to the University of California and to graduate from this incredibly distinguished university, it will mean a great deal to all California families, because it will enable young people to come to a university that will propel them in terms of social mobility.”

    Katherine S. Newman, provost, University of California System

    Students turned down by UCLA might, for example, be admitted to the University of California, Riverside, about 80 miles to the east.  UCLA accepts roughly 11 percent of first-year students, while UC Riverside accepts about 65 percent of first-year students and offers a Transfer Admission Guarantee to California community college students who meet certain requirements.

    Recent data from the university shows that 58 percent of UC Riverside transfer students graduated in two years, 81 percent graduated within three years and nearly 85 percent graduated within four years.

    Veronica Zendejas, director of undergraduate admissions at Riverside, said that the starting at a community college before transferring to a UC campus is the right choice for many students.

    When she goes to recruit high schoolers, she reminds them that even if they start at a local community college, they can plan to transfer after earning an associate degree because of the university’s guaranteed admission for community college students who meet requirements.

    “A lot of times now, what we’re seeing is a lot of students are purposely going to community college and taking those first two years to really think about what they want to do before transferring to a four-year institution,” Zendejas said.

    Clark, from UCLA, said that other students may have life circumstances pop up that prevent them from pursuing a four-year university immediately after high school, and still others may apply but not be academically ready yet. Still, he said, there should be opportunities for those students to get into the University of California later on, when the time is right for them.

    “A large state university, like us, I think needs to be committed to maintaining access. And in spite of the fact that we’ve gotten quite competitive from an admissions standpoint, we still want to ensure that students have more than one path to UCLA,” Clark said. “I think it’s kind of the right thing to do for a state university.”

    This story about California community colleges was produced by The Hechinger Report, a nonprofit, independent news organization focused on inequality and innovation in education. Sign up for our higher education newsletter. Check out our College Welcome Guide.

    The Hechinger Report provides in-depth, fact-based, unbiased reporting on education that is free to all readers. But that doesn't mean it's free to produce. Our work keeps educators and the public informed about pressing issues at schools and on campuses throughout the country. We tell the whole story, even when the details are inconvenient. Help us keep doing that.

    Join us today.

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  • ‘My number one enemy’: The hidden financial aid hurdle derailing college students

    ‘My number one enemy’: The hidden financial aid hurdle derailing college students

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    SANTA CRUZ, Calif. — At 19, Elizabeth Clews knew attending community college while balancing a full-time job and caring for a newborn would be hard. But she wanted to give it a shot.

    After a few months, the single mom, who had just exited the foster care system, realized she wasn’t doing well enough to pass her classes at Ventura College. “All I could really focus on was taking care of my baby and making sure that I kept a roof over our heads,” she said.

    Clews thought her performance would improve if she quit work. But when she logged into the school’s online portal to register for a second semester, a message popped up that she described as saying, “You can enroll for classes, but you’re not gonna get financial aid.” Clews was in danger of failing to meet a standard called SAP, or “satisfactory academic progress,” which is attached to nearly all federal financial aid for higher education — including grants, loans and work study — and most state aid too.

    “I didn’t really know it was a thing,” Clews said, “I didn’t understand any of the financial aid terminology.” But one thing she knew with utter clarity: She couldn’t pay tuition and fees out of pocket. So, she dropped out.

    Advocates are seeking changes to the rules around “satisfactory academic progress” that they say will benefit students like Elizabeth Clews. She dropped out of Ventura College after receiving a warning that she wasn’t meeting the standard. Credit: Talia Herman for The Hechinger Report

    The number of students across the U.S. affected by satisfactory academic progress requirements each year likely runs in the hundreds of thousands, yet until recently the issue garnered almost no attention from news media, academics and policy makers. “It’s not a noisy problem” because it doesn’t impact people with social capital and power, said Christina Tangalakis, associate dean of financial aid at Glendale Community College in Southern California.

    Now, a loose coalition of nonprofits, legislators and financial aid administrators are trying to reform what they describe as overly punitive, vague standards that keep many students capable of earning a degree from obtaining one. The state of Indiana was an early actor, creating a grant in 2016 for returning students who had “SAP-ed out” of federal funding. Last month, California enacted legislation to make all colleges align their requirements for “satisfactory academic progress” with the federal minimum standard.

    At the federal level, 39 nonprofit organizations sent a letter in August asking the U.S. Department of Education to clarify the rules around the SAP minimum requirements. And in Congress, Sen. Cory Booker, a Democrat, is expected to re-introduce SAP-related legislation that would give students a second chance at aid.

    Related: ‘Revolutionary housing’: How colleges aim to support formerly incarcerated students

    The logic behind satisfactory academic progress rules is that giving aid to students who are unlikely to graduate is a bad investment, wasting students’ time and taxpayers’ dollars.

    The policy was created in 1976, and at first, each college or university was left to set its own standards. Then, in a 1981 report to the Senate, the General Accounting Office said tougher ones were needed. Citing little evidence, the agency asserted that $1.28 million had been accessed inappropriately.

    “It was Reaganomics and welfare reform and this idea of deserving and undeserving poor,” said Debbie Raucher, the director of education for John Burton Advocates for Youth, or JBAY, a California nonprofit. The stance was “if a student isn’t pulling their weight, they don’t deserve our help,” she said.

    Under current federal rules, students must maintain a 2.0 GPA or higher, complete at least 67 percent of credits attempted and stay on track to finish a degree in no more than 150 percent of the time it usually takes (for example, six years for a four-year degree). During the Obama administration, SAP regulations were further tightened in an attempt to prevent low-performing for-profit institutions from lining their pockets with taxpayer dollars.

    “SAP is my number one enemy, my arch nemesis.”

    Elizabeth Clews, University of California, Santa Cruz student who was kicked off financial aid because of SAP requirements when attending community college

    Once a student becomes ineligible for financial aid after failing to make SAP, that status stays with them forever.

    Some students appeal, but that process can be complicated and riddled with inconsistencies. Campuses aren’t required to offer appeals. Those that do  grounds to “the death of a relative, an injury or illness of the student, or other special circumstances,” according to federal regulations. What circumstances qualify as “special” varies tremendously. For example, some schools explicitly allow students to appeal if they are struggling to balance school and work demands, while others explicitly disallow appeals on the same grounds, according to a 2023 analysis by JBAY.

    At 20, Clews didn’t know anything about an appeal, but two years later, she felt “this itch to try again,” and attempted to re-enroll at Ventura. When she got a similar notification, a more mature Clews “decided to do some investigating.” She had experienced homelessness and food insecurity, but didn’t see those circumstances on the appeals list. Her takeaway was: “Oh, well you didn’t die, you didn’t get your leg cut off, so there’s no reason that you shouldn’t have been successful.”

    So Clews worked as a waitress and in retail for the next five years.

    “It was Reaganomics and welfare reform and this idea of deserving and undeserving poor.”

