The 2026 NCAA women’s tournament, combining a mix of expected winners and up-and-coming programs, has provided an exciting month of basketball for millions of fans across the nation. In the last few years, thanks to the athleticism and on and off the court charisma of powerhouse stars in both pro and college teams, women’s basketball is now front and center and more thrilling than ever. 

Witness, for instance, the Vanderbilt Commodores’ Mikayla Blakes, the nation’s leading scorer, perform a near triple-double with 25 points against Illinois. Or the outstanding performance of UCLA’s Lauren Betts and Gabriela Jaquez as the Bruins stomped the Gamecocks of South Carolina to win the school’s first NCAA national title. The list that highlighted the Madness this March could go on, but the point is clear: Women’s basketball is a treat to watch.

But how well do these competitive schools, whose ability on the court has been rewarded with bids to the Big Dance, do when it comes to helping their students reach financial security? 

To find out, I have applied a methodology detailed in my recent analysis of the men’s tournament. 

The formula used ranks each college on an Economic Mobility Index (EMI), based on how many years graduates need to pay down the total net cost of their degree; how much more than a high school graduate the college’s bachelor’s degree recipients earn after 10 years; and how broadly the school’s effort applies to its low- and moderate-income students, using the percentage of students eligible for Pell grants as a proxy for low family income. 

Consequently, the EMI ranks 1,320 bachelor’s degree-granting institutions by how well each provides economic mobility for its most disadvantaged students. 

One way to grasp the value of the EMI is by comparing the two colleges that made it to the NCAA Tournament’s championship game. Although both schools are mighty on the court, there are wide differences in the statistics they provide for the tournament and for the index. To get to the championship game, the No. 1 seeded Bruins of University of California-Los Angeles had to overcome 23 turnovers and survive a late surge from the Texas Longhorns to manage a 51-44 win against the only team that beat them this season. Meanwhile, the South Carolina Gamecocks made it by breezing past the Horned Frogs of Texas Christian University. 

More significantly, in the Social Mobility Tournament, the University of South Carolina got only as far as the second round because the school’s total price tag is $43,300, but the earning premium for its graduates — compared with someone with only a high school diploma — averages just $28,600. Therefore, it takes 1.5 years on average to pay down the cost of its degrees. Compare this to UCLA, where a degree costs $34,500 and the earning premium is a whopping $45,000, making it possible to pay back the amount spent on a degree in less than one year. 

What’s more, South Carolina’s student body is made up of only 19.9% Pell-eligible students, compared with 31.9% for UCLA. The result: South Carolina ranks 501 in our index with a 17.6 EMI score, whereas UCLA, which went on to play in the championship game in both our bracket and the NCAA tournament, is ranked 115 with an EMI score of 30.4. 

Given the challenges colleges face today, as more and more people question whether they are worth the cost, the EMI calculations provide an important service. Not only do they help to identify which colleges are associated with the highest return on the educational investment made, but also which ones are doing so for the greatest numbers of underresourced students.

From a wider perspective, the 2026 NCAA teams in the Sweet Sixteen were a formidable lot. The No. 1 seeded University of Connecticut Huskies crushed the Syracuse Orange. The No. 1 seeded Gamecocks of South Carolina did the same to the embattled Trojans of USC. Meanwhile, the Louisiana State University Tigers, on their way to a fourth consecutive Sweet Sixteen appearance, battered the unfortunate Lady Raiders of Texas Tech by a punishing 101-47 score. 

Still, not every game leading to the Sweet Sixteen was lopsided. In one of the most thrilling games of the tournament, the Gophers of Minnesota sneaked by the Ole Miss Rebels by a mere 2 points, and it took two overtime periods for the University of Virginia Cavaliers to best the Hawkeyes of Iowa. 

But no matter which team you rooted for, this is exhilarating basketball right through to the Final Four matches between four No. 1 seeds. Still, as I have noted in the past, what should be no less thrilling is observing how well some of the tournament’s schools succeed in putting their students on the path to economic security.

After all, with college costs a major concern for most parents and students, an examination of the total net price to earn a degree at the participating schools is worth undertaking. For example, on average, an undergraduate degree at the Sweet Sixteen colleges in our Social Mobility Tournament costs approximately $40,900 but provides an earning premium beyond a high school graduate of about $32,200. It is data like these that make possible an earning premium that permits a graduate to pay down the cost of their degree in less than two years. This type of information is important for anyone considering a college education.

Also important is knowing how wide the door is open at any institution. For instance, when it comes to access, the colleges in our Sweet Sixteen differ greatly from their counterparts in the NCAA tournament. The Social Mobility Sweet Sixteen enroll nearly twice as many Pell-eligible students — 138,000 out of 461,600 — than those in the NCAA Sweet Sixteen, where only 74,200 out of 342,000 students qualify for Pell grants. 

While the winners in the NCAA tournament receive much praise, and their schools enjoy both bragging rights and potential increases in applications and donations, there is much reason to also celebrate this year’s Social Mobility Tournament champion, the University of California at San Diego. 

Not only did the Tritons win the Big West Tournament, but they also enjoy a 34.8 EMI score, putting them in 68th place out of 1,320 schools in the index. This means their approximately 11,100 lower-income graduates can pay back the cost of their education in less than one year and go on to earn on average more than $43,600 than a high school graduate in California.

I look forward to seeing powerhouse teams like the NCAA’s Final Four win games, but more than that, I am pleased that policymakers on both sides of the aisle in Congress and in state legislatures are now paying close attention to which schools are putting their students on the road to financial well-being. These are the schools most worthy of our praise and most deserving of the admiration that comes with success, whatever their fate on the court.

March Madness, that anxious, exciting and promising time for players and fans alike, is upon us. Like millions of others, I have been really enjoying these three weeks of competitive games full of surprises and awesome athletic feats. However, beyond the thrills, this moment highlights the stakes not just for the players, but also for colleges and their broader missions. While loyal students and alumni have experienced moments of joy and grief as they followed their schools’ progress, and administrators hoped for wins that will increase applications and donations, even more important for the nation is how these colleges enable upward economic mobility for their graduates. 

American higher education is experiencing one of the most challenging times in its history. Since 2017, when The 74 began publishing a Social Mobility Tournament bracket composed of colleges participating in the Big Dance, the percentage of surveyed adults who believe a four-year degree is not worth the cost has risen from 40% to 63%. 

This loss in public support that colleges previously took for granted has made them targets of both left- and right-leaning critics and policymakers. They are demanding that schools take greater responsibility not only for educating students, but for ensuring that the education they receive leads to employment with meaningful earnings.

With this in mind, our bracket aims to shift the focus to the broader mission of higher education: advancing economic mobility. Beginning in 2017, each year we have taken the schools competing in the NCAA Division 1 basketball tournament and plotted them in a parallel bracket, where winners and losers are determined not by their prowess on the court, but by how well the colleges put students on the road to financial security.

To do this, we employ Third Way’s Economic Mobility Index (EMI), created by the former director of the U.S. Department of Education’s College Scorecard, Michael Itzkowitz. This index uses information from the department and the Census Bureau to rank 1,320 bachelor’s degree-granting institutions by how well each provides economic mobility for its students. Taking into account the key concerns of students, parents and policymakers, the EMI first assesses the return on investment for lower- and moderate-income students at each college by calculating the out-of-pocket costs required to earn a four-year degree. 

The index then considers the added financial benefits students gain from attending one of these schools. This earnings premium is the additional income graduates accrue compared to someone with only a high school diploma. In effect, the lower the out-of-pocket costs and the higher the earnings premium, the quicker a student will receive a return on the investment needed to obtain the degree. Lastly, the index rewards schools for the proportion of financially challenged students they enroll and for the return on investment they deliver. (Click on each school in the bracket to see its Social Mobility score, total net price, earning premium and how long it takes graduates to pay off the cost of their education.)

To make this clearer, consider the following: While the Wolverines of the and the Wildcats of the faced each other in this year’s NCAA Final Four, neither school went further than the second round in our Social Mobility Tournament bracket. After all, Michigan had a lowly score of 16.9 in the EMI and Arizona only a slightly higher ranking at 25.1. Digging into the data, this disparity shows the importance of each data point that composes the index’s score.

As a EMI breakdown shows, the University of Arizona, a public institution, has a total price of $41,000 but an earning premium of a mere $23,700 for graduates when compared with someone holding only a high school diploma. This translates into a price-to-earnings premium that allows Wildcat graduates to pay off the cost of their education in 1.7 years. But the University of Michigan enjoys a net price of just $15,850 and a handsome earning premium of $48,800, making it possible for grads to pay down the total cost of their degree in only 0.3 years.

While winning games in a tournament made up of proven champions is a difficult achievement for any college, helping students move up the economic ladder is no less a challenge, especially for schools serving a high percentage of low- and moderate-income undergraduates. That’s why we believe colleges should be honored not only for victories on the court, but also for earning a high ranking in the Economic Mobility Index.

So, which teams deserve the highest praise this year? Of the 68 teams in the Social Mobility Tournament bracket, only 16 are private universities, and just six of them advanced past the first round. Moreover, by the end of Round 2, just a single private school, , managed not only to reach our Sweet 16, but, as it did last year, to go on to win our Social Mobility Tournament.

The main surprise here is that any private school could go that far, considering that the EMI is based primarily on affordability — how quickly the cost of a degree can be repaid — and the percentage of students enrolled who require financial aid. Therefore, beyond producing winning teams that can be invited to the NCAA tournament, private colleges must be inexpensive and serve a wide range of students to move up the Social Mobility Bracket. 

Given these requirements, how did BYU win it all? Though the Cougars were beaten by the in the first round of the NCAA Tournament, they earned their 33rd straight bid by having a 23-12 season in which they defeated eight teams ranked among the Associated Press’ Top 25. In addition, have a price-to-earnings premium that permits them to pay down the cost of their degree in less than a year, a feat made possible through low tuition and generous financial aid. Meanwhile, the school serves a student body in which nearly 37% of students receive Pell Grants.

How about the other three teams that make up our Final Four? How did they get there? The , and all have high EMI scores of at least 35%, giving them rankings that place them in the top 104 out of 1,320 colleges in the index. This translates into graduates who on average can pay down the cost of their degrees in fewer than four years, and all while having student bodies made up of at least 36% Pell Grant recipients. These, then, are excellent examples of schools working to increase the social mobility of their students.

In this highly polarized time, it is good to know that a bipartisan consensus exists around policies that require colleges to do more to help students gain employment with reasonable earnings. This state of affairs supports our nearly decade-long call to praise colleges like those in our Final Four. After all, few athletes will ever make the pros, but all students need to make a decent, family-sustaining living.

Clarification: The Economic Mobility Index is the property of Third Way.

This gap between the American public and students’ experience reveals a college value disconnect highlighted in a new Lumina Foundation and Gallup , The College Reality Check, based on responses from about 4,000 undergraduates and 6,000 graduates.

Let’s start with the public mood.

�Ҳ������ܱ�’s higher education confidence measure shows a steep slide from 2015, when 57% of U.S. adults said they had “a great deal” or “quite a lot” of confidence in colleges and universities, to 36% in 2024. Even with a modest 2025 rebound to about 42%, confidence remains well below the 2015 level.

Yet, here’s what college students say about their day-to-day reality.

The Lumina–Gallup study reports that seven in 10 students say the quality of the education they receive is either “excellent” or “very good,” while 69% feel they belong on campus. Roughly nine in 10 students say their college degree is worth the investment.

Other findings reinforce this pattern. For example, 93% of current associate- and bachelor-degree students say they are at least “very confident” or “confident” that their degree is teaching them career-relevant skills. And 88% believe it will help them secure a job after graduation.

Here are four likely reasons that explain this disconnect.   

First, the surveys are asking two related but different questions: The public is answering questions about the system: Is college affordable? Is it politically biased? Is it worth the debt? Are taxpayers getting value for money?

