A Portrait of Low-Income Young Adults in Education

Provides an overview of 2000-08 college attainment and completion trends by poverty and race/ethnicity. Considers the links between low-income young adults' postsecondary education and labor market outcomes and policy implications for improving outcomes

President Obama’s free community-college plan is a necessary plan – and a good one.

Last week, President Obama announced that community college will be made free for all students for the first two years of study. Sara Goldrick-Rab welcomes the announcement, which will be especially helpful for less affluent families who spend a large proportion of their family income on college. She writes that the next steps in improving college affordability should include making the first two years of college free at four-year colleges and universities, increases in per-student funding, and coverage of students’ living expenses, books, and supplies

The Real Price of College: College Completion Series: Part Two

The high price of college is the subject of media headlines, policy debates, and dinner table conversations because of its implications for educational opportunities, student and family pocketbooks, and the economy. Some people caution against giving too much weight to the advertised price of a college education, pointing out that the availability of financial aid means that college is not as expensive as people think it is. But they overlook a substantial problem: for many students, the real price of college is much higher than what recruitment literature, conventional wisdom, and even official statistics convey. Our research indicates that the current approach to higher education financing too often leaves low-income students facing unexpected, and sometimes untenable, expenses.Financial challenges are a consistent predictor of non-completion in higher education, and they are becoming more severe over time. Unexpected costs, even those that might appear modest in size, can derail students from families lacking financial cushions, and even those with greater family resources. Improving college completion rates requires both lowering the real price of attending college -- the student's remaining total costs, including tuition, books, and living expenses, after financial aid -- to better align with students' and families' ability to pay, and providing accurate information to help them plan to cover the real price of college.Many policymakers argue that bringing the personal and public benefits of higher education to an expanded population of Americans is important for the economy and to address inequality. Financial aid policies, they assume, help those with scarce resources to earn their degrees. But these policies often fall short, and when students have difficulty paying for college, they are more likely to focus their energies on working and raising funds rather than studying and attending classes, and are less likely to complete their degrees

A Review of State Investment in Higher Education Affordability and Access During the 86th Legislature

Postsecondary student demographics are dramatically shifting in the state of Texas, resulting in an increased need for state government resources to ensure college access affordability in the state. It is critical that lawmakers prioritize higher education to allow Texans from all backgrounds access to afford higher education. This editorial is an overview of the Texas 86th Legislature’s increased investment in need-based financial aid, disparate state funding to public Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCU), proposals of state College Promise programs, and legislation aimed at serving nontraditional students. Together, these investments and programs demonstrate that the Texas Legislature has taken positive steps to improving higher education access and affordability but must increase focus on and investment in higher education in the future to ensure the economic prosperity of Texas.Educatio

Pell Grants as Performance-Based Scholarships? An Examination of Satisfactory Academic Progress Requirements in the Nation's Largest Need-Based Aid Program

The Federal Pell Grant Program is the nation’s largest need-based grant program. While students’ initial eligibility for the Pell is based on financial need, renewal is contingent on meeting minimum academic standards similar to those in models of performance-based scholarships, including a grade point average (GPA) requirement and ratio of credits completed compared to those attempted. In this study, we describe federal satisfactory academic progress (SAP) requirements and illustrate the policy’s implementation in a statewide community college system. Using state administrative data, we demonstrate that a substantial portion of Pell recipients are at risk for Pell ineligibility due to their failure to meet SAP GPA or credit completion requirements. We then leverage the GPA component of the policy to explore the impacts of failure to meet standards on early college persistence and achievement, earning a credential, and transferring to a four-year college using two methodological approaches: regression discontinuity (RD) and difference-in-differences (DD). Our results across the two approaches are mixed, with the RD providing null estimates and the DD indicating some statistically significant impacts, including a negative effect on early college persistence. We conclude by discussing the implications for future research.Educational Leadership and Polic

Low-Income Single Mothers at Community Colleges: Recommendations for Practices to Improve Completion

Low-income, single mothers beginning or returning to higher education overwhelmingly choose to pursue their goals at community colleges. These schools often provide the best fit of available institutions because of their relative affordability, variety of offerings, ease of entry, and proximity to the student. Like other higher learning institutions, however, many community colleges struggle to address the challenges low-income, single mothers can face. Colleges often unwittingly place more obstacles in the path of these students.Many colleges are taking action and trying a variety of approaches to improve their institutions and better serve low-income, single mother students. While some interventions have been rigorously studied, most have not. Many promising interventions, though so far lacking empirical support, have shown great success based on student and provider testimony. When taken as a whole, it is clear that community colleges can undertake effective interventions to help student parents complete their programs and meet their goals

Sun Devils Together: Breaking Stigmas on Student Homelessness

abstract: In universities, such as Arizona State, students are becoming homeless at an alarming rate. These homeless ASU students are often invisible, as seen through the lack of information on who they are and what resources the university has developed to help them. Typically, students arrive at university campuses with most of the resources required for them to pursue a degree. However, several economic factors such as unemployment or financial instability can impact these resources which influence students ability to stay enrolled in classes. This feature is reflected in the well understood concept of the starving student. Despite this paradigm, the fact remains that students under this stress are attending classes and are under financial stress to do so while being unable to meet their basic needs. These intertwined elements result in ASU students becoming exposed to cyclical needs-insecurities including homelessness. Therefore, the team decided to develop a project called Sun Devils Together which addresses the needs of ASUs students facing homelessness and overall aims to help increase the accessibility of available resources through reducing the silo effect that occurs due to lack of communication between different departments and increases faculty, staff, and student awareness regarding the issue. In order to achieve this, the team has collaborated with the Assistant Dean of Students to produce a training module for ASU faculty, professional staff, and students. The team is contributing information to the creation of a new website that will have all the resources available to students in one place. In addition, the team will create a coded pamphlet with a map of resources that will be given out to different departments around campus that students may potentially reach out to for help while informing those departments regarding the existence of other departments that work towards the same cause

The End of the Ramen Diet:Higher Education Students and SNAP Benefits

Americans joke that college students have so little money that they subsist on 10 cent packs of ramen. Statistically, college students face much higher rates of food insecurity than the general population and the situation is particularly dire for students of color. Much has been written on this area in recent months and years and many commentators are seeking to denormalize poverty, hunger, and the “freshman 15” on campuses. This article will look to a solution for this hungry and often neglected population. In 2010, the Health, Hunger-Free Kids Act (HHFKA) reauthorized the Federal School Lunch Program. HHFKA contained several innovations, however, one that is particularly relevant is the “identified students” provision. Under this scheme, students whose families already receive Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits, Medicaid, or are enrolled in several other federal assistance programs qualify for free or reduced-price school meals without a separate application. With the next iteration of the Farm Bill, SNAP should be adjusted to similarly accommodate low income college students. Under this new program, students who qualify for Perkins Loans, Federal Work Study, Pell Grants, Federal Supplemental Educational Opportunity Grants, and similar federal programs would also receive SNAP benefits without an additional application. The benefits to such a program would be tremendous. In many states, college students are specifically excluded from receiving benefits such as SNAP and Medicaid. This policy change would move students away from food insecurity, reduce the burden of schools providing high quality dining experiences that are a major contributor to the cost of higher education, reduce student debt, and bring the political capital of university students to SNAP

Ram Essential

The underlying causes of food insecurity are complex and often intertwined with related issues that affect a student’s ability to meet even basic needs, such as housing, employment and health care, forcing them to choose between their well-being and their education. The latest Hunger in America report finds that about 10 percent of Feed America’s 46.5 million adult clients are college students. That equates to 2 million full-time college students. “Of those surveyed by the emergency food services network, roughly 30.5 percent of students reported that they were forced to choose between food and educational expenses at some point over the last year.”1 In response, colleges and universities, including VCU, have sprung into action, and the number of campus food pantries at higher educational institutions has risen from a handful in 2009 to more than 500 in 2017.2 But changing food insecurity to food security goes beyond providing just food. It involves a comprehensive approach to providing resources that address the causes and results of being food insecure. Ram Essentials is a holistic approach to addressing basic needs insecurity among VCU students by asking the question, What is essential for our students to be successful? The project focuses on raising the awareness of all existing VCU resources and disseminating them widely through a single user-friendly portal to enhance students’ experience, academic achievement and physical and mental well-being