    Debbie Raucher, the director of education for John Burton Advocates for Youth

    This turn of events was, in part, the luck of the draw. Some schools are more stringent than the federal rules require: For example, JBAY identified 10 colleges in California that mandate a course completion rate between 70 and 80 percent, not 67. Some institutions require a 2.0 GPA every term, while others consider SAP satisfied if a student’s cumulative GPA is above the threshold. In deciding whether students are progressing fast enough, some colleges include remedial coursework and classes taken in pursuit of an old major, while others don’t. Raucher, of JBAY, said Ventura’s currently posted policy isn’t significantly stricter than average, but wouldn’t have offered Clews “the full leniency allowed by federal regs.” (A Ventura representative said in an email that the school follows federal and state guidelines.)

    Fearful of government audits, financial aid administrators tend to take a conservative view of the regulations, Raucher said.

    Both JBAY’s analysis and a 2016 study place the number of students who don’t meet SAP requirements at more than 20 percent of Pell grant aid recipients, with that share higher for community college students.

    “This is not a fringe issue that 1 percent of students are facing,” Raucher said.

    Related: Overdue tuition and fees — as little as $41 — derail hundreds of thousands of California college students

    Glendale Community College’s Tangalakis, who has served at four different colleges in her 22-year career, said the policy can undermine colleges’ equity efforts. Institutions must demand rigor, she said, and that’s why they have an “academic progress” requirement for all students that is distinct from SAP.

    But since SAP standards are sometimes stricter than the schools’ individual policies, Tangalakis said, low-income students “have to meet a higher standard simply because they have financial need.” The appeals process also often results in staff laying “a lot of unnecessary judgment” on students, she said, and may retraumatize students, who can be asked to prove hardships such as domestic violence.

    “Ultimately, it’s just a very powerful message that says you don’t belong here,” Tangalakis said.

    Two analyses place the number of students who don’t meet SAP requirements at more than 20 percent of aid recipients, with that share higher for community college students

    After taking on a senior role at Glendale, she made changes. Tangalakis instructed her team to assess SAP using the most liberal interpretation of the federal regulations and to handle appeals generously, allowing consideration of anything a student thinks relevant and accepting a statement completed online or via phone (rather than demanding documentation from third parties as some schools do).

    The result has been striking: According to Tangalakis, the share of students who lost aid for failing to make SAP fell from 9.3 percent in 2017 to 6.4 percent in 2021. And she found that students who failed SAP in 2021 went on to complete degrees and certificates at a significantly higher rate than those who’d failed in 2017. These gains were even larger for students from traditionally disadvantaged backgrounds. 

    Other research confirms SAP’s disparate impact along racial lines: In 2021, for example, JBAY found that Black students, Native American students and foster youth who received a Pell Grant ran afoul of SAP provisions at more than twice the rate of white, Filipino and Asian students.

    In theory, if students who “SAP-out” find another way to pay for college, they can requalify for aid if they improve academically. But for most students, that creates a Catch-22, Raucher said: They can’t re-enroll without financial aid, and they can’t get financial aid without re-enrolling. State aid that bypasses SAP status can springboard adults returning to college out of that Catch-22. But most don’t offer it.

    “Ultimately, it’s just a very powerful message that says you don’t belong here.”

    Christina Tangalakis, associate dean of financial aid at Glendale Community College in Southern California

    In practice, this means that students who fall short of SAP standards are significantly more likely to drop out. In the 2016 study of one unnamed community college system, for example, the majority of those who failed SAP, approximately 60 percent, dropped out. For many students, “there is no plan B,” Tangalakis said, and SAP is “just a de facto end to their academic journey a lot of times.”

    Even just receiving a SAP warning can produce that result: An analysis of data from Minnesota community colleges, for example, showed that only half of students who received a notice that they were in danger of failing to make SAP in the fall of 2013 tried to return that spring.

    That, it turns out, is what happened to Clews. The message she initially received from Ventura was a warning, not notice that she was already ineligible. A financial aid deposit for what would have been her second semester showed up in her bank account, but by then she’d left the area to try to find reliable shelter and employment. Of course, when she didn’t show up for those classes, she officially failed SAP. (The money was taken out of her tax refund.)

    Related: Is California saving higher education?

    Years later, the pandemic hit and Clews found herself in an unusual position – with free time. Yes, she was home-schooling two kids, but with restaurants and stores closed, she couldn’t work. She said she filed an appeal letter but couldn’t receive aid while it was pending. Normally, that would have meant no school, but like millions of Americans that year, Clews received pandemic stimulus checks from the federal government.

    After reenrolling with that money, her GPA shot up. Clews said, “I was doing really well, and I realized, ‘Oh, it wasn’t that I wasn’t smart enough, I just didn’t have the resources and the support that I needed to be successful.’ ”

    That jibes with a small 2021 interview study that did not detect a difference in motivation between Pell-eligible students who were meeting SAP and those who weren’t. The study suggests that students who fail SAP requirements often do so because their life circumstances are different, not because they’re less “cut out” to succeed academically. Other research shows that students who SAP-out stop pursuing a degree more often than their peers with similarly low GPAs who aren’t subject to SAP.

    “What SAP policies end up doing is targeting students who are coming in with the biggest existing barriers, and then doubling down,” said Raucher, whose organization helped develop the California SAP reform bill.

    That legislation, which passed unanimously, requires that colleges use the least stringent definition of SAP allowed by the federal regulations for state financial aid, in effect dictating how all aid is administered. It also encourages colleges to better communicate the policy to students and mandates changes to the appeal system, including creating a review process for denied appeals, and prohibits institutions from disenrolling a student for nonpayment of tuition while an appeal is pending.

    After graduating from Ventura College, Elizabeth Clews transferred to the University of California, Santa Cruz. She plans to become a teacher. Credit: Talia Herman for The Hechinger Report

    The federal legislation Booker, the Democratic senator, is expected to introduce would be similar to a bill he proposed in 2020, allowing a renewal of SAP eligibility when a student “stops out” for two years or more. The 2020 bill didn’t advance in Congress, but Booker may have a co-sponsor this time around, as talks with several Republican senators are in progress.

    “The satisfactory academic progress standard is not without its flaws,” said Virginia Foxx, a Republican congresswoman from North Carolina who serves as chairwoman of the House Committee on Education and the Workforce. “Senator Booker’s bill isn’t perfect, but I am always willing to find common ground to improve policies and outcomes for students.”

    In the meantime, organizations including JBAY and the national nonprofit Higher Learning Advocates have asked Education Secretary Miguel Cardona to encourage schools to make the appeals process more user-friendly, among other changes. Tanya Ang, managing director of Higher Learning Advocates, said reforming SAP has bipartisan support because eliminating “unnecessary hoops” for degree completion helps more people gain skills they can use in the workforce.  

    In theory, stringent SAP requirements tell students where they stand and force them to improve. But the 2016 study didn’t find that SAP policies had much of an incentivizing effect, on average.