But students are answering questions about their experience: Do professors know their material? Am I learning? Do I feel respected? Will this help me get a job?

Students can report that courses are strong, professors are committed and the campus is welcoming. But parents worry about the tuition bill. And voters question whether universities are accountable.

Cost and affordability bridge the disconnect: Even students who like college don’t necessarily believe it’s priced fairly. The Lumina–Gallup report finds that only 25% of students say four-year colleges charge fair prices, while a majority say they don’t — though community colleges fare better. The report comments, “students broadly agree that the cost of college is not only unaffordable but even unfair to many hoping to pursue a degree.”

So, students may be satisfied with what they’re learning, while simultaneously believing the bill is too high. The experience ledger and the cost and affordability ledger are not the same. This ambivalence can translate at the public level into declining confidence.

There’s also a behavioral dynamic: When people invest heavily in a decision, they’re less likely to describe it as a mistake. Economists call this the or . Psychologists describe a related phenomenon, , which leads us to align our beliefs with the choices we have made.

College fits this pattern. It isn’t a small purchase but a formative life decision. Students — and families — invest not only tuition dollars but also years of effort and identity in becoming college-educated. It shouldn’t be surprising that many students hesitate to describe that investment as a mistake.

So students distinguish between “college is worth it to me” and “college is fairly priced.” Many believe their education will pay off in career opportunity and personal development, even while acknowledging concerns about cost.

That is less a case of denial than a reflection of ambivalence.

Finally, public opinion is often shaped by the examples that come most easily to mind, what behavioral economists call the . In the case of higher education, those examples are often negative.

Stories of graduates with heavy debt and low wages travel far. Campus controversies dominate cable news and social media. Viral anecdotes about ideological excess or administrative bloat quickly become shorthand for the entire sector.

The typical college experience, however, is far less dramatic. Students attend lectures, complete assignments, form friendships, pursue internships and eventually enter the workforce. Those everyday experiences rarely generate headlines.

The result is reputational drift, a condition where higher education is judged by its most visible outliers rather than by its typical outcomes.

Closing the disconnect between the public viewpoint and the student viewpoint will require clearer evidence about outcomes and visible progress on affordability and opportunity.

If higher education leaders want to close this gap, slogans won’t suffice. What’s needed is clearer signals about value and stronger evidence about outcomes. Here are four suggestions for how to do this.

First, transparency. Institutions should provide clearer information about program-level outcomes such as completion rates, debt levels,and post-graduation earnings, not just institutional averages. Families increasingly want to know what happens in specific majors, not simply the reputation of the college.

Second, cost discipline. Students may value their education, but many doubt that the price reflects its value. Both student and public skepticism will persist unless institutions and policymakers demonstrate credible progress on cost and affordability.

Third, opportunity. Colleges must strengthen the link between education and early-career opportunity through internships, apprenticeships, employer partnerships and the development of the knowledge and skills that translate into workplace opportunity.

Finally, perspective. Policymakers and institutional leaders alike must resist caricature. The national conversation about higher education often swings between two extremes: College is broken or college is indispensable. The reality is more complicated. Most students report positive experiences, while many families remain anxious about cost and value.

For most enrolled students, college is not an ideological battleground or a financial scam. It is a demanding and often rewarding educational experience that they believe will help them build a future.

The public’s declining confidence signals something different. It signals a demand for affordability, accountability, and clearer evidence that higher education delivers value.

Both signals matter. The challenge is to bring them closer together.

If colleges can reduce cost risk, strengthen labor-market relevance, and communicate results more transparently, the reputation of higher education may eventually catch up with the reality many students already report.

Until then, the college disconnect will remain, and may even grow. This outcome isn’t likely to serve students or the nation.

The small office helped the southeast Michigan community college establish better relationships with 21 neighboring school districts and grow its dual enrollment population by 37% over the next three years.

Like Macomb, many of the community colleges and four-year universities in Michigan have put more of their resources toward a fast-growing demographic: high schoolers. As a result, Michigan’s dual enrollment population grew by 16% in 2023-24, with high school juniors and seniors accounting for .

“We knew that we had a lot of potential to grow that population, but really needed to put more intentional focus on it and additional resources,” said Aimee Adamski, director of Enrollment Services at Macomb Community College.

Across the country, via dual enrollment in 2023-24, with an additional 300,000 students receiving both high school and college academic credits for taking courses. Studies show dual enrollment has been found to have on college access, degree attainment, credit accumulation and completion of high school. But, as has found, these benefits could go even further by expanding outreach to underserved high schools and communities.

Although Michigan is keenly focused on for students to earn college credits during high school, it still lags behind its Midwest neighbors, including states like Indiana, where high school students account for more than a quarter of undergraduate enrollment, .

Community college advocates believe one way Michigan could grow dual enrollment even further is by removing the requirement that school districts pay for the courses. Michigan public schools are funded by a yearly foundation allowance provided by the state of $10,050 per student. Currently, the district is obligated to pay for whatever portion of classes a student takes via dual enrollment, creating a heavy financial burden. So if 20% of a student’s classes for the year are through dual enrollment, the school district will pay around $2,000 of that student’s $10,050 foundation allowance toward those dual enrollment courses.

The Michigan Community College Association, Detroit Regional Chamber have recommended the state for dual enrollment programs, such as a designated categorical grant or the state’s postsecondary scholarship fund.

“We have the right ingredients for a really robust dual enrollment participation in Michigan,” Michigan Community College Association President Brandy Johnson said. “The problem is really aligning the fiscal incentives to make sure that K-12 school districts are truly shouting the benefits of dual enrollment from the rooftops without being nervous about how it’s going to impact their bottom line.”

Michigan Department of Education spokesman Ken Coleman said the state wants to expand secondary learning opportunities for all students, including dual enrollment, Advanced Placement, Early Middle College, career and technical education programs and International Baccalaureate. Coleman said the state’s education department is reviewing the MCCA’s report. In the meantime, the state’s Department of Lifelong Education, Advancement, and Potential will focused on improving Michigan’s dual enrollment policies and increasing its participation rates. 

Meetings students’ evolving needs

Dearborn Public Schools has built one of the most robust dual enrollment and early middle college programs in Michigan, with approximately 56% of eligible seniors enrolled in at least one college course. Its unique K-14 model allows students to blend high school and college classes and to graduate in five years with both a high school diploma and associate degree or trade certificate. 

Dearborn’s partnership with neighboring Henry Ford College, for example, opened the door for more than 3,800 students to take nearly 9,000 college classes in 2024-25, Dearborn Executive Director of Student Achievement Diana Shahin said. The district estimated it provided $5.8 million in 2024-25 to pay for dual enrollment and early middle college tuition and books. 

The district works with students as early as middle school to identify possible career paths and provides four different early middle colleges to accommodate specific careers in education and engineering. Shahin said it is important Dearborn Public Schools offer a variety of postsecondary education options because it is competing with neighboring schools for the same pool of students.

“I think the way we understand traditional education as we once knew it feels somewhat antiquated,” Shahin said. “I think students want to be able to accomplish more in a shorter period of time, and they have lots of options at their fingertips in the world. So, school districts are having to compete with the various options and really have to listen to their audience. If we’re not serving our students and changing and being innovative and growing and learning with the technology and with the access to information, then we’re behind.”

Providing incentives

Beyond increased outreach from community colleges and universities, Johnson said high school students have plenty of their own motivation to pursue dual enrollment.

Michigan allows high school students to enroll in up to 10 college classes through dual enrollment. While many students choose to take courses toward an associate’s degree or certificate, Johnson said most of them use the courses to make early progress toward a degree at a four-year university. 

“There is a ton of motivation to take as many courses as they can,” Johnson said. “The truth is, our dual enrollment students are our most successful students. They have higher course completion rates than the general population, and I think that has everything to do with how much incredible support they get from their K-12 settings. They have other teachers, school counselors, principals, coaches and their parents, who typically they still live with, that are cheering them on.”

While listening to families and building partnerships with surrounding districts helps boost interest in dual enrollment, Macomb Community College’s Adamski said it is undeniable that the motivation for high school students to take college classes is financially-driven.

“It can be a really financially supportive way to help a student access and move through those barriers that they might have to higher education — get them that early start and really help launch them toward their career objectives,” she said.

With this in mind, Johnson said she would like to see the cost barriers district schools face removed so students can take full advantage of Michigan’s dual enrollment opportunities.

“At the end of the day, the system we have now is that (public) school districts bear the full cost of dual enrollment out of their per pupil foundation allowance and it’s exactly the disincentive that we think is a reason for why school districts haven’t expanded more,” Johnson said.

Each has implemented at least one of five strategies to boost student participation and success in the subject, according to in its recent report. 

Some, through these efforts, have reduced the need for remediation at the college level. This is particularly relevant for low-income students and those of color, who are more likely to be placed in these noncredit courses, which can derail their college trajectories. 

Concern over the issue has risen in recent years thanks to COVID: More than 900 students at the needed catch-up math classes in the fall of 2025 compared to just 32 five years earlier. And their lack of understanding wasn’t confined to high school: they were missing material they should have mastered in middle and Other universities reported similar problems.  

“Too often we spend a lot of energy discussing the challenges and constraints related to education or redesigning math,” said Shakiyya Bland, Just Equations’ director of educational partnerships. “This report highlights states that are doing the work, showing what’s possible — and showing results.” 

The report recognized efforts in other regions, too. The Virginia Community College System, for example, saw the need for remedial math plummet from 40% of incoming students to 4% between 2014 and 2021 after it changed how it judged college math readiness and how it teaches students who need additional help, Bland said. 

“Instead of a single placement test that pushed huge numbers into noncredit remedial tracks, colleges started using multiple measures like high school GPA and math coursework, expanding access for more students to go straight into college‑level math with added support,” she said. “That shift, from assuming students weren’t ready to assuming they could succeed with the right help, is what drove the big drop in ‘remedial’ placements.”

Just Equations cited five strategies states can implement to align mathematics from high school to college, including course co-design, where secondary and post-secondary instructors unite to craft high school math sequences.  

The organization said, too, universities should have transparent expectations for incoming freshmen so these students know what is expected of them for various college majors. 

Just Equations also touts the value of senior year transition or readiness courses for high school students: These classes, the organization observes, help ensure students can handle the challenge of college-level work. 

States might also offer dual enrollment courses which allow high school students to earn college credit, saving them time and money, Just Equations concluded. They can also work to ensure public universities recognize new high school mathematics offerings so students are properly credited for those classes. 

Georgia redesigned its math pathway through a partnership with K-12 and higher education math teachers to make sure new high school courses aligned with college entry requirements. The state also added several new courses for high school seniors, including Advanced Placement Statistics and Mathematics of Industry and Government. 

California had given students conflicting guidance about how many years of high school math they needed: State law demanded two while school districts often required three and some colleges recommended four. State universities are now more transparent about what is needed for college success in general and in specific majors.

Just Equations notes Tennessee’s efforts date back 18 years when its high school students were first required to complete four years of math, including Algebra II. The state’s mathematics offerings have been reworked numerous times since then and statistics has emerged as a valuable course for many.

Out West, Utah’s dual-enrollment program made college-level classes more accessible and affordable. The state also expanded the range of math pathways for high school students beyond college algebra, a course that relies heavily on algebraic procedures where students often struggle with the material and finding its relevancy.

Students may now opt for quantitative reasoning, focusing on practical numeracy skills such as personal finance and statistical reasoning or introductory statistics, geared toward life sciences, business and social sciences.

Mike Spencer, secondary mathematics specialist for the state board of education, said the change has been helpful to many students who might otherwise be kept out of college by their inability to pass a course that often had no bearing on their major or career aspiration. 

But, he said, students were reluctant to make the switch. 

“When it was first released, we saw a majority of our students were still taking college algebra, partly because of tradition,” Spencer said. “So, we made a significant effort to help inform students, families and counselors to understand why you would go into each of these.”

Just Equations noted, too, Utah’s university professors help craft high school syllabuses, screen high school teachers to teach college-level courses, and “verify grading consistency using common assessments.” It credits these and other changes for a massive increase in the rate of high school seniors completing four years of math, from 28% in 2012 to 87% in 2020. 

Bland of Just Equations said states should routinely bring together K–12, higher education, and workforce leaders to find the best math pathways for students. And, she said, they should invest in sustained professional development and K–16 longitudinal data to track students into the workforce to learn which math experiences best supported their success. 

Five years ago, Oregon adopted new mathematics standards intended to be “more modern and equitable,” moving away from the three-course sequence of Algebra I, geometry and Algebra II to a required two-year core curriculum focused on algebra, geometry and data/statistics. 

Students can now choose a course of study for a required third year — including mathematical modeling, data science and quantitative reasoning — and an optional fourth year. 

The changes required colleges to revisit their stated requirements. The University of Oregon, for example, mandated Algebra II for all incoming students, but now requires three or more years of high school math, which “could be satisfied by any math course with a primary focus on concepts in algebra, calculus, data science, discreet mathematics, geometry, mathematical analysis, probability or statistics.” 

In addition to the five core states at the heart of the study, Just Equations also lauded North Carolina’s automatic enrollment policy, adopted in 2018, which places students who score high on state assessments into advanced mathematics courses for the following year, eliminating subjective recommendations. More than 95% of the state’s eighth-grade students who scored at the highest level were placed in advanced math courses in 2022–23, up from 87% in 2017–18, before the policy was enacted. 

While these states have made noteworthy progress, critics note problems remain. 

A lack of longitudinal data in Tennessee makes it difficult to understand the impact of the changes that have taken shape there, state officials say. 

“One of the goals that I have over the next year or so is to better track the entire arc of the student journey,” said Juliette Biondi, who directs the state’s Seamless Alignment and Integrated Learning Support program, as documented in the report. “I want to understand how they do in their college math classes. Do they struggle? Does it influence graduation rates?”

Utah, too, can also improve: Rural areas find it hard to recruit and retain qualified teachers for college-level courses, leading them to rely on virtual instruction.

And Jo Boaler, the Stanford professor who helped California reshape its math program, said she regularly observes ineffective teaching practices that undermine K-12 learning.

“All I can see is that we have not built conceptual understanding or number sense well by the end of school,” Boaler told The 74. “When I visit classrooms, I still see students going through uninspiring textbook math. Maybe there has been some improvement but I have not heard about it or seen it yet.”

Disclosure: The Gates Foundation provides financial support to Just Equations and The 74.

New international students enrolling at U.S. colleges declined sharply this fall, a concerning development for universities that rely on those students for research, tuition revenue and the diversity they bring to campus culture. It could, however, create more space for U.S. residents at those campuses.

Enrollments of new international students were down 17% compared to fall 2024, according to a report released Monday by the Institute of International Education, which surveyed more than 800 colleges about their fall 2025 enrollments. The institute, a nonprofit organization based in New York, publishes an annual report that examines the enrollment of international students. 

The fall data was not broken down by state, so the scale of decline in California is unclear. At USC, which enrolls more international students than any other California college, overall enrollment of international students is down 3% this fall, according to a campus spokesperson. That includes returning and first-time students, so the drop could be much higher for new arrivals. USC this fall enrolls about 12,000 international students, or 26% of its total student population, according to the college. About half of those students are from China. 

The declines come amid a changing landscape for international students under the Trump administration, which has delayed visa processing, created travel restrictions and pressured some campuses to recruit and admit fewer students from other countries. The colleges surveyed this fall by the institute cited visa application concerns and travel restrictions as top factors in the decline. 

“We are confronting major headwinds with what I would say are poor policy decisions that the administration is taking. And that is creating a climate for international students that signals that you’re not welcome here,” said Fanta Aw, CEO of NAFSA, a nonprofit for international education and exchange.

President Donald Trump has said that he wants to lower the number of international students at U.S. colleges to leave more room at those campuses for U.S. students. “It’s too much because we have Americans that want to go there and to other places, and they can’t go there,” he said earlier this year, referencing the number of international students at Harvard and other universities.

For the full 2024-25 academic year, new international student enrollments were down by 7%, driven by a 15% drop among new international graduate students, compared to 2023-24. However, the number of new undergraduates was up by 5%. Trump took office in January, just before the start of the spring semester at most colleges. 

In the U.S., students from India were the largest group of international students, accounting for 30.8% of all international students, followed by students from China, with 22.6% of enrollments.

In the 2024-25 academic year in California, the largest share of international students were from China, and they made up 35.4% of enrollments, followed by students from India at 20.9%. Overall enrollment of international students in California was down 1.1% in 2024-25. 

USC enrolled the most international students of any California university, followed by four University of California campuses: Berkeley, Los Angeles, San Diego and Irvine. According to the report, the total number of enrolled international students were: 12,020 at Berkeley, 10,769 at UCLA, 10,545 at San Diego, and 7,638 at Irvine.

Across the state, international students make up about 7% of enrollments at four-year colleges, . They make up a large share of graduate students, accounting for 31% of graduate students at UC campuses, 15% at private nonprofit universities, and 12% at California State University campuses. 

Freya Vijay, 20, a third-year student from Canada studying business administration at USC, said she always planned to come to the United States for college. 

“In terms of business and just the economy, you have Wall Street, you have New York, Chicago, L.A., and San Francisco, all these big cities that dominate what’s going on in the world,” she said. “So immediately, in terms of opportunity, my mind was set on the States.” 

In addition to visa and travel restrictions, the Trump administration has directly requested — or threatened, as some have called it — California campuses to limit enrollments of international students. The administration’s compact offer to USC last month would have forced the university to cap international enrollment at 15% for undergraduates and limit enrollment from any one country to 5%.

, which also would have required the university to make a number of other changes, including committing to “transforming or abolishing institutional units that purposefully punish, belittle and even spark violence against conservative ideas.” 

Separately, in a settlement proposal to UCLA, the Trump administration calls on the campus to ensure that “foreign students likely to engage in anti-Western, anti-American, or antisemitic disruptions or harassment” are not admitted. UCLA is still in negotiations with the administration and has not yet reached a deal. The Trump administration has charged the campus with antisemitism and civil rights violations. 

Even amid the turmoil, experts say they expect California universities to continue recruiting international students. Julie Posselt, a professor of education at USC’s Rossier School of Education, noted that at research universities, much of the research is being carried out by international graduate students. 

“Especially in STEM fields, international students are really central to the research functions of universities,” Posselt said. “Enrolling international students is not optional. It is absolutely a part of the fabric of what makes universities great.” 

On top of that, colleges have financial incentives to enroll international students. That’s especially true at UC campuses, which charge international students and students from other states much higher rates of tuition than California residents. In the 2026-27 academic year, new international and out-of-state undergraduates at UC will pay nearly $52,000 in tuition, more than triple what in-state students will be charged. Nonresidents in graduate programs also generally pay higher rates than residents.

Facing pressure from the state Legislature to make more room for California residents, UC in 2017 passed a policy to cap nonresident enrollment at 18%, with a higher percentage allowed for campuses that were already above that mark. But the system still gets significant tuition revenue from nonresidents, including international students, which UC says supports the system’s core operations and helps to lower the cost of attendance for California residents.  

In a Nov. 10 interview with Fox News, Trump seemed to acknowledge the importance of international students, saying colleges might “go out of business” without them.

“You don’t want to cut half of the people, half of the students from all over the world that are coming into our country — destroy our entire university and college system — I don’t want to do that,” he said. 

International students also bring diverse perspectives and “a richness to the campus culture,” said Stett Holbrook, a spokesperson for the University of California system. “That’s something we really appreciate and try to cultivate.”

At USC, the presence of international students from more than 130 countries means there are “innumerable opportunities at USC to encounter different perspectives” and “experience new cultures,” a spokesperson said in a statement. 

Vijay, the USC student from Canada, said she regularly boasts about USC to friends, adding that she hopes attending remains an option for other international students. 

“I always think it’s just such a great opportunity and that no international student should ever take it for granted,” she said. “I wish other internationals could experience it.”

This was originally published on .

The researchers analyzed four decades of data on 7 million first-year college students and found that, since the 1980s, political polarization on college campuses has grown. Schools that traditionally enrolled more liberal students have become even more liberal, while conservative-leaning colleges have become more conservative. These shifts cannot be fully explained by changes in student demographics, academic readiness or state-level political trends, suggesting that enrollment choices and political self-sorting are playing a role. 

To better understand how ideology shapes enrollment, the researchers surveyed 1,028 undergraduates, presenting them with hypothetical colleges that varied in cost, type, location and political leanings of both the schools’ student bodies and the states in which they’re located. Using this experimental design, Acton, Cook and Araya found a strong willingness to pay for political alignment. 

Liberal students were willing to pay $2,617 more to attend a college with fewer conservative classmates, $1,162 more for campuses with more liberal peers and $3,064 more to attend a college in a state with a higher share of Democratic voters.

Conservative students were willing to pay $2,201 more to avoid liberal classmates and $2,720 more for colleges in states with fewer Democratic voters. But conservatives did not show a statistically significant preference for attending schools with more conservative students. Moderates, meanwhile, showed little political preference, though they tended to favor colleges in Democratic-leaning states. 

The research says these results suggest that students are increasingly uncomfortable with political differences on campus. Assuming that survey participants’ stated preferences reflect real-world decision-making, political identity appears to influence college enrollment choices alongside academic and financial considerations — a development with consequences not just for higher education, but for the nation more broadly.  

As the authors note, decreased political diversity on college campuses limits opportunities for students to engage with and be challenged by different perspectives. Exposure to diverse viewpoints has long been considered a core component of the college experience, helping students sharpen their reasoning skills, question assumptions and develop empathy. A more homogenous campus, by contrast, risks reinforcing echo chambers and discouraging the kind of debate upon which democratic societies depend. The Trump administration has criticized colleges for diminishing conservative voices, but as the new study suggests, homogeneity on campus doesn’t run in a single direction. 

Political self-sorting may also reinforce geographic and demographic divides. Political identity is correlated with factors such as race, income and whether students come from urban or rural areas, and these patterns could deepen the divides that already shape where Americans live and learn. And since college experiences strongly influence students’ long-term civic engagement, social networks and political identities, such self-sorting could further entrench polarization. 

“If colleges seek to ensure that students interact with others with opposing views,” the authors write, “our findings imply that they will need to actively work to attract a politically diverse pool of applicants and enrollees.” That is no easy task. As colleges face declining enrollment and intensifying political scrutiny, deliberate steps toward ideological diversity will require both resources — including outreach and recruitment efforts and scholarships — and political resolve. Efforts to promote free expression or diversity of viewpoints are often cast as political statements themselves, and recent federal restrictions on diversity, equity and inclusion programs have made universities more cautious about launching initiatives that touch on identity or representation.

But if colleges are to remain places for open inquiry and civic preparation, campus leaders may need to make a more concerted effort to foster political diversity just as they do with racial, socioeconomic and other forms of representation. Otherwise, the sorting in higher education may further reinforce the social and political divides currently shaping the country.

Stakes are high. that attending an elite college confers big benefits in lifetime income. For example, students who attend an Ivy league school per year than those attending less selective private schools.

As a result, the country’s best schools regularly receive tens of thousands of applications a year and have acceptance rates in the low-to-mid single digits. 

To optimize their chances of being one of the select few, students spend years setting themselves up to have strong college applications. They work diligently to get good grades, cram for standardized tests, labor over college essays and participate in myriad extracurricular activities to show that they are well rounded (or quadruple-down on one to show that they are ). 

Given how hard students work to hone their résumés and applications, it’s striking how many ignore the strategy at play in how to apply. But students make these mistakes — the equivalent of a fumble on the one-yard line — because the market for allocating college slots isn’t well-understood. 

In , I discuss “hidden markets” where allocations are not just based on price and where rules that govern outcomes — and the strategies to maximize success — can be frustratingly opaque. This is true for many markets: everything from markets for hard-to-snag restaurant reservations and live-event tickets to labor markets and dating markets.

And it is true in the market for college admission. Nearly half of students on this market fail to take advantage of applying early to a highly selective college: the easiest way to dramatically increase one’s chance of admission.

of the most popular colleges and universities offer some form of early admissions, allowing students to apply a few months before the regular admission deadline (e.g., on November 1 rather than January 1). “Early decision” comes with a binding commitment: You must agree to matriculate if you are admitted. “Early action” allows you to apply to other schools at the regular admission deadline but often restricts you from applying to any other school early. 

Colleges like admitting students who are very likely to matriculate — or have already committed to doing so — since it improves their yield, the fraction of admitted students who eventually enroll. This rate once entered the calculus of the U.S. News and World Report rankings of colleges and universities. While it’s no longer used that way, it’s still a matter of pride and reputation. People perceive the best schools as the best in part because very few people turn down their offers of admission.

So, schools reward early applicants with a higher chance of admission — often substantially higher. For the incoming class of 2029, Brown University of early decision applicants versus of those who applied at the regular decision deadline. Research has estimated that applying early increases acceptance rates as much as a . Top colleges routinely give away to early applicants.

But while the benefits are large, many applicants do not avail themselves of the opportunity. Analysis conducted by the Common App found that of the 1.5 million students who applied using their application — which serves — did not apply early anywhere. They also found that lower-income students and students from neighborhoods with lower education levels were less likely to take advantage of the chance to apply early. 

Some that lower-income applicants are less likely to apply early because they need to compare financial aid packages before committing to a school. But early action does not require commitment and still gives students an admissions advantage, meaning that even students who are financially constrained can avail themselves of that option. As a result, failing to apply early somewhere is a strategic mistake.

But even the students who do apply early may still fail to do so strategically. Since students who apply early can often only do so to one school, they must be very thoughtful about where to send that application. Many waste it on a dream school that’s unreasonably out of reach.

For many students, that dream school is my employer, the University of Pennsylvania, one of the most selective schools that uses early decision. In a recent year we admitted fewer than 16% of students early and only 6.5% of applicants overall. But while rates of admission are higher if you apply early, doing so will only actually increase your chances if you are close to the admissions cutoff. If a candidate falls well below the school’s high standards, it does not matter whether they apply early: They have no chance of admission either way.

These students should consider applying to a less prestigious school early — one where they are close enough to the admissions threshold that applying early might actually help them get in. 

This strategy, which I call “settling for silver,” may seem counterintuitive, since it requires aiming for something less desirable (e.g., a less-prestigious school that is your second or third choice rather than the dream school you like most). But while counterintuitive, it can be effective when the chance of securing your true first choice is vanishing low. 

Students who have a college they’d be thrilled to get into that might not be their pie-in-the-sky reach school should consider applying early, even if it means foregoing the very long-shot chance at a dream come true. Better to maximize your odds on a silver than to go for gold and end up failing to make the podium.

How can they tell the difference? They can research how their test scores compare to a school’s most recent incoming class, information that is often. They can also ask their guidance counselors or graduates from their high school who were admitted in prior years about their GPAs and test scores.

Thinking strategically is a necessity in markets where you are competing for scarce resources. That’s a lesson students must learn: better for them if they learn it in the next few weeks before early applications are due.

You can make a lot if your bachelor’s degree is in petroleum engineering ($146,000) or pharmaceutical sciences or administration ($145,000) but a lot less if you earn a B.A. in counseling ($55,000) or early childhood education ($51,000), according to the the latest report by the Georgetown University Center on Education and the Workforce.

On the whole, having a bachelor’s degree leads on average, to earning 70% more than just having a high school diploma, reports the center, which has been a leader the last several years in researching which credentials employers are seeking and the return for students who earn them.

People with graduate degrees earn 29% more than those with just a bachelor’s degree.

But there are big differences between fields and degrees at each level.

“Choosing a major has long been one of the most consequential decisions that college students make — and this is particularly true now, when recent college graduates are facing an unusually rocky labor market. Students need to weigh their options carefully,” wrote lead author Catherine Morris.

Speaking broadly, the fields of Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM), business and communications, and healthcare degrees lead to the highest median earnings at their peak. Education, public service, humanities and the arts are as much as $40,000 a year lower.

The report — and the chart to search all 152 majors below — also shows the earning by degree for students right out of college, as well how much earnings increase when a student adds a graduate degree.

How much earnings should factor into a student’s choice of major is another debate. Some believe humanities degrees make people more informed citizens and happier adults. Advocates of some of the lower-paying fields argue that society doesn’t function well without them and that individuals can find meaning in other professions that outweigh paychecks.

Matt Hooper, vice president of communications and membership for the Council on Social Work Education, said the value of social workers to mental and behavioral health, often for children and the elderly, is hard to place a value on.

“You often hear how that pursuit (of social work degrees) was driven by their desire to make a positive difference in their communities and in the world,” Hooper said. “Social work offers inestimable value in that respect.”

As college costs rise, college loan debt cripples some graduates and Georgetown and others provide more and more data on earning potential, students have been shying away from arts to STEM and other higher-paying majors. That’s and families to and pick pursuits with better returns instead.

Humanities degrees earned have fallen a third since 2009, the report shows, while more lucrative degrees in computers, statistics and mathematics have grown by 159%. Those findings are similar to , which has also tracked the growth of engineering, health and medical degrees and the declines in humanities and education degrees.

was originally reported by Chabeli Carrazana of .

Child care is so expensive for parents in college that it often exceeds the cost of their education. For years, one federal program has been helping lower those costs, until this year when the program has faced cuts under the Trump administration.

Now, Democratic lawmakers are leading a push to save it.

House Democratic Whip Katherine Clark and Sen. Tammy Duckworth are reintroducing a bill Thursday to dramatically grow the $80 million Child Care Access Means Parents in School (CCAMPIS) program, which awards four-year grants to about to offer child care to low-income students, the lawmakers shared exclusively with The 19th.

Duckworth and Clark have been reintroducing this legislation for almost a decade, but this year has brought new challenges.

In his 2026 budget, President Donald Trump called for a , saying that “subsidizing child care for parents in college is unaffordable and duplicative.” It’s an effort the president has supported . The House also recommended eliminating the program, and the Senate has suggested maintaining the current level of funding, but a budget has not yet been finalized.

Already, fewer schools are participating this year because the Department of Education decided not to open the application process, so schools that would typically be reapplying for a four-year grant were shut out, experts told The 19th.

Then in August, the department made an unusual move: It notified 13 other colleges that they would no longer be receiving grant funding to run their child care programs, arguing that some of the recipients were teaching toddlers about gender ideology and the concept of race. The decision is part of the administration’s efforts to dismantle diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives, though advocates said what was being taught were simple concepts to help toddlers, who are beginning to understand race and gender.

The Education Department did not respond to The 19th’s questions about cuts in grant funding, but Ellen Keast, a spokesperson for the department, that the “Trump administration will not fund programs that are not in the best interest of the American families they are intended to serve.”

Rescinding more than a dozen grants in the middle of their cycles — impacting schools in California, Florida, Illinois, Maryland, Ohio and other states— has been destabilizing for those programs, experts told The 19th. Edward Conroy, a senior policy manager on the higher education team at New America, a left-leaning think tank, said that schools relied heavily on CCAMPIS funding to operate and that some will likely be closing their on-campus centers when the money runs dry. That could be as soon as this month. The schools were informed just before Labor Day, when some had already begun their school years.

“If you’re on a four-year grant cycle, unless something goes really sideways, you’re expecting those funds to continue for the four years,” Conroy said. “It’s very unusual for them to be ended. It’s even more unusual for them to be ended with essentially no warning.”

Some institutions are appealing, but the future of the federal program is in question.

Clark argued that this all means it’s “even more reason to continue to push” for her bill. But that effort is also likely to face some opposition in the current political climate because Clark and Duckworth are not only suggesting the program continue operating, they want to raise its budget by more than six times what it is now.

The new price tag: $500 million.

More than 3 million college undergrads — 1 in 5 — have children, and about have kids under the age of 6. An estimated of those students are women, many of them and . The largest share of those students are .

The CCAMPIS program, which was established in 1998, targets those low-income students to help them reach graduation. Overall, student parents are about to drop out of college, and only about of single mothers who are students reach graduation within six years.

But in , the cost of center-based infant care exceeds the cost of in-state college tuition.

“There is no reasonable way for someone to be a full-time student, work and also afford child care,” said Elliot Haspel, a national child care expert who has written on the subject. “The math doesn’t math. It can be back breaking, which is why we need parents to access some kind of subsidy.”

The CCAMPIS program not only supports students (those who qualify for the Pell Grant can access the program), but smaller community colleges that don’t have the discretionary funds to operate their own child care programs. Grantees can either establish their own on-campus centers or partner with local facilities. One study at Monroe Community College in New York analyzing data from 2006 to 2014 found that 71 percent of students who used on-campus child care , compared with 42 percent of student parents who did not use on-campus child care.

“It really punches above its own weight in terms of what it can do,” Duckworth told The 19th. “Many of these programs are training centers for students who are getting degrees in early childhood education so it’s a real win, win, win, and it’s a relatively cheap program for what it provides.”

But only a small share of the students who need on-campus child care are being covered by the program as it exists now. A report from the Institute for Women’s Policy Research found that about parents were supported by the program in 2018. An earlier report from the analyzing program data from 2016 to 2017 found some 4,000 children were on waitlists. And because the funds are offered on a sliding scale to students, some only get a covered by the program.

It’s a : Care is too expensive and too hard to find, and those who can’t afford it or find it have to make difficult decisions around whether to care for their kids or continue to work .

“We are asking parents of young children to foot this incredible bill when we need them and it is in the interest of everyone to help them find and be able to afford child care,” Clark, who represents Massachusetts, told The 19th. “It is not only good for families and good for kids, it is really good for our economy.”

By expanding the program and its funding, Clark and Duckworth are hoping it can be better designed to actually support what students need. On-campus child care options declined from 2012 to 2021, according to a report from New America. And though CCAMPIS has been steadily receiving more funding annually, from $15 million in fiscal year 2017 to $75 million in fiscal year 2023, fewer institutions have received grants.

Advocates believe a $500 million price tag would allow the program to better cover the cost of administering child care, cover more students who need it and . New America estimates that expansion would cover .

“The $500 million is based on need and what we are seeing from people who would love to access this program but can’t,” Clark said.

The bill would reauthorize CCAMPIS through 2031 and raise the minimum grant amount in the law’s statute from $30,000 to $75,000  and establish a maximum grant amount: $2 million. It will also require that on-campus child care centers meet either federal or state quality standards, or be accredited by a respected national early childhood accrediting body; grant funds can be used for these quality improvements.

Clark told The 19th the legislation is also about giving smaller colleges the funding they need to more efficiently stand up the infrastructure to establish on-campus care. A higher minimum grant amount is “going to encourage more colleges, more universities to participate in this,” she added.

In prior years, the bill has had Republican co-leads. This year it doesn’t. Still, some Republicans do want to see improvements to the program, including Rep. Nathaniel Moran, from Texas, who has previously to also raise the minimum grant amount and add additional flexibility into the program.

Duckworth said that reintroducing the bill is in some ways about sending a message on priorities, that they are not giving up on improving the program.

“It’s also about getting the word out so colleges in and universities in red districts and red states can speak to their congressmen and their senators and say, ‘Hey, you know what? You should probably sign on to this,” Duckworth said. “There are students everywhere that have children, and they need the help, and so I’m hoping eventually somebody will sign up.”

But the $500 million price tag is likely to be a sticking point at a time when the federal government is looking for areas to cut costs.

Richard Davis Jr., a policy analyst for higher education at New America, said that while increases are badly needed for the program, “there’s still a real fight ahead to sustain funding.”

For American families, child care is a major line item in family budgets for those with young children, yet the Trump administration has not made the issue a priority despite it being one that across the political spectrum would like to see the federal government address.

“Given there is so much talk about a pro-family agenda with the Republican Party, we think there is a really great opportunity for increasing support for children and families in this way,” Davis said.

And, Haspel added, even if the $500 million figure is aspirational for advocates, there is some value in introducing legislation that draws Americans’ attention to efforts that directly address their needs.

“Something like introducing a bill and saying, ‘Hey, we actually want to increase it,’ can help force that conversation,” Haspel said. “Make those who oppose it say why.”

This story was originally published on The 19th.

Six out of 10 parents hope their child will attend college, according to a new survey by Gallup and the Lumina Foundation.

The survey, conducted in June, comes out at a time when the value of a college degree is the subject of public debate.

“We hear all this skepticism of higher education,” said Courtney Brown, vice president of impact and planning for the Lumina Foundation, which advocates for opportunities for learning beyond high school available to all. “We hear the narrative that people don’t value it.” 

Just last month, the results of a Gallup poll showed that confidence in higher education among Americans  over the last decade.

But the results of actually asking what parents want for their own children, Brown said, are striking. This is the first survey that Gallup has specifically asked parents for their views on the topic.

“When it comes down to it, it’s pretty clear that parents hope their children get a college degree,” Brown said.

Brown has found that parents’ biggest concerns about higher education tend to be the cost, whether it leads to a job, or increasingly, whether it is political.

This may explain why community colleges were a popular option among parents who responded. Community colleges tend to have a much lower sticker price than four-year colleges, and there is a greater emphasis on job credentials. Roughly 1 out of 5 parents of varying backgrounds said that they would like to see their child enroll at a community college. 

But there were some notable differences in the survey among parents, depending on their own level of education, but especially their political orientation.

The strongest narratives against higher education come from the Republican Party. That is reflected in the responses, Brown noted.

Greater differences emerged around whether students should enroll in a four-year college immediately after high school; 58% of college graduates and 53% of Democrats preferred sending their children straight to a four-year college, compared to 27% of Republicans and 30% of parents without a college degree.

Republicans are more likely to say that their children should go straight into the workforce or job training or certification, followed by independents and those without a college degree. Other options include taking time off or joining the military. 

But overall, 4 out of 10 parents want to see their child attend a four-year college or university, making it the most popular option by far. This is something that comes up repeatedly in surveys about higher education.

“We see that people value four-year [degrees],” Brown said. “We see that people have trouble accessing it and have some concerns about the system, but they do greatly value it.”

The survey also measured the preferences of non-parents. It asked respondents to think about a child in their life, whether a nephew or niece, grandchild or family friend under 18 who has not graduated from high school. Responses were remarkably similar: 55% said they wanted this child to attend either a four-year or two-year college, compared to 59% of parents.

This was originally published by .

“Then, if I want to go to college, I can do it later.”

Buffington is representative of a growing number of young people, especially , who are eschewing a college degree for alternatives, such as apprenticeships, entrepreneurship, and microcredentialing. While overall college enrollment numbers have roughly rebounded to pre-pandemic levels, surveys indicate that more of today’s high schoolers are valuing on-the-job training over a traditional four-year college degree. Polls also show that Americans overall have soured on higher education in recent years, with only 36% saying in a recent that they have a “great deal/quite a lot” of confidence in the sector, compared to 57% in 2015. 

Connor Boyack isn’t surprised. He is the new president of , a decade-old apprenticeship preparation and placement program that his free-market organization, the Libertas Network, acquired last month. Boyack believes the future of postsecondary pathways lies in creating more opportunities for teenagers and young adults to explore their interests and gain career-related skills and knowledge outside of a conventional college classroom. Boyack’s 2019 book, Skipping College (to which I was a contributor), offered strategies and suggestions for finding personal satisfaction and career fulfillment without higher education. “Since then, the problem has worsened,” Boyack told me, explaining that mounting debt, changing economic realities, and higher education’s perceived progressive ideological leanings is prompting more young people to forgo a college diploma. 

“There have never been more reasons and more opportunities to build a successful life without spending the time, money, and mental energy pursuing that piece of paper,” Boyack said.

Buffington says both he and his friends are seizing these opportunities to gain on-the-job work experience immediately after high school by reaching out to local business owners, who have been enthusiastic about hiring them. They start with a part-time apprenticeship role and join the company full-time after high school graduation. Mike Harris, who owns Cardigan Mechanical where Buffington works, says there are ample opportunities for young people to gain job skills and explore different career paths through apprenticeships. “I would love to hire more ambitious apprentices like Chase,” said Harris, who has an engineering degree from Vanderbilt University but says he wishes he had discovered the trades earlier on in his career. “College is one path but there are so many more options. I think kids today see that and are being more thoughtful about what they want their life and work to look like.” He also encourages parents to support their children in considering the trades and related occupations.

In her new book, , Kathleen deLaski looks more closely at the college alternatives currently available and why more students are interested in them. She says debt is the biggest reason, but young people are also more eager for practical, “just-in-time-learning” options connected more closely with career possibilities. 

A senior advisor to the Project on Workforce at Harvard University, and an adjunct professor at George Mason University, deLaski is a strong proponent of higher education, as well as high-quality alternatives. She urges colleges and universities to explore creative ways to be more responsive to the needs and interests of students. “Some colleges are creating ‘micropathways’ that provide a six month fast track to professional employment,” said deLaski, adding that workplaces also need to adapt. “Employers beyond the trades need to consider apprenticeship and they need to provide certifications in a broader number of fields so that learners can demonstrate skills mastery without a degree.”

As colleges and universities, as well as employers, respond to the changing preferences of a young workforce, a college degree can become one of many meaningful options to career success and individual satisfaction. Buffington, whose parents both have Bachelor’s degrees, holds open the possibility of going to college in the future if he thinks it is necessary. 

For now, though, he says he loves his apprenticeship work and hopes more people his age will research the wide range of pathways to adulthood, including but not limited to college. “I would say if you’re confused or pondering what you want to do, the trades are a great thing that you can try out,” he said. “It’s risk- and pretty much money-free, and you can very easily start working with a company and learn a skill. You can find out if you do or don’t like it, and then make a further decision.”

Nearly half of Texas high school students who earn college credits are Hispanic, study says

Nearly half of all public high school students in Texas who earn college credits before they graduate are Hispanic, a new study found. That makes Texas a national leader in closing the gap between Hispanic and non-Hispanic students who participate in dual credit programs.

Hispanic students in dual credit classes, however, graduate from college at a lower rate compared to peers who were also in those programs, underscoring the need to strengthen the transition from high school to college for students of color.

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“We both have to focus on equalizing access to dual credit and providing dual credit students with the supports they need to go to college and complete college,” John Fink, a researcher with the Community College Research Center, said.

The Community College Research Center used National Student Clearinghouse data to look at high school juniors and seniors in 2015 who were enrolled in a dual credit course and in their first four years out of high school. Researchers selected that particular group of students to study the long term effects of dual credit on educational attainment. The researchers said it’s the first of its kind to break down dual credit outcomes by race, socioeconomic status and age by state.

The study found Black student participation, meanwhile, has lagged behind. Black students made up 8% of dual credit programs in the state, compared to 13% of Texas high school enrollment, according to a report on dual credit released Tuesday.

When Texas students made plans after high school, about half of dual enrollment students returned to the community college where they took dual credit classes for at least one term, according to the report’s findings.

The number of dual-credit students in Texas and around the country has ballooned in the past 10 years. Education leaders have seen dual credit programs as a way to encourage students to pursue higher education by giving them a chance to familiarize themselves with a college environment in high school. Earning college credit while still in high school has been linked to a higher educational attainment.

Texas legislators even changed to incentivize dual credit last year. Community colleges now get more money when high school students earn at least 15 college credit hours on their campuses. As part of the new funding system, state lawmakers also created the Financial Aid for Swift Transfer, or FAST, program, which gives community colleges extra money if they to low-income students who qualify for free and reduced price lunch.

In the past year alone, dual credit participation has grown at record numbers, with about 250,000 students taking advantage of the FAST program to take dual credit classes at no cost, Sarah Keyton, the interim commissioner of the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board, said in testimony in front of the Senate Higher Education Committee last month.

The Texas Tribune partners with Open Campus on higher education coverage.

This article originally appeared in at . The Texas Tribune is a member-supported, nonpartisan newsroom informing and engaging Texans on state politics and policy. Learn more at texastribune.org.

COLUMBIA — Fewer high schoolers enrolled in or applied for college this fall, even though the graduation rate for the Class of 2024 was slightly better than last year, according to data released Tuesday.

Overall, that grade public schools contained few surprises, teachers’ advocates said.

That’s not good news, as schools’ ratings still reflect low test scores and high absence rates statewide.

“There’s very little movement at all,” said Sherry East, president of the South Carolina Education Association. “I’m not seeing much ‘Oh, wow,’ or ‘Oh, yikes,’ either.”

The number of schools at the highest and lowest ends of the spectrum decreased.

This year, 230 schools — 18% — were considered excellent, down from 278, or 22.5%, last year.

At the same time, 47 schools — just 4% — were rated unsatisfactory, the lowest of five rankings. That’s down from 60 last year, according to the data jointly released by the state Department of Education and the independent Education Oversight Committee.

It is good news that fewer schools fell in the bottom tier, said Patrick Kelly with the Palmetto State Teachers Association.

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“I tend to look more toward underachieving schools,” Kelly said. “I don’t want any student in South Carolina to attend a school that’s underachieving.”

Education officials pointed to Pinecrest Elementary School in Greenwood, where they held a news conference releasing the report cards, as an example of a school doing well despite difficult circumstances.

Pinecrest Elementary, where 87% of students live in poverty, scored an “excellent” rating overall, along with top scores in academic performance and student progress.

“While the road ahead is challenging, we remain optimistic as the performance of schools like Pinecrest Elementary demonstrate that academic improvement is achievable,” April Allen, chair of the Education Oversight Committee, said at the school.

College and career readiness

The percentage of students who graduated on time (four years after entering ninth grade) improved slightly to 85% — 1.6 percentage points better than last year. Still, less than a third of all high school seniors were considered ready for both the workforce and college, according to the data.

“We want to ensure that our students are adequately prepared for life after graduation,” Allen said.

In South Carolina, all 11th graders take a career-readiness assessment of skills commonly needed for jobs. It tests four areas: Math, reading, understanding data (such as correctly interpreting graphics), and so-called “soft skills,” which is basically knowing how to act professionally, be dependable and work well with others.

Students receive scores of 1 to 5. The higher the score, the more jobs and career fields they’re ready to pursue.

But that score alone may not mean much, Kelly said, since “some students go through the motions” when it comes to that test.

Nearly 70% of students in the Class of 2024 were considered ready for a career.

That means they received at least a 3 on the career-readiness assessment, earned a technical education certificate, completed a , or scored well enough on the Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery (commonly known as the ASVAB) to qualify to enlist in the military.

That was up from 61% last year.

At the same time, the percentage of students enrolling in and applying for college decreased from last year. Nearly 55% of students who graduated in the spring started this semester in a two- or four-year college, compared with 63% of last year’s graduates attending college in fall 2023.

And 61% applied for college, compared to 64% of the Class of 2023. About 4,530 fewer students completed a Free Application for Federal Student Aid, which determines how much state and federal aid a student’s eligible to receive.

Statewide, the percentage of graduates considered ready for college was 32.5%, essentially unchanged from last year. That reflects students’ scores on the ACT or SAT college entrance exam, whether they earned college credit through a dual-enrollment course, or scored high enough on end-of-course Advanced Placement tests to earn college credit.

The numbers suggest students can graduate high school without actually being prepared for the workforce or college, East said.

“We made sure our graduation rates are where they need to be, even if we’re just passing (students) along,” she said.

Students who fail tests or entire classes are more often offered alternatives, which are sometimes easier than the original class. That enables them to graduate, boosting schools’ graduation rates, without preparing students for any sort of career, East and Kelly said.

Offering second chances for struggling students “is not a bad thing,” Kelly said.

“But there are too many instances where the second chance is not as aligned with the rigor or expectations of the first chance,” he said.

Chronic absences

The rate of students who miss 10% of the school year — 18 days or more, when considering the state’s required 180 days of instruction — remains a concern for education leaders, Allen said.

Nearly 23% of students were considered chronically absent last school year, according to the data.

The more often students miss class, the less likely they are to earn scores on end-of-year standardized tests showing they’re reading for the next grade, the oversight committee heard Monday.

“It makes sense: If students aren’t in school, it is unlikely that they are going to stay on track for success,” Allen said.

Test scores

Report cards for elementary and middle schools are based on performance on end-of-year standardized tests. About 54% of third- through eighth-grade students statewide showed they could read on grade level, while 43% could meet math expectations for their grade.

High school report cards factored in students’ end-of-course tests in English 2 (usually taken by sophomores) and Algebra I (often taken by freshman). Two-thirds of students passed the English test, while less than half of algebra students scored at least a 70 (a C).

“Students are struggling in math, and as a state, we want to provide schools, teachers and students the tools and resources they need to improve,” Allen said in a statement.

State Superintendent Ellen Weaver credited the Palmetto Literacy Project with improving reading scores. Since 2019, the state budget has provided the agency up to $14 million annually to hire reading specialists, train teachers and provide more resources to schools with particularly low scores.

Officials are hoping for a similar outcome from the new Palmetto Math Project, which was funded with $10 million in this year’s state budget to hire math tutors, buy textbooks, and improve training for teachers at the lowest-scoring schools.

“Improving math proficiency must also be an urgent, parallel priority to ensure that all students are fully prepared for future success,” Weaver said in a news release. “The department’s newly launched Palmetto Math Project is positioned to do just that.”

is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. SC Daily Gazette maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Seanna Adcox for questions: info@scdailygazette.com. Follow SC Daily Gazette on and .

Many college students don’t have enough time for their studies. This “,” as we call it, is often due to inadequate child care access or the need to work to pay for college and living expenses.

While issues have plagued the federal government’s revamp of the application for student aid, West Virginia’s higher education leaders say help from Gov. Jim Justice and the state Legislature have caused the state to be much better off than others.

The 2024-2025 Free Application for Federal Student Aid forms debuted in January, than it’s typically available.

In April, over , allowing West Virginia students to bypass filling out the form and still be eligible for state school aid including the Promise Scholarship and the Higher Education Grant Program.

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In addition to the state of emergency, redirecting about $83.2 million from the state’s rainy day fund to the state Higher Education Policy Commission to be distributed to college-bound students for the fall college 2024 semester.

“By having the flexibility to make these adjustments, we have been able to alleviate student concerns about being able to afford to go to college this fall,” said Jessica Tice, senior director of communication for the state HECP. “We look forward to seeing final enrollment and award numbers in the coming months.”

The commission awarded funding through the Higher Education Grant Program to 43 ,510 students for the 2024-25 school year, up from 31,867 students awarded in the 2023-2024 year, Tice said. She added that the commission does not anticipate that every student who was awarded funding will use it.

In addition, 30 students who qualified for the Promise Scholarship but did not have a current FAFSA on file were awarded the scholarship as a direct result of the change, she said.

As of Monday, 63,291 West Virginia students had completed the FAFSA, Tice said.

Tice said the additional funding from the Legislature allowed the HEPC to increase the amount of the grant award from $3,300 last year to $6,800 this year.

“This is an unprecedented one-time amount for students who have financial need,” Tice said.

Also, the HEPC provided funding to institutions to allow them to provide $2,000 College Access Grants to students with more need, she said.

Tice said the concerns about the 2024-2025 FAFSA form are largely at the colleges and university level now. The federal Department of Education recently announced that colleges and universities won’t be able to submit batch corrections to files for aid this cycle, which will put a burden on the institutions, she said.

West Virginia University is receiving and processing the 2024-25 FAFSA and disbursements are on schedule, said April Kaull, executive director of communications. The first day of classes at WVU is Aug. 21.

“We want students and their families to know that they should apply for federal or state aid for fall 2024,” Kaull said. “If they’ve put it off or become frustrated and thrown in the towel, we can help. It is not too late to get financial aid in place for a successful start to the fall semester.”

Tice said higher education officials are concerned about the rollout of the 2025-2026 FAFSA form, which is expected to be

“As we continue working at the state level to do everything we can to award students state aid despite their FAFSA status, we are very concerned about the impact of another delay,” Tice said. “The FAFSA allows students to maximize their financial aid beyond state programs, and we want all of our students — especially those with financial need — to be able to access all of the funding they are eligible to receive.”

is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. West Virginia Watch maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Leann Ray for questions: info@westvirginiawatch.com. Follow West Virginia Watch on and .

“There are clear priorities that overwhelming numbers of Americans on both sides of the aisle can support,” said James Lane, CEO of PDK International, a professional organization for educators that administers the annual survey. “If I were a candidate for any office at the federal level, I would want to know those things that have broad support because they’re likely to have an opportunity for success.” 

But beyond those narrow avenues of agreement, the country is separated by large partisan differences on issues from student mental health to paying for college. Eighty-six percent of Democrats want the next administration to focus on mental health and college affordability, compared with less than two-thirds of Republicans.

American voters also vary widely on their views of Washington’s role in education. Former President Donald Trump says he would dismantle the U.S. Department of Education, push for universal private school choice and expect schools to promote patriotism, according to his . On the Democratic side, Vice President Kamala Harris would push for more “stringent guardrails” on charter schools, revive an effort to pass and expand the to provide up to $6,000 for families with a newborn. 

Less than half of Americans — 45% — approve of how the Biden administration has handled education policy, the same they gave former President Donald Trump in 2020. But less than a third say they’d trust Trump on education if he’s elected again in November. Their views on a potential Harris-Walz administration are unclear — the poll was conducted before the disastrous debate that sparked President Joe Biden’s departure from the race. 

Lane, who served as acting assistant secretary for elementary and secondary education at the U.S. Department of Education in the Biden administration before joining PDK last year, declined to comment on the president’s education track record. Attitudes toward the candidates might have shifted slightly if the poll had been conducted after Harris became the nominee, he said, but views on the major issues likely wouldn’t have changed much. 

The large partisan gaps are surprising given that many issues “don’t really have a straightforward partisan connotation,” said David Houston, an education professor at George Mason University. Public pre-K, for example, has long held bipartisan support at the state level, but a federal role in expanding access is a much higher priority for Democrats than Republicans, 71% and 48% respectively. 

The poll also shows that 54% of Americans overall — and 70% of public school parents — say education will play an extremely or very important role in the upcoming presidential election. But Houston is skeptical. 

“I would be surprised if education was the top-of-mind issue that would be deciding those votes,” he said. That could change, he said, if the race is really close. “Anything that moves the vote count a fraction of a percent matters in a head-to-head race.”

Across the sample of over 1,000 participants, there are also striking differences in responses by race. Support for a greater focus on helping students catch up in school, addressing mental health and reducing college costs is roughly 20% higher among Blacks than whites. 

The largest gap is on the issue of protecting students from discrimination, with 87% of Black respondents saying they want more attention paid to civil rights, compared to 51% of whites. Hispanic and Black Americans were nearly tied on wanting the next administration to strengthen access to public pre-K — 66% and 67% respectively — but just half of white respondents viewed it as a priority.

The Trump platform doesn’t mention early learning, but a for his potential second term, released by the conservative Heritage Foundation, would eliminate Head Start, the federally funded program for low-income families. While for 3- and 4-year-olds remains a plank in the Democratic platform, Biden was not able to win Congressional support for the issue when he ran on it in 2020.

Views on charters

Charter school expansion was the only issue where less than half of Americans — 35% — want an expanded federal role. Surprisingly, just half of Republicans called it a priority, perhaps reflecting the party’s increasing shift toward education savings accounts, which allow parents to pay for private school tuition or homeschooling costs with public funds.

“[GOP] interest in charter schools has really petered out, compared to their heyday in the 2010s,” Houston said. “The school choice wing of the party has its energies focused elsewhere.”

Among Democrats, who often accuse such schools of siphoning students from traditional outlets, less than a quarter wanted more federal attention on charter expansion.

Enrollment trends tell a different story, said Sonia Park, executive director of the Diverse Charter Schools Coalition, a network that encourages socioeconomic and racial diversity. Charters overall have seen continued growth — a 2% increase last year, — during a time when the student population in district schools was flat or declining. 

“Parents want quality public school choice, regardless of where they are, and charters are part of that,” she said.

Democrats promise to pick up where the Biden administration left off on charter policy. According to the 2024 , additional federal funding for charter expansions or renewals would hinge on whether local districts determine they “systematically underserve the neediest students” — a change that goes beyond restrictions the Biden administration adopted in 2022. 

‘Harrowing’ results on teaching

With Harris’s selection of Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, a former high school teacher, as her running mate, education is likely to get frequent attention during the fall campaign. But Lane, with PDK, wants to hear specific plans to address ongoing in the teaching workforce. Relief funds that allowed districts to hire more staff will soon expire, a reality that already contributed to a wave of . Some districts are still starting the school year with , and another shows just 16% of teachers would recommend the profession to their friends.

For the first time, the survey also asked the public about AI in education, a subject that often generates mixed reactions. Over 60% of Americans support AI for tutoring, test preparation and lesson planning. But only 43% favored students relying on AI for help with homework.

In keeping with its focus on teaching, PDK International routinely includes a question in its poll that asks parents whether they’d support their children going into education. The organization runs , a nationwide program that aims to get middle and high school students interested in the profession.

Just four in 10 parents say they’d like to see one of their children become a teacher — a significant drop from the three-fourths of parents who favored that choice when the question was first asked in 1969. The primary reason: low pay. 

​​”We’re going to have to address salaries,” Lane said. “The fact that 60% of folks wouldn’t even recommend a teaching career to their own children is harrowing, considering the needs that we have.”

Even after the exams and papers are done, students at New Hampshire’s community colleges have sometimes faced another headache: credit transfers.

Across the state’s public higher education systems, not all completed courses at a community college are helpful for a given degree at a public four-year college or university. A student pursuing an engineering degree, for instance, might learn too late that the algebra-based physics course they took in community college is less useful toward their four-year degree than a calculus-based course.

It can be a vexing problem, requiring a student to pay for credits they didn’t think they needed.

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“The large private online college in Manchester will take everything,” said Stephen Appleby, director of educator support and higher education at the New Hampshire Department of Education, referring to Southern New Hampshire University. “So how do our public colleges compete when they’re turning away credits and one of their competitors is accepting every credit?”

College administrators have been working in recent years to strengthen those course pathways and eliminate confusion. But it’s one of several processes state officials say need to be improved to take on a growing problem for state-run colleges: Costs are too high and not enough students are attending.

New Hampshire colleges continue to face . High school graduating classes continue to shrink on average. And annual enrollment across New Hampshire state-run colleges and universities has fallen from 31,307 students in 2019 to 27,056 in 2023.

This year, public colleges and universities are being pressed into action. Gov. Chris Sununu signed a law July 12, , requiring the University System of New Hampshire and the Community College System of New Hampshire to follow from a task force convened by the governor last year.

The main objective: increasing consolidation.

The task force had 90 days to try to increase enrollment and decrease costs, and it came away with a clear conclusion. New Hampshire’s public colleges and universities and its community colleges will need to combine resources and scale back in the coming years.

The school systems are not merging – lawmakers , proposed by Sununu in 2021, after pushback from faculty of the community college system who feared layoffs. But they are coordinating, officials say.

A push toward alignment

Enrollment challenges are not unique to the Granite State. Nationwide, colleges are closing at a rate of one per week, according to Appleby. “We think that’s going to continue to accelerate the next few years,” he said.

But while areas of the country such as Florida, Texas, and Arizona are growing, enrollment problems are particularly acute in the Northeast and Midwest. “We’re not high-growth areas of the country, and our populations are aging,” Appleby said.

Some states are already choosing to consolidate. Alaska, Connecticut, Pennsylvania, and Vermont are among the states that have tried a similar approach with their state-run community colleges and higher education institutions.

Those states “have gone down this road of saying, ‘Okay, we can’t sustain cost and enrollments,’” Appleby said.

Now it’s New Hampshire’s turn, Appleby and others say. Working with a Boulder, Colorado-based organization known as the National Center for Higher Education Management Systems, the New Hampshire task force came up with a number of recommendations to carry out the idea – some that would require funding and legislative approval and others that could be done more quickly.

In the short-term category, the committee recommended that the two systems align their credits so community college students can transfer more of their coursework into the four-year colleges and universities. They suggested a fast-tracked admissions process where community college students with a certain GPA could automatically enroll in a USNH college. They also proposed a similar process where a high school student with a certain GPA could easily enter a community college.

Other ideas included recruiting employers who agree to help graduates with loan repayments if they are hired, and consolidating the entire community college system into one entity with one accreditation.

Among the longer-term ideas: further merging the community college and public higher education system under one chancellor and one governing board; eliminating duplicate courses between the two systems to reduce competition; and expanding online instruction.

Different challenges, advantages

Though aligned on the goal of boosting enrollment, the problems for the university system and community college system are different.

For the University System of New Hampshire, whose colleges include the University of New Hampshire, Plymouth State University, and Keene State College, the problem is existential: Fewer students are going to high school in New Hampshire, and fewer high school graduates are going into college.

Beyond the basic demographic challenges accompanying more than 20 years of dropping K-12 enrollment, young adults are concerned about cost and debt, and are gravitating toward online options or alternative career paths, noted Catherine Provencher, chancellor of the University System of New Hampshire, in an interview.

The result is that colleges – both public and private – are not only competing against each other for students but also attempting to sell students on the concept of college itself. Provencher said USNH is largely working to stabilize its student population now, about 50 percent of whom are from out of state.

“Increasing enrollment in this environment? That might not be realistic,” she said.

In contrast, the community college system may be better poised to adapt to toughening economic conditions, noted Mark Rubinstein, the chancellor of the CCSNH and a member of the task force, in an interview.

Community colleges are less dependent on high school graduates and cater more to working adults, who may be more likely to seek higher education training during downturns. And community colleges, which are less residential-based, can meet students’ needs geographically, allowing them to maintain families and jobs outside of classes.

“Part of the way that we’re envisioning the future is that with technology changing, with industries changing, with the circumstances in individual people’s lives causing them to want to alter directions, we anticipate that although the number of 18-year-olds can only grow as fast as as the number of newborns arise, that the number of adults who will need education and will want to pursue new pathways is likely to grow significantly,” Rubinstein said.

Many of the consolidation moves are centered around defensive actions to stop state-run colleges and universities from losing more money, Appleby says. While the University System of New Hampshire has for in-state students for the past six years, administrative costs have continued to climb. Finding savings will allow USNH to hold off on future tuition hikes and maintain financial aid options even as expenses grow.

‘Clear pathways’

Administrators aren’t just trying to stanch the financial bleeding. They’re also trying to build enthusiasm.

One approach is by increasing industry involvement with the colleges. “If I’m a high schooler, a young adult, and I know that if I go through this program at Manchester Community College or at Keene State (College) and then on the other end is a job waiting for me it makes it a lot more likely I’m going to go through the program,” said Appleby.

Clear roadmaps for community college students thinking about four-year college could help too, officials say. Following a law passed in 2022, USNH and CCSNH have coordinated to develop 50 different ”transfer pathways” for community college students, according to a report to lawmakers this month.

Those pathways delineate exactly which community college courses they should sign up for in order to have the smoothest transition to their intended bachelor’s degree if they choose to transfer to a four-year college. A student interested in working in the biotechnology industry, for instance, could follow one of the pathways to enroll in the exact community college chemistry, microbiology, and physics courses they need to finish the degree seamlessly at the University of New Hampshire.

Another tactic is to streamline the college-going experience for students – even before they reach adulthood. That’s where the “Early College At Your High School” program comes in. Previously known as “Running Start,” the program allows high school students to take college courses in high school, allowing them to obtain credits and cut down on costs later on. For students, two courses are free; subsequent courses are $150 each.

“There may be a whole cohort of students in high school right now that haven’t thought about going to college,” said Provencher. “But if we can have clear pathways for students and joint communication … there are opportunities for those students to get some credits in high school, maybe get a lot of credits in high school, go on to the community college system, and then go on to the university system.”

is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. New Hampshire Bulletin maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Dana Wormald for questions: info@newhampshirebulletin.com. Follow New Hampshire Bulletin on and .

Benjamin Gregory, a former community college student, managed to graduate with an associate degree and transfer to a four-year school despite the challenges of enrolling as an older student.

And for Loren Van Tilburg, earning a four-year degree came to a halt when he left college and started his own automobile business.

From financial concerns to questioning the need of a four-year degree, Jennifer, Benjamin and Loren represent many students who were left unprepared to make their college decisions as the path to earn a four-year degree continues to be riddled with barriers.

“If you have some understanding of what you want to make of yourself and you have a plan to apply your skills, leaving college can be the best thing for you,” said Loren, who like many of his peers has had a growing interest in immediate employment and apathy for a four-year education.

Here are the experiences that led to Jennifer, Benjamin and Loren’s college decisions:

Jennifer Toledo, 19

Northwest Vista College

Growing up in Mexico, Jennifer always wanted to live in the U.S. and finally got her chance when she moved to San Antonio, Texas by herself when she was 15 years old.

But there were challenges — including when her high school stopped offering ESL classes — forcing her to learn English and complete schoolwork on her own.

“It was hard,” Jennifer told The 74. “I was using the translator on my computer [because] I didn’t know how to say anything.”

But Jennifer’s experience changed when she took an education class in high school and the teacher helped her learn English.

Intending to join the U.S. Navy post-high school, Jennifer’s teacher encouraged her to enroll in classes at Northwest Vista College instead.

Today, Jennifer has earned her associate degree in teaching and will transfer to The University of Texas at San Antonio in the fall.

Her goal is to earn a bachelor’s degree in bilingual education so she can teach the ESL classes she was unable to receive as a high school student.

“I really want to help students,” Jennifer said. “I want to be that teacher who speaks and teaches them English.”

But Jennifer said navigating her transfer experience was “stressful” because she was balancing her studies with working part-time at a local middle school.

“At some point, I wanted to quit [and] go back to Mexico to stay with my family because of the stress,” Jennifer said.

Jennifer attributes the counseling offered at her community college as one of the support systems that helped her stay afloat.

“I needed help, I needed someone to listen to me and tell me ‘you’re okay, everything’s going to be fine,’” Jennifer said.

Her hope for other students is that they don’t allow their inability to speak English to hinder their higher education goals.

“I want to demonstrate to my family, and to everyone, that it’s possible,” Jennifer said. “I want to be an inspiration for them so they know there’s no limit to what they can do.”

Benjamin Gregory, 27

The University of Texas at San Antonio

Benjamin graduated high school in 2014 and enrolled at Texas A&M University where he majored in aerospace engineering.

But he was more focused on getting a “PhD in partying” and left school after a semester to join the workforce.

He spent three years working as a Target employee followed by one year as a mall security guard — where a physical altercation with a thief altered his life.

“Being a security guard was such a terrible experience for me because I hate being mean to people,” Benjamin told The 74. “I got reprimanded for laying my hands on someone who on the [security footage] obviously attacked me and I ended up quitting my job.”

His parents encouraged him to “give college another shot.”

“This path working an hourly job as a security guard and as a retail worker wasn’t for me. I really didn’t like doing it, but it was just something I had to do to live, pay for food and rent and all that,” Benjamin said. “I just wanted a clean slate.”

In 2019, Benjamin enrolled at Northwest Vista College and eventually transferred to The University of Texas at San Antonio where he majored in mechanical engineering.

“I went from working a job where I didn’t really have to do anything besides walk around a mall…to having homework again,” Benjamin said, adding how grateful he was to have a second chance to take courses in what he is truly passionate about.

But navigating college as an older student without a paycheck came with challenges — most notably how to pay tuition on top of his other bills, including car payments and credit card debt.

“I didn’t know if I was actually going to be able to stick with it the whole time,” Benjamin said. “But fortunately enrolling in community college first was significantly cheaper and a lot more relaxed because [professors] know there’s other things outside of school that students have to worry about.”

Enrolling in community college first offered him a better transition back into higher education, he added.

“The class sizes were so much smaller so you could get to know your professor very easily,” Benjamin said. “And they don’t really do research at a community college so they were a lot more excited to show up to class than a lot of professors you will meet in a university.”

Benjamin recently graduated with his bachelor’s degree and will continue his studies at The University of Texas at San Antonio — but instead of a “PhD in partying” he’ll be working towards a doctorate in chemical engineering.

“I know that classes can sometimes suck…but I’ve been in the workforce without a degree and I know that sucked a lot more,” Benjamin said. 

“I’m thankful to my community college for the professional development and helping me be a more open person,” he said. “It was one of the best experiences of my life.”

Loren Van Tilburg, 19

University of La Verne

Loren originally enrolled at the University of La Verne and majored in economics, but quickly grew disinterested in his studies.

After his first year, Loren made the decision to leave his four-year school and get a job.

He experimented with a few ways to earn income — from day trading to dropshipping — but found his real passion was taking care of cars.

In 2023, Loren started a car detailing business which involves traveling to his clients’ home to clean and repair their vehicles.

“I won’t sugarcoat it, the decision was very difficult,” Loren told The 74. “But at the end of the day, I knew that I wanted to start a business and I wouldn’t need a degree for it.”

While balancing his budding business, he also began working with a brokerage firm to become a financial advisor, which involves studying for a securities license he aims to complete by the end of the year.

Loren’s desire for on-the-job training and trade certification compared to a four-year degree reflects the mindset of a growing number of young students.

“I’ve always wanted to do something like this because managing money makes money,” Loren said, adding that many of his coworkers had similar educational pathways.

“It’s a cool environment to be in,” Loren said. “So if anyone chooses the path that I chose, it’s really good to find a community of people that made similar life choices because they will understand where you’re coming from and your struggles.”

For Loren, leaving his four-year school was the best decision he could make for himself despite initial pushback from his parents. 

“There have been ups and downs, but I definitely don’t regret my decision,” Loren said.

“For me, if I have to resort to going back to school then I failed,” he added. “I’m not saying if you go to college you’re a failure, but I chose this path for myself so if I go back then I kind of just wasted all this time.”

This article is part of a series in partnership with reporter Joshua Bay’s highlighting the struggles of community college students.

Now, with the start of the next financial aid season less than three months away, the U.S. Department of Education won’t promise it can avoid a repeat.

The department is “working toward” opening the Free Application for Federal Student Aid on time and ensuring “a smooth experience,” a spokesperson told The 74, but dismissed last week’s bipartisan vote by the House education committee to legally enforce an Oct. 1 start as an unhelpful “political stunt.”

comes as financial aid officials are dealing with another delay hindering some students from receiving final aid packages for the fall. The complications have also deterred others from even applying for assistance. Completion rates remain below last year’s rate, suggesting enrollment will stay down this fall.

“Are we going to close the gap? It would be a really herculean effort,” said Bill DeBaun, senior director for data and strategic initiatives at the National College Attainment Network, an organization of college access organizations. Summer, he said, isn’t typically FAFSA season. But even increasing the rate by 3 or 4 percentage points would mean “tens of thousands of additional” students receiving funds for college. 

Members of Congress say forcing the department to release next year’s FAFSA on Oct. 1 will avoid the confusion and chaos that families and colleges endured this year. “Establishing a hard deadline … will provide students, families and schools with much needed clarity and stability,” Republican Rep. Virginia Foxx of North Carolina, who chairs the House education committee, said before the July 10 vote.

Six Democrats on the committee who voted against the bill argued that Congress didn’t provide to help the department make the switch and predicted it could lead to even more errors. 

“I want FAFSA to work; we all want FAFSA to work,” said Virginia Rep. Bobby Scott, the ranking Democrat on the committee. “What we don’t want is for the department to rush to meet arbitrary deadlines and push out a FAFSA form once again that has the same technical problems.”

‘A lot of anxiety’

Schools that predominantly serve students whose parents are not U.S. citizens — the population most harmed by the FAFSA overhaul — have been especially stressed.

“It’s been a rollercoaster,” said Ingrid Fragoso, a counselor at KIPP Austin Collegiate in Texas. Only about 10% of the charter school’s students have parents with social security numbers. The redesign first blocked them from completing the form and then required  to submit it. “In the beginning, there was a lot of anxiety around how to help our students.”

At the peak of the chaos, in February and March, the counseling team phoned the department daily to troubleshoot issues for families. While waiting on hold, the counselors used a detailed grid of each senior’s schedule to quickly grab students from class when a department staffer came on the line. For parents with limited English skills, they held practice sessions prior to calls. Now, all 91 students going to four-year schools have received aid packages.

Some counselors and higher education officials say they’re beginning to see the streamlined FAFSA’s potential.

“I feel a lot better about where we’re at than I did a few weeks ago,” said Karen Krause, the executive director of financial aid at the University of Texas at Arlington. The FAFSA completion rate is up 4% compared to last year, bucking and national trends, and the staff was able to begin distributing aid offers in April — ahead of many other . “I do think it’s going to be a better process for students and families.”

When FAFSA works, it works quickly — sometimes in less than 10 minutes. Students and parents who have submitted the forms, she said, keep asking, “Is that all?” The education department also kept to conduct fewer reviews of students’ forms. At UT Arlington, that number dropped dramatically, from over 5,300 last year to under 200, Krause said. 

At the same time, her staff is grappling with a new setback — a backlog of corrections the department . Those revisions ultimately affect how much money colleges can offer students, especially those whose financial circumstances changed since they first applied.

“Say a family member loses a job or there are medical expenses,” explained Jill Desjean, director of policy analysis at the National Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators. In those cases, schools might issue a new offer to make tuition more affordable, but those figures won’t be official until the education department approves them. 

Currently, colleges can only one at a time.

“It’s manual and it’s way more work,” Desjean said. 

But they can’t submit them in bulk until next month, a time when students are usually preparing to register for classes and move into dorms. 

‘Answers for kids’ 

If higher education officials feel any sense of relief after such a stormy season, it’s partly because of their own work to ensure families don’t pay the price for FAFSA’s botched implementation. UT Arlington, for one, has waived late fees for students still waiting on federal aid and isn’t dropping them from summer classes if they can’t make tuition payments, Krause said.

West Virginia Gov. Jim Justice declared a state of emergency over FAFSA, allowing students to apply for state aid without completing the federal form. The move made 17,000 students eligible for merit- or need-based aid, according to a state higher education commission.

And at the University of Florida, Mary Parker, vice president for enrollment management, created a special that offers low-income students up to $15,000 to tide them over until their federal aid comes through. If they end up qualifying for less federal aid than the scholarship covers, they won’t have to make up the difference.

That short-term fix impressed one university official who understands the strain on families with first-time college students.

“It will not be perfect, but [Parker] had enough in her budget to eat the cost of the margin of error. It was more important to prioritize first-generation students,” said Penny Schwinn, the former Tennessee education commissioner who now serves as vice president for the university’s “pre-K to pre-bachelors” initiatives. “K-12 and states are wrestling with this, and it was a really proud moment to see my colleague find innovative and immediate answers for kids.”

But colleges are taking risks when they use their own funds to lower tuition costs for students, said Desjean, with the National Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators.

“Not all schools can afford to front their own money while waiting for the federal dollars,” she said. “But it’s great to see that those who are able are doing what they can to minimize harm to students.”

With college costs rising and some students and families questioning the return on investment of a four-year degree, a few pioneering state universities are exploring programs that would grant certain bachelor’s degrees in three years.

The programs, which also are being tried at some private schools, would require 90 credits instead of the traditional 120 for a bachelor’s degree, and wouldn’t require summer classes or studying over breaks. In some cases, the degrees would be designed to fit industry needs.

Indiana recently enacted legislation calling for all state universities there to offer by next year at least one bachelor’s degree program that could be completed in three years, and to look into whether more could be implemented. The Utah System of Higher Education has tasked state universities with developing three-year programs under a new Bachelor of Applied Studies degree, which would still need approval by accreditation boards.

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More than a dozen public and private universities are participating in a pilot collaboration called the College-in-3 Exchange, to begin considering how they could offer three-year programs. The public universities include the College of New Jersey, Portland State University, Southern Utah University, the Universities of Minnesota at Rochester and at Morris, the University of Wisconsin Oshkosh and Utah Tech University.

Proponents of the three-year degree programs say they save students money and set them on a faster track to their working life. But detractors, including some faculty, say they shortchange students, particularly if they later change their minds on what career path they want to follow.

The Utah Board of Higher Education in March approved the new three-year degree category. Various areas of study would be tied to specific industry needs, with fewer electives required. These degrees are broader than two-year associate degrees, but narrower than a full four-year bachelor’s.

“We told the institutions to start working on them now and developing the curriculum,” Geoff Landward, commissioner of the Utah System of Higher Education, said in an interview. “Also, we want them to find industry partners that would be willing to hire people with bachelor’s degrees of this type.”

He added: “We created a sandbox for our institutions to play in.”

Once created, individual programs would need both national accreditation and state Board of Higher Education approval.

Landward said he has taken note of criticism that the three-year programs might “cheapen” the bachelor’s degree by shortchanging students who wouldn’t receive a broad college education. But he said students could save on tuition, get a head start in the workforce and meet the needs of industries that are looking for certain skilled workers to address shortages in the state.

That includes nursing, he said, where requiring a four-year degree means taking lots of electives that have nothing to do with the career.

Utah State University’s current , for example, suggests several electives along with the required anatomy, math and biology courses as prerequisites during freshman and sophomore years.

“We think if we are partnering with industry and they help us develop it, I don’t think it cheapens the degree,” Landward said. “I think it creates a very specific degree.”

Robert Zemsky, a University of Pennsylvania professor and founding director of the university’s Institute for Research on Higher Education, began proselytizing for the three-year college movement about a dozen years ago.

He said the idea has gotten traction recently because “we are wading in the deep waters of righteous anger” at colleges and universities because of the perception that four-year degrees are not worth their high costs.

A Pew Research Center released last week found only 1 in 4 American adults said it is extremely or very important to have a four-year college degree as a means to getting a good-paying job. Only 22% of the respondents said the cost is worth getting a four-year degree even if the student or their family has to take out loans.

Zemsky suggested that a shorter time span also would lead to higher college completion rates. More than a third of students who began seeking a bachelor’s degree in fall 2014 at a four-year school failed to complete their education at the same institution in six years, the National Center for Education Statistics.

Zemsky said 27 colleges and universities have embarked on creating three-year pilot programs and predicted 100 would be doing so in another year.

Over the past 10 years, Zemsky said, schools have been ignoring the desires of students and instead creating their curricula around the preferences of faculty — which is where most of the opposition is coming from.

Last year, at a conference of the Association of Pennsylvania State College and University Faculties, a bargaining unit for professors, President Kenneth Mash said the overwhelming number of college faculty nationwide “have a visceral disdain for the idea.”

In an interview with Stateline, he said three-year programs would hurt students too, creating a “two-tiered” system under which wealthy students would get a full four-year education and lower-income students a cheapened three-year degree.

“If it’s not going to be a four-year degree, they should name it something that indicates it’s not a B.A.,” said Mash, who also is a political science at East Stroudsburg University. “We don’t know that employers will treat them the same.

“I’m on board, as most faculty are, with the notion that people want to increase their job opportunities. But that’s not all there is to a college degree,” he said. “Degrees prepare you to be a better citizen, a better parent, and on and on.”

And he said a broad education is what makes it possible for students to change jobs and careers many times during their working lives. “It’s really that baking in liberal arts … that makes it possible for people to do different things in their lifetimes.”

Indiana’s new law

Indiana enacted a in March that requires each public institution that offers bachelor’s degrees to review all the four-year degrees with an eye toward making some of them three years. And the law requires that by July 1, 2025, each state university offer at least one bachelor’s degree that can be completed in three years.

Indiana state Sen. Jean Leising, a Republican who sponsored the measure, pointed out that every extra year of college costs the students, their parents and the state.

But she noted that not all degrees lend themselves to compressed curricula. “If you’ve got a kid in pharmacy [studies], they are not going to be able to get through it in three years. Engineers aren’t going to be able to do it in three years. But some of the other kids will.”

Chris Lowery, Indiana’s commissioner for higher education, said the law will encourage schools to think about how to create 90-credit-hour bachelor’s degrees: “How feasible is this, would you still have the quality, would you still have the agency?”

Three-year degrees allow for choice, he added. His daughter, for example, had enough AP credits after high school to make a college degree feasible in three years, but opted to go to school for four, because she wanted to have enough time to study so that she could get “straight As” as well as to have time for extracurricular activities.

“But for a lot of students, the finances are tighter,” he acknowledged.

Credentialing requirements

At both public and private universities, the new three-year degree programs that require fewer credits would need national accreditation.

The Northwest Commission on Colleges and Universities, a regional credentialing agency, several three-year bachelor’s degrees at two private schools, Brigham Young University-Idaho and Ensign College, last year. The degrees are in applied business management, family and human services, software development, applied health and professional studies.

Sonny Ramaswamy, the commission’s president, said in an interview that the three-year programs underwent two years of evaluation before being awarded accreditation.

He said the evaluation showed that competency in many professions could be attained in three years instead of four, and that graduate schools were willing to accept three-year bachelor’s as a credential for the pursuit of higher degrees. He noted that European college degrees often are completed in three years.

“We said, ‘We will approve you, but this is a pilot,’” Ramaswamy said. The schools will provide data to show their students have earned a good education, he added.

“My intuition is that it will head in the right direction,” he said. “The public is calling for innovation.”

Michael Poliakoff, president of the American Council of Trustees and Alumni, a nonprofit organization that says its mission is promoting academic freedom, excellence and accountability at colleges and universities, said “fluff” courses strengthen the case against a 120-credit hour bachelor’s degree.

“Let people get a good foundation with a strong general education core, strong skills and some electives,” Poliakoff said in an interview. “That’s what a responsible university should be doing.”

The council does an annual of higher education institutions and grades them A through F on what the group calls “core curricula” — the proportion of courses dedicated to mathematics, literature, composition, economics, laboratory science, American history and government, and foreign languages.

Poliakoