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In a report released today, the KIPP Foundation called on Congress to make college more affordable and help students begin a path to finding good careers. By using federal money to pay for more high school guidance counselors and expand already-successful college completion programs, the organization said, lawmakers could open the door to millions more low-income and minority students earning their degrees.

The report was released as both the House and Senate consider whether to reauthorize the Higher Education Act, a federal law governing most aspects of postsecondary education. The act was last updated in 2008, and many fear that it has fallen behind the times with respect to college access and affordability. Given the looming retirement of Sen. Lamar Alexander, chairman of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, some believe that a rare bipartisan effort to revisit the law could be in play ahead of the 2020 election season.

While reauthorizing the act is a long-held goal of Alexander鈥檚, it鈥檚 unknown whether the KIPP Foundation鈥檚 concerns are likely to be addressed. Much of the college debate has been dominated by the need to address the student loan debt burden and simplify the Free Application for Federal Student Aid.

Richard Barth is CEO of the foundation, a nonprofit affiliated with the nationwide charter school network that educates more than 100,000 students in 224 schools.

鈥淔or some people that might say, 鈥榊ou鈥檙e a K-12 system, this is not your swim lane,鈥� our commitment to our kids is that we鈥檙e setting them up to live a choice-filled life,鈥� Barth told The 74. 鈥淲e feel deeply responsible for taking our learning and sharing it with policymakers.鈥�

Barth said that he felt it necessary to share the sometimes dispiriting perspectives of the more than 28,000 KIPP alumni, most of whom have matriculated at colleges.

The report details the challenges that many KIPP students 鈥� overwhelmingly from low-income and minority families 鈥� have encountered in college. The network, for its concerted efforts to track graduates through their college years and support them as they complete their degrees, surveys its alumni annually on campuses around the country.

Among its discoveries: Seventy-two percent of respondents 鈥� KIPP alums 鈥� said they hadn鈥檛 pursued summer jobs or internships related to their desired career; 58 percent said they felt negatively judged because of their race; 57 percent said they worried about running out of food; and 42 percent said they鈥檇 missed meals to meet education-related expenses.

Those findings were bolstered by a of 86,000 college students in 123 colleges and universities across the country that was just released April 30. It found that more than half of college and university students faced housing insecurity in the past year and 45 percent of students were food insecure. Such challenges help explain why, , just 11 percent of low-income students graduate from college after six years.

The foundation鈥檚 findings, Barth said, made it clear that the network needed to be heard from on debates around higher education.

鈥淚t makes you sick. It also makes you feel like, if we don鈥檛 do something about this, we鈥檙e not doing our jobs. We鈥檙e telling them, 鈥榌College] really is a great thing to do,鈥� and then almost half of them are making a choice of whether they eat or buy school materials.鈥�

The report lists five recommendations to include in a revised Higher Education Act, all designed to make college more accessible and affordable to students like those enrolled at KIPP charters:

1. Direct federal funding to send more college counselors to high-need schools, where they are in short supply;

2. Incentivize more spending on public university systems through a federal-state partnership focusing on need-based student aid;

3. Launch and replicate pilot programs designed to lift college completion rates among low-income, minority, and first-generation college students;

4. Invest directly in schools that already serve outsize numbers of disadvantaged students, such as historically black colleges and universities; and

5. Expand the federal work-study program to assist students in securing internships and summer jobs that bring meaningful workplace experience.

The recommendations partially echo those by a group of financial aid administrators. They dovetail less with a proposal released by the White House, which focused more on workforce training and instituting student lending caps.

KIPP has recently shown a willingness to weigh in on matters of public policy. Last year, it lobbied Congress to for students protected under DACA; the foundation also send to the Supreme Court in March, arguing against the administration鈥檚 proposed use of a citizenship question in the 2020 census.

Barth said that the organization wouldn鈥檛 shrink from a role as public advocate with the stakes for its students set so high.

鈥淲e鈥檝e got a lot of lived experience, and there鈥檚 also a research base,鈥� he said. 鈥淲e feel like it is our obligation to bring that voice to bear.鈥�

Disclosure: The 74鈥檚 CEO, Stephen Cockrell, served as director of external impact for the KIPP Foundation from 2015 to 2019. He played no part in the reporting or editing of this story.

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