    The message Clews received was the opposite: Don’t try. Because if at first you don’t succeed, there’s no chance to try, try again.

    In 2022, she completed her classwork at Ventura and transferred to the University of California, Santa Cruz. Clews plans to become a teacher. “I’m thankful to be where I’m at,” she said, “but I definitely feel like it shouldn’t have been so hard to get back to school.”

    This story about satisfactory academic progress was produced by The Hechinger Report, a nonprofit, independent news organization focused on inequality and innovation in education. Sign up for the Hechinger newsletter.

    The Hechinger Report provides in-depth, fact-based, unbiased reporting on education that is free to all readers. But that doesn't mean it's free to produce. Our work keeps educators and the public informed about pressing issues at schools and on campuses throughout the country. We tell the whole story, even when the details are inconvenient. Help us keep doing that.

    Join us today.

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  • Pathify Partners With Foundation for California Community Colleges

    Pathify Partners With Foundation for California Community Colleges

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    The Partnership Will Enhance Procurement and Transform the Higher Education Experience


    DENVER, October 26, 2023 (Newswire.com)
    –
    Pathify, the exclusive centralized user experience hub for higher education, has partnered with the Foundation for California Community Colleges CollegeBuys program to simplify the procurement and purchasing processes while providing cost savings to more than 100 institutions.

    CollegeBuys enables California higher education institutions to streamline lengthy procurement processes by offering legally compliant agreements with pre-vetted partners, now including Pathify. 

    The partnership standardizes pricing agreements, ensuring colleges receive “most favored nation” pricing, terms and service agreements. This helps colleges receive competitive pricing and favorable terms. To date, the CollegeBuys program has achieved savings exceeding $500 million for California Community Colleges, with over $34 million reinvested to fund scholarships for 34,000 students.

    With faster, easier access and pre-negotiated costs, Foundation for California Community Colleges partner campuses can seamlessly acquire Pathify to address the significant user experience gap in the center of the higher education digital ecosystem. This partnership will empower colleges to deliver a personalized user experience that integrates technology, content, communications, and people. 

    “Given the success we’ve had working with a large number of public institutions in California, this partnership makes enormous sense for all parties,” said Pathify’s Chief Revenue Officer Matt Hammond. “We’re excited to make the purchasing process far simpler for schools through a contract vehicle that actually supports student scholarships.”

    Pathify offers highly personalized experiences for users at every point in their journey. The Engagement Hub promotes system-agnostic integrations, collaborative social groups, personalized tasks, and multi-channel communication, offering a seamless web and mobile experience.

    About CollegeBuys

    CollegeBuys is the Foundation for California Community Colleges’ system-wide procurement vehicle that leverages the buying power of California’s 116 community colleges to secure and offer discounts of up to 85 percent on a wide range of educational products — from industry-leading software and technology to high-quality office and classroom furniture. 

    For more information, visit https://purchasing.collegebuys.org/vendor/path-education-inc-pathify/.

    About Pathify

    Obsessed with making great technology while developing incredible long-term relationships with customers, Pathify remains hyper-focused on creating stellar experiences across the entire student lifecycle — from prospect to alumni. Delivering cloud-based, integration-friendly software designed to drive engagement, Pathify pushes personalized information, content, and resources to the right people, at the right time — on any device. Led by former higher ed executives, entrepreneurs, and technology leaders, the team at Pathify focuses every day on the values Impact, Wit, Contrast, Technique and Care. 

    Learn more at pathify.com.

    Source: Pathify

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  • OPINION: With a little extra help and support, rural students can overcome daunting barriers to higher education – The Hechinger Report

    OPINION: With a little extra help and support, rural students can overcome daunting barriers to higher education – The Hechinger Report

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    For many rural students, higher education means waking up before the sun four days a week, then driving an hour through cornfields or pine forests to reach the only college for 100 miles.

    It’s a far cry from the awkward parental drop-off, search for elusive twin XL sheets and Olivia Rodrigo wall poster most people associate with the back-to-college season.

    For the more than 33 million people living in education deserts, college-going can be a drastically different experience. In addition to long commutes, homesickness and culture shock, many students arrive underprepared in key subjects like math and science.

    Their new college calendar may not be conducive to seasonal demand for jobs harvesting, hunting or fighting wildfires. They often grapple with local or even familial skepticism about the value of higher education, especially in areas where the main industries have not historically required a college degree and where students who leave town for college prove unlikely to return.

    For all of these reasons, despite high school graduation rates similar to those in suburbs and cities, rural college-going rates are much lower. For rural students, the calculation about going to and staying in college is very different. Montana is seeking to make that calculation a little more positive through a new program, Montana 10.

    Consider Baker, Montana, population 1,800. For high schoolers there dreaming of a college education, the nearest option, Dawson Community College, is about 70 miles away.

    The nearest four-year institution, Dickinson State University, is 100 miles away, across the border in North Dakota. Students seeking a traditional four-year college experience in their home state must travel more than 225 miles to Montana State University in Billings.

    That’s why these students need a little extra help both adjusting to and staying in school, and why they need someone like Julie Pettitt-Booth, executive director of new student services at MSU Billings, who understands what they’re going through as they adjust to college and the big city for the first time.

    Related: Rural students are the least likely to go to college

    Coming from tight-knit communities, many rural students struggle with isolation and homesickness, as well as financial constraints. Such challenges are especially prevalent for students coming from low-income homes, for students who are the first in their families to attend college and for those who have especially long commutes to school.

    Each challenge makes it easier to contemplate dropping out. That’s where Pettitt-Booth and college support staff across the state come in: providing one-on-one care to help students stay focused and clear those hurdles.

    If a comprehensive student support program can work in Montana the way that it has worked in other places, the state could see more degrees and less debt, spurring economic stability for rural towns and the state as a whole.

    The Montana University System’s new program called Montana 10 offers academic, social and financial supports designed to help low-income, rural and Native American students get acclimated to college, stay enrolled and reach graduation on time.

    To do this, Montana 10 simultaneously offers a combination of student support services — advising, career planning, academic help in first-year math and English classes — and financial supports like textbook assistance and scholarships.

    In exchange, students must enroll full-time, complete their federal financial aid paperwork and meet with program staff regularly to stay on track.

    The goal is simple: graduate students.

    At the heart of the program are advisers who understand what students need both logistically and emotionally and who recognize what it means (good and bad) for a student, a family and a community when students leave for college.

    They also help students navigate unique financial aid situations, such as how to qualify when their family’s assets are all farm equipment or when their parents live off the grid.

    These advisers know how to help students who want to leave their small towns behind as well as those who commute daily from the homesteads where they plan to spend their whole lives.

    Related: STUDENT VOICE: Why rural students like me are ‘meant to be here’ in college

    Building students’ sense of belonging, along with financial and academic supports, can help students stay in college semester after semester. Montana 10 follows a tradition of comprehensive approaches to student success that have been proven effective in rigorous research studies in improving students’ likelihood of staying in college and earning a credential.

    There’s also a big payoff: According to Montana state officials, of Montana jobs paying more than $50,000 a year created between 2011 and 2021, 63 percent went to degree holders.

    In eastern Montana, the most rural part of the state and home to towns like Baker, more than 60 percent of high-demand occupations have workforce shortages, especially in vital fields like education and healthcare.

    If a comprehensive student support program can work in Montana the way that it has worked in other places, the state could see more degrees and less debt, spurring economic stability for rural towns and the state as a whole.

    That means illuminating a winding path through the Rockies toward a postsecondary degree. A path that will lead to more teachers, nurses, engineers and tradesmen.

    Rural colleges matter. When they’re the only option for a hundred miles, getting students in the door, and even more importantly, keeping them enrolled and helping them graduate, can have far-reaching benefits.

    Alyssa Ratledge is a research associate at MDRC, a nonprofit, nonpartisan research organization that is conducting an evaluation of Montana 10.

    This story about rural students and college was produced by The Hechinger Report, a nonprofit, independent news organization focused on inequality and innovation in education. Sign up for Hechinger’s newsletter.

    The Hechinger Report provides in-depth, fact-based, unbiased reporting on education that is free to all readers. But that doesn't mean it's free to produce. Our work keeps educators and the public informed about pressing issues at schools and on campuses throughout the country. We tell the whole story, even when the details are inconvenient. Help us keep doing that.

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  • OPINION: Here’s why a costly college education should not be the only path to career success – The Hechinger Report

    OPINION: Here’s why a costly college education should not be the only path to career success – The Hechinger Report

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    More than 40 million Americans — roughly one out of every seven adults — have earned college credit but have no degree to show for their time and money.

    Florida native Alix Petkov is one of them. He enrolled in college right after high school with the idea of becoming a psychiatrist. Unaware that this career choice required medical school — and unable to afford college, much less a graduate education — Petkov changed majors twice and found himself making only halting progress toward a bachelor’s degree.

    An on-campus job in information technology rekindled his interest in computers, but the gig paid just $10 per hour, and his computer science classes covered the same things he had already picked up at work.

    So Petkov quit college roughly 30 credits short of a degree, with $16,000 in student loans and a credit card balance of $4,000 from paying living expenses.

    He burnished his tech portfolio with freelance computer work, applied for IT jobs, worked in restaurants and stewed over his frustrating experience, later saying that “College only destroyed me.”

    It doesn’t have to be this way. Like millions of other learners, Petkov was forced into an outdated and bureaucratic model of higher education that’s not designed for how people navigate learning and work today.

    Far too many learners are pausing their education long before they earn a credential because they run out of money, time or patience. Or they wind up in a program that lacks the support and structure to meet their individualized needs and goals.

    Related: The college degree gap between Black and white Americans was always bad. It’s getting worse

    Learners need better access to lower-cost, shorter-term programs that help them achieve their career goals.

    Federal and state governments and postsecondary institutions can and should adopt policies and practices that will help students build career pathways and make alternatives to a college degree more accessible, affordable and practical.

    To achieve this, federal and state policymakers must ease some of the guardrails meant to protect learners from making “bad” decisions — after all, some of these guardrails have stifled postsecondary innovation and limited competition between college and noncollege options, ultimately restricting learners’ choices. Students must also receive better information about college and noncollege pathways and outcomes both before they begin a program and while they are enrolled.

    College isn’t always the best option for every learner.

    Petkov said he received little — and often incorrect — information in high school and college about higher education and potential alternatives. No one advised him, for example, that he could save thousands of dollars by completing university-required general education classes at a local community college.

    Looking back, Petkov admits he would have pursued a different path altogether if he had a better up-front understanding of the costs and courses required to complete a degree.

    His story, which he shared with me this summer over a video call after I requested an introduction, illustrates why students need more transparent financial counseling and more options for using financial aid beyond the limited college options currently afforded by student aid programs.

    Giving high school students information about program costs and financial aid well before they apply to college will aid their decision-making. Students should be able to use Pell Grants for noncollege alternative programs that have proven track records of moving students into jobs that pay family-sustaining wages.

    Petkov said it didn’t become apparent until later that his financial aid and campus job wouldn’t cover all of his college expenses. Because he was awarded Pell Grants, he borrowed less than other students.

    But Pell Grants can be used in just one setting: college. Had Petkov been allowed to use the federal subsidy to pursue a college alternative — like an accelerated tech or healthcare upskilling program from a noncollege provider — he would have done that instead.

    Related: OPINION: Often overlooked vocational-tech schools provide great solutions to student debt, labor shortages

    Because of time and expense, college isn’t always the best option for every learner. Mounting evidence on program-level outcomes shows that far too many of the options that the government deems “safe” simply because they are accredited have failed learners and left them no better off than if they had not pursued college at all.

    Petkov didn’t find his true path until more than a year after he quit college. While searching online for IT jobs, he stumbled on information about Merit America, a nonprofit offering low-cost programs that prepare people for tech careers. (Merit America is a grantee of the Charles Koch Foundation, part of the Stand Together philanthropic community, where the author is a senior fellow.)

    Merit America built on Petkov’s existing IT knowledge to give him new tech skills that allowed him to push past self-doubt and launch a successful career. After completing the program, Petkov landed a tech coordinator’s job at a nonprofit in Washington, D.C., that started him at $45,000 — more than twice what he was making in food service.

    Two jobs later, he’s currently the IT director of an executive coaching firm and makes a little more than $100,000 per year. A University of Virginia analysis shows that Merit America completers see an average annual wage increase of $24,000 three or more months after finishing the program.

    Merit America is among the growing number of providers preparing students for placement into high-demand tech and healthcare careers. Yet students from low-income backgrounds who rely on financial aid and loans often get little guidance about such college alternatives and may instead be advised to pursue a college degree.

    It’s time to open more doors to short-term, noncollege options, so that students like Petkov can access more personalized options to help them thrive.

    Steven Taylor is a senior fellow on postsecondary education at Stand Together Trust. He leads the postsecondary education and workforce policy portfolio and partnership strategy.

    This story about debt but no degree was produced by The Hechinger Report, a nonprofit, independent news organization focused on inequality and innovation in education. Sign up for Hechinger’s newsletter.

    The Hechinger Report provides in-depth, fact-based, unbiased reporting on education that is free to all readers. But that doesn’t mean it’s free to produce. Our work keeps educators and the public informed about pressing issues at schools and on campuses throughout the country. We tell the whole story, even when the details are inconvenient. Help us keep doing that.

    Join us today.

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  • 7 Reasons You Shouldn’t Underestimate Community College

    7 Reasons You Shouldn’t Underestimate Community College

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    Deciding to go to a local community college after graduating high school in the Bay Area in 2004 was one of the best, most transformative choices Cecilia Caballera ever made.

    When she made the decision, though, it felt like her only choice.

    “In high school, I felt an immense amount of anxiety and fear about college and my future,” Caballera, a poet and adjunct professor in the California State University system, told HuffPost.

    “My family was very poor, and I felt pressured to continue living at home and work various jobs to help pay the household bills,” she said. “I didn’t even apply to any four-year universities. I truly believed that moving away and attending a ‘real’ college was something that was only available to more privileged people.”

    In spite of chatter at her high school about how community college was a second-rate experience, Caballera pressed on and applied to Los Medanos Community College in Pittsburg, California.

    “Hearing that contributed to my sense of shame and doubt about not attending a ‘real’ college but I was determined to continue my education in any way, shape or form,” she said. “I knew that community college was the gateway to my future.”

    Pushing through those doubts paid off. Thanks to her community college experience and an incredibly supportive counselor at the school, Caballera transferred to UC Berkeley and graduated with honors. After that, she entered a fully-funded PhD program, and in 2022, graduated with a doctoral degree in philosophy from the University of Southern California.

    Courtesy of Cecilia Caballero

    Cecilia Caballero, a community college grad, believes community colleges “are essential for advancing equity and justice in our public education system.”

    “I would not be where I am today without my community college or [connecting with a] Latina community college counselor who understood my challenges and lived experiences, which ultimately changed the entire trajectory of my life,” Caballera said.

    She believes that community colleges are invaluable sites of “transformation, empowerment, and social justice” in our communities, especially for working-class, first-generation, BIPOC students.

    “Community colleges are essential for advancing equity and justice in our public education system,” Caballera said. “That’s even more true for marginalized student populations: students of color, re-entry students, student parents, system impacted students, and many more.”

    Mautra Staley Jones, the president of Oklahoma City Community College (OCCC) ― the fourth-largest institution of higher education in Oklahoma ― agrees.

    “Education is not one-size-fits-all, and community colleges are prepared to meet this challenge by providing an array of programs and services for students regardless of age, background or academic goals,” Staley Jones told HuffPost.

    “Education is not one-size-fits-all, and community colleges are prepared to meet this challenge by providing an array of programs and services for students regardless of age, background or academic goals,” said Mautra Staley Jones, the president of Oklahoma City Community College, pictured here.

    Oklahoma City Community College

    “Education is not one-size-fits-all, and community colleges are prepared to meet this challenge by providing an array of programs and services for students regardless of age, background or academic goals,” said Mautra Staley Jones, the president of Oklahoma City Community College, pictured here.

    Since the pandemic, news about community college hasn’t been entirely rosy. Transfer rates between community colleges and four-year institutions continued to drop last year ― an ongoing trend since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, according to a March 2023 report from the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center. (On the brighter side, completion rates rose for transfer students.)

    For many students, the transfer process is so hard to navigate, it can derail their college plans.

    More often than not, what stalls students’ plans is credit loss: The Government Accountability Office estimated that, among students who transfer, about 43% of their college credits don’t end up counting toward a new degree — including private and public schools, as well as two- and four-year schools.

    As a result, transfer students take longer to finish their degrees and end up spending more in tuition.

    Experts say that both community college and universities can do a better job at communicating what courses students need or don’t need to transfer and get their bachelor’s degree.

    Meeting with a transfer advisor early and often can make a huge difference in student success rates, said Staley Jones.

    “Community colleges are in the business of promoting student success, whatever the academic end goal might be, which is why we have student success advisors,” she said. “We want to facilitate an easy transfer process for our students.”

    Like many community colleges, Staley Jones’ school also has transfer agreements, also known as articulation agreements or 2+2 agreements, in place with many four-year institutions.

    “Many schools have relationships in place with businesses and four-year institutions to facilitate students’ career dreams becoming reality,” Staley Jones said.

    Despite some of the concerns above, former community college students we spoke to said attending a junior college is still one of the best investments you can make in yourself.

    Below, they highlight seven reasons you should consider attending a local community college.

    1. They’re affordable.

    Let’s start with the obvious: Given the ever-rising cost of tuition elsewhere, you can’t beat the price of an education at a junior college.

    “Choosing to attend community college was one of the best financial decisions I ever made due to the affordable tuition,” said Allen Tran, a software engineer in the Bay Area who transferred and graduated debt-free with a bachelor’s degree at San Jose State University.

    Tran took advantage of the financial aid program his community college offered, which made it tuition-free and offered a $500 stipend for him to use toward books and school supplies. (He estimates that his tuition without the program would have been around $1,500.)

    “I was able to save the money I would have spent my first two years had I gone to a university right off the bat, and use it to pay for the tuition at my university after I transferred,” he told HuffPost. “That completely changed the trajectory of my finances at an early stage in my life. I have that financial freedom.”

    Allen Tran, a software engineer who lives in the Bay Area, thinks the affordability factor is the best perk of going to a community college.
    Allen Tran, a software engineer who lives in the Bay Area, thinks the affordability factor is the best perk of going to a community college.

    Before transferring to the University of California, Los Angeles, Odin Contreras, a film student, attended San Bernardino Valley College, where he got an education at a fraction of the cost. Contreras, a Texas native, was paying out-of-state student costs for tuition at first, but once he became a resident of California, he only had to pay $45 a semester. Free of considerable financial stress, he could focus on extracurricular activities, which helped him get into UCLA.

    “While I was at SBVC, I had time to join clubs and organizations that assisted me with building an elaborate resume, from being the president of the Dreamers Club to receiving a $20,000 grant to create my own short film on 35mm film,” he said. “I wouldn’t have had the opportunities I had if I had jumped straight into a university.”

    2. Community colleges give you access to prestigious universities that might not be an option otherwise.

    Tran wasn’t accepted to the schools he’d been dreaming of going to when he applied straight out of high school. His track record at community college opened doors those doors for him, though.

    “For instance, I applied to San Jose State University’s CS Program in high school, was rejected, then attended community college, and was finally admitted into SJSU’s transfer class,” he said.

    Many community colleges have programs that guarantee university admissions to certain schools based on course requirements. Enrolling in such a program early on was how Tran got into his dream school.

    Caballera said she took advantage of a similar program called the Transfer Alliance Program (TAP). It’s a partnership between participating California community colleges and the University of California to give priority consideration to transfer applicants.

    “Before meeting with a college counselor, I didn’t even know that the TAP program existed,” Caballera said.

    “Moreover, the counselor also encouraged me to apply to UC Berkeley, her alma mater. At the time, I had assumed that I would never be admitted into a prestigious university like UC Berkeley, and I had no intention of even attempting to apply,” she said. “But meeting a fellow Latina who graduated from Cal absolutely blew my mind. If she could do it, I could too.”

    3. Community college offers greater flexibility when it comes to schedules and class formats.

    Have a weird schedule or need to prioritize work alongside your education? Community colleges are skilled in accommodating a range of needs when it comes to class scheduling and format, Staley Jones said.

    “For example, our community college offers online and in-person classes that meet for the length of a traditional semester, and we also offer shorter-term class options that are completed within a few weeks over the summer or throughout the year,” she said.

    That flexibility was a major benefit to Caballera when she was attending her two-year school.

    “I was able to commute to my local community campus and complete my degree while living at home and working various jobs,” she said. “This flexibility was absolutely critical for me because I was able to arrange my work schedule around the two or three days a week that I was on campus for classes,” she said.

    Community college offers greater flexibility when it comes to schedules and class formats.

    supersizer via Getty Images

    Community college offers greater flexibility when it comes to schedules and class formats.

    4. You can consider different majors and take different courses without feeling bad about “wasting” money.

    Considering being an engineering major but not sure if you’re cut out for the course work long-term? Take a class and see. Because units are cheaper, community college gives you an opportunity to play around with different potential majors and minors, said Diocelina Arellano, a community college grad, and a social media specialist in the transportation and logistics industry.

    “I was not sure what I wanted to major in so I was buying myself time to figure it out before I transferred over to a four-year university,” she said. “Besides that, everyone is taking prerequisites for the first two years of college anyway, so you can get that done at community college.”

    5. Contrary to what you might think, community colleges offer a sense of community.

    Arellano’s other piece of advice? Don’t wait until you transfer to find student-run-clubs or to make friends with like-minded people. Stay active on campus, she said, you don’t have to navigate community college alone. “Join the student government association and clubs at your community college,” she said. “You can still have a student life and sometimes even a better experience since it’s less crowded.”

    Valerie de la Rosa, an educator in Los Angeles, California, agreed; the sense of actual community at a community college is an underrated perk.

    “If I am being honest, one of the best perks I received from community college is the ability to speak on a variety of topics which has led to making many important connections,” she told HuffPost.

    “I grew up in a low-income area and could not afford extracurricular activities,” she explained. “Community college offered me a chance to learn about things I had no exposure to, like art, philosophy and business.”

    By the time she transferred to UC Berkeley, she could speak on a variety of topics, which made making friends in high places a whole lot easier.

    “I don’t think we talk about it very much but connections and networking are one of the biggest takeaways from major universities,” she said.

    Don't wait until you transfer to get involved in student groups or make strong connections.

    xavierarnau via Getty Images

    Don’t wait until you transfer to get involved in student groups or make strong connections.

    6. The generational diversity is a major perk.

    Nolvia Delgado is the executive director of the Kaplan Educational Foundation, a nonprofit public charity that helps underserved, underrepresented community college students transfer to top four-year colleges and universities. She’s also a Dominican-born first-generation college student and a graduate of Borough of Manhattan Community College and Smith College.

    Reflecting on her own community college experience, the perk that stands out the most is the diversity of thought in the classroom.

    “For example, I vividly remember that in one of my political science classes, one of my classmates worked at city hall, another was a mother of two who was finally close to graduating after multiple attempts, and then there was me ― a ‘traditional’ 19-year-old college student,” she told HuffPost.

    That wide range of personal and professional lived experiences fueled the course discussions and broadened our perspectives.

    Community college also seems to attract a diverse range of professors.

    “Like the students, they also have diverse experiences,” Delgado said. “One of my favorite classes was an Italian class taught by an older Italian woman. In addition to teaching us basic Italian, she exposed us to the cultural differences, similarities to other Romance languages, and common mistakes. Every lesson transported us to Italy.”

    There's students of all ages and experiences at community college, which makes classroom discussion all the more enriching.

    FG Trade via Getty Images

    There’s students of all ages and experiences at community college, which makes classroom discussion all the more enriching.

    7. Because the colleges are smaller, everyone is really rooting for your success.

    Whenever Caballera talks to incoming or potential community college students, she reminds them that community college is real college. (That “high school 2.0” stigma still pervades to some degree, unfortunately.)

    She also highly encourages students, especially first-generation, working class, students of color, to continually seek help and support from faculty, staff and campus resources, and other students.

    “Over time, you will build relationships and community, which means that you don’t have to navigate community college alone,” she said. “If you’re a first-generation, working class student of color, I realize that it can be hard to ask for help. However, just know that there is an abundance of people and programs on campus to help you achieve your educational goals and dreams. They believe in you.”

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  • Ron DeSantis’s Joyless Ride

    Ron DeSantis’s Joyless Ride

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    Real-life Ron DeSantis was here, finally. In the fidgety flesh; in Iowa, South Carolina, and, in this case, New Hampshire. Not some distant Sunshine State of potential or idealized Donald Trump alternative or voice in the far-off static of Twitter Spaces. But an actual human being interacting with other human beings, some 200 of them, packed into an American Legion hall in the town of Rochester.

    “Okay, smile, close-up,” an older woman told the Florida governor, trying to pull him in for another photo. DeSantis and his wife, Casey, had just finished a midday campaign event, and the governor was now working a quick rope line—emphasis on quick and double emphasis on working. The fast-talking first lady is much better suited to this than her halting husband. He smiled for the camera like the dentist had just asked him to bite down on a blob of putty; like he was trying to make a mold, or to fit one. It was more of a cringe than a grin.

    “Governor, I have a lot of relatives in Florida,” the next selfie guy told him. Everybody who meets DeSantis has relatives in Florida or a time-share on Clearwater Beach or a bunch of golf buddies who retired to the Villages. “Wow, really?” DeSantis said.

    He was trying. But this did not look fun for him.

    Retail politicking was never DeSantis’s gift. Not that it mattered much before, in the media-dominated expanse of Florida politics, where DeSantis has proved himself an elite culture warrior and troller of libs. DeSantis was reelected by 19 points last November. He calls himself the governor of the state “where woke goes to die,” which he believes will be a model for his presidency of the whole country, a red utopia in his own image.

    From the May 2023 issue: How did America’s weirdest, most freedom-obsessed state fall for an authoritarian governor?

    What does the on-paper promise of DeSantis look like in practice? DeSantis has performed a number of these in-person chores in recent days, after announcing his presidential campaign on May 24 in a glitchy Twitter Spaces appearance with Elon Musk.

    As I watched him complete his rounds in New Hampshire on Thursday—visits to a VFW hall, an Elks Club, and a community college, in addition to the American Legion post—the essential duality of his campaign was laid bare: DeSantis is the ultimate performative politician when it comes to demonstrating outrage and “kneecapping” various woke abuses—but not so much when it comes to the actual in-person performance of politics.

    The campaign billed his appearance in Rochester as a “fireside chat.” (The outside temperature was 90 degrees, and there was no actual fire.) The governor and first lady also held fireside chats this week at a welding shop in Salix, Iowa, and at an event space in Lexington, South Carolina. The term conjures the great American tradition started by President Franklin D. Roosevelt during the Great Depression. Those were scary times—grim visages of malnourished kids and food riots and businessmen selling pencils on the street. FDR’s cozy evenings around the radio hearth were meant to project comfort and avuncular authority.

    Sitting on gray armchairs onstage in Rochester—Casey cross-legged and Ron man-spread—the DeSanti reassured their audience that the Florida governor was the candidate best equipped to protect Americans from contemporary threats no less serious than stock-market crashes and bank closures. He was focused on a distinct set of modern menaces: “woke indoctrination” and “woke militaries” and “woke mind viruses” and “woke mobs” that endanger every institution of American life. He used woke more than a dozen times at each event (I counted).

    Also, DeSantis said he’s a big supporter of “the death penalty for pedophiles” (applause); reminded every audience that he’d sent dozens of migrants to “beautiful Martha’s Vineyard” (bigger applause); and promised to end “this Faucian dystopia” around COVID once and for all (biggest applause).

    Also, George Soros (boo).

    Mark Leibovich: Just wait until you get to know Ron DeSantis

    Casey talked at each New Hampshire stop about the couple’s three young children, often in the vein of how adorably naughty they are—how they write on the walls of the governor’s mansion with permanent markers and leave crayon stains on the carpets. Ron spoke in personal terms less often, but when he did, it was usually to prove that he understands the need to protect kids from being preyed upon by the various and ruthless forces of wokeness. One recurring example on Thursday involved how outrageous it is that in certain swim competitions, a girl might wind up being defeated by a transgender opponent. “I’m particularly worried about this as the father of two daughters,” DeSantis told the Rochester crowd.

    This played well in the room full of committed Republicans and likely primary voters, as it does on Fox. Clearly, this is a fraught and divisive issue, but one that’s been given outsized attention in recent years, especially in relation to the portion of the population it directly affects. By comparison, DeSantis never mentioned gun violence, the leading cause of death for children in this country, including many in his state (the site of the horrific Parkland massacre of 2018, the year before he became governor). DeSantis readily opts for the culture-war terrain, ignoring the rest, pretty much everywhere he goes.

    His whole act can feel like a clunky contrivance—a forced persona railing against phony or hyped-up outrages. He can be irascible. Steve Peoples, a reporter for the Associated Press, approached DeSantis after a speech at a VFW hall in Laconia and asked the governor why he hadn’t taken any questions from the audience. “Are you blind?” DeSantis snapped at Peoples. “Are you blind? Okay, so, people are coming up to me, talking to me [about] whatever they want to talk to me about.”

    No one in the room cared about this little outburst besides the reporters (who sent a clip of it bouncing across social media within minutes). And if the voters did care, it would probably reflect well on DeSantis in their eyes, demonstrating his willingness to get in the media’s face.

    Yair Rosenberg: DeSantis is making the same mistake Democrats did in 2020

    Journalists who managed to get near DeSantis this week unfailingly asked him about Donald Trump, the leading GOP candidate. In Rochester, NBC’s Gabe Gutierrez wondered about the former president’s claim that he would eliminate the federal government’s “administrative state” within six months of a second term. “Why didn’t you do it when you had four years?” DeSantis shot back.

    In general, though, DeSantis didn’t mention Trump without being prompted—at least not explicitly. He drew clear, if barely veiled, contrasts. “I will end the culture of losing in the Republican Party,” he vowed Thursday night in Manchester. Unsaid, obviously, is that the GOP has underperformed in the past three national elections—and no one is more to blame than Trump and the various MAGA disciples he dragged into those campaigns.

    “Politics is not about building a brand,” DeSantis went on to say. What matters is competence and conviction, not charisma. “My husband will never back down!” Casey added in support. In other words: He is effective and he will follow through and actually do real things, unlike you-know-who.

    “Politics is not about entertainment,” DeSantis said in all of his New Hampshire speeches, usually at the end. He might be trying to prove as much.

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  • The nation’s community colleges falter as enrollment plunges

    The nation’s community colleges falter as enrollment plunges

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    When Santos Enrique Camara arrived at Shoreline Community College in Washington state to study audio engineering, he quickly felt lost.

    “It’s like a weird maze,” remembered Camara, who was 19 at the time and had finished high school with a 4.0 grade-point average. “You need help with your classes and financial aid? Well, here, take a number and run from office to office and see if you can figure it out.”

    With scant advising, many community college students like Camara spend time and money on courses that won’t transfer or that they don’t need. Though most intend to move on to get bachelor’s degrees, only a small fraction do. Now these failures are coming home to roost.

    Advocates for community colleges defend them as the underdogs of America’s higher education system, left to serve the students who need the most support but without the money to provide it. Critics contend this has become an excuse for poor success rates and for the kind of faceless bureaucracies that ultimately led Camara to drop out after two semesters. He now works in a restaurant and plays in two bands.

    screen-shot-2023-04-03-at-11-03-51-am.png
    Santos Enrique Camara, who dropped out of Shoreline Community College at age 19 in 2015 after completing one semester studying audio engineering. 

    AP Photo/Lindsey Wasson


    Community colleges are far cheaper than four-year schools yet consumers are abandoning them in droves. The number of students at community colleges has fallen 37% since 2010, or by nearly 2.6 million, according to the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center.

    “The reckoning is here,” said Davis Jenkins, senior research scholar at the Community College Research Center at Teachers College, Columbia University. 

    Yet even as these colleges serve fewer students, their already low success rates have by at least one measure gotten worse.

    While four out of five students who begin at a community college say they plan to go on to get a bachelor’s degree, only about one in six of them actually manages to do it. That’s down by nearly 15% since 2020, according to the clearinghouse.

    Disproportionate share of  Black and Hispanic students

    Two-year community colleges have the worst completion rates of any kind of university or college. Like Camara, nearly half of students drop out, within a year. These frustrated wanderers include a disproportionate share of Black and Hispanic students. 

    Several reasons explain why enrollment has declined. Strong demand in the job market for people without college educations has made it more attractive for many to go to work. Another reason: many Americans increasingly are questioning the value of going to college at all.

    Megan Parish, who at 26 has been in and out of community college in Arkansas since 2016, said she waits two or three days to get answers from advisers. “I’ve had to go out of my way to find people, and if they didn’t know the answer, they would send me to somebody else, usually by email.” Hearing back from the financial aid office, she said, can take a month.

    Oryanan Lewis doesn’t have that kind of time. Lewis, 20, is in her second year at Chattahoochee Valley Community College in Phenix City, Alabama, where she is pursuing a degree in medical assisting. 

    She failed three classes and was put on academic probation. Only then did she hear from an intervention program.

    “I feel like they should talk to their students more,” Lewis said. “Because a person can have a whole lot going on.”

    Employers, meanwhile, are unimpressed with the quality of community college students who manage to graduate. Only about a third agree that community colleges produce graduates who are ready to work, according to a survey released in December by researchers at the Harvard Business School.

    Community colleges that fail students can’t just blame their smaller budgets, said Joseph Fuller, a Harvard professor of business management.

    “The lack of resources inside community colleges is a legitimate complaint. But a number of community colleges do extraordinarily well,” he said. “So it’s not impossible.”

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  • Upright Partners With Two Community Colleges in Western Mass. to Expand Workforce Opportunities in Growing Tech Hub

    Upright Partners With Two Community Colleges in Western Mass. to Expand Workforce Opportunities in Growing Tech Hub

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    Press Release
    –

    Sep 14, 2022


    SPRINGFIELD, Mass., September 14, 2022 (Newswire.com)
    –
    Upright Education is pleased to announce new partnerships with two community colleges in the Springfield, Mass., area, Holyoke Community College and Springfield Technical Community College, the only technical community college in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.

    Both colleges are excited to partner with Upright to create more technical jobs, including in the growing information technology (IT) sector, and skilled labor opportunities for the Western Massachusetts workforce.

    The colleges and Upright are offering online educational opportunities for adult learners looking for a new career in technology. No experience is necessary to enroll. 

    STCC is an institution dedicated to closing gaps in opportunity and achievement for students who traditionally face disproportionate challenges in the professional sphere. HCC pursues a similar mission by fostering a connected college experience designed to educate students holistically in an open and inclusive atmosphere. Both are also designated Hispanic Serving Institutions dedicated to promoting diversity in public education in Massachusetts. 

    Upright President and CEO Benjamin Boas and the Presidents of both colleges participated in a formal announcement on Tuesday, Sept. 13, 2022.

    STCC President John B. Cook said, “STCC is excited to partner with Upright Education to offer short-term certificate programs that will help anyone in Western Massachusetts who would like to change their career or develop technical skills to find jobs in high-demand fields, which includes high tech. This new partnership aligns strongly with STCC’s technical mission and helps meet the demand for skilled workers in the region.”

    HCC President Christina Royal said, “HCC is happy to join in the announcement of our joint partnership with Upright to provide 21st-century skills for today’s job seeker. The development of skills in IT will make our students more ready for the jobs in the future. Together Upright, HCC and STCC will help make jobseekers of Western Mass. job ready.”

    Along with Greenfield Community College, Upright now partners with three different colleges in the Massachusetts area. These partnerships represent Upright’s investment in the growing tech sector in the state, particularly surrounding Springfield, which Boston Business Journals ranked the #1 city in the country for tech job growth in 2021.

    Massachusetts has received support and resources for its tech sector from major companies in the tech industry, including an annual donation of $500,000 of cloud computing resources from Microsoft. Upright’s presence also continues to grow in the Northeast more broadly, where its partnerships include multiple schools in New York and Vermont, and nationally, where it has signed 11 total education partnerships to date.

    “Adults working hourly jobs want salaried careers where they can work remotely, enjoy a comfortable lifestyle, and reside in a neighborhood that doesn’t break the bank. Western Massachusetts represents a landscape that is ripe for providing these career opportunities in the growing tech economy,” said Benny Boas, CEO, and Founder of Upright Education. “Upright’s partnership with Springfield Technical Community College and Holyoke Community College provides direct-to-career pathways for in-demand technology jobs through accessible programs, which don’t require industry experience or a college degree.”

    Upright’s full- and part-time bootcamps and individual courses currently maintain a job placement rate of 92% and offer a 30% increase in salary for students coming from prior careers.

    Expanding services in areas like Springfield supports Upright’s mission of stimulating economic growth in areas where large populations of working adults stand to benefit from innovative educational opportunities and skilled training in burgeoning professional fields like software development and designing visual elements on a website and improving user experience and user interface with the website (UX/UI design). Upright is proud to be taking this vital step toward its stated goals.

    If you are interested in learning more about these programs, an informational session hosted by the enrollment team will be taking place via Zoom on Thursday, Sept. 22, at noon EDT. Register here.

    Press Contacts:

    STCC: Jim Danko – jdanko@stcc.edu

    HCC: Chris Yurko – cyurko@hcc.edu

    Upright: info@uprighted.com

    Source: Upright Education

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  • Upright Education Partners With SUNY Clinton Community College to Offer Fast-Track Technology Career Enhancement Pathways

    Upright Education Partners With SUNY Clinton Community College to Offer Fast-Track Technology Career Enhancement Pathways

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    Press Release
    –

    Aug 24, 2022


    PLATTSBURGH, N.Y., August 24, 2022 (Newswire.com)
    –
    Upright Education is pleased to announce its first partnership with a college in the State University of New York system (SUNY), Clinton Community College, located in Plattsburgh, New York. Upright’s complete curriculum of full- and part-time bootcamps and individual courses will be available online to Clinton enrollees.

    Clinton CC already offers a varied hybrid workforce development curriculum, including courses on information security, business technology, and emerging technologies. Workforce development is a key initiative of the SUNY system in general, where 1.9 million dollars in grant funding per year goes to various job training programs. Partnerships with institutions like SUNY colleges are essential to Upright’s mission to make skilled labor training available to all working adults.

    “Upright’s trainings in software development or user experience/interface design are offered as a complete package for anyone who would like to change their career or enhance it in technology industries. One can start with no experience, go through the program at an accelerated pace, and after 3 or 6 months land a well-paying job with the help of Upright’s career services,” said Anna Miarka-Grzelak, Dean of Enrollment Management at Clinton CC. “That’s exactly the type of opportunity that we want our students to have.” 

    Upright’s partnership with Clinton will expand the organization’s presence in New York State, where the tech sector continues to rank among the top states in the country for job creation and local job placement. Much of this employment density is concentrated in or near New York City. Upright’s courses, which are nationally ranked and designed to be accessible to learners of all levels of education and career experience, will play a major role in bringing the resources of New York’s tech sector to working adults across New York State’s diverse socioeconomic landscape. Upright’s partnerships have already contributed to the growth of the tech workforce in emerging industry hubs like greater New England and Central Tennessee.

    “There has never been a better time to enter a high-skilled profession. Companies are struggling with talent shortages and tech salaries remain high while other parts of the market seem to be cooling off,” said Upright Education CEO, Benny Boas. “Clinton Community College coding and design bootcamps offer the perfect opportunity for adults looking to make a switch to one of these high-paying jobs.”

    Upright continues to offer its introductory Career Ignition programs and its immersive Career Bootcamps in synchronous settings, allowing collaboration with peers and hands-on attention from live instructors. Financing and scheduling options vary and can be selected to fit the needs and dependencies of every adult learner. Upright is pleased to be bringing its award-winning curriculum and its 91% success rate to the table and developing the workforce of Plattsburgh, New York and the burgeoning economy beyond.

    Clinton and Upright Education are hosting a Bootcamp Info Session on Wednesday, August 31, to discuss upcoming courses and meet prospective students. The live webinar will take place remotely at 8:00 p.m. EST. Interested participants can register online: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/clinton-community-college-bootcamp-info-session-tickets-406522548887

    To learn more about Clinton Bootcamps and Ignition Courses and to apply, visit: bootcamp.clinton.edu

    Press Contact

    SUNY Clinton CC

    Anna Miarka-Grzelak

    (518)562-4171

    anna.miarka-grzelak@clinton.edu

    Source: Upright Education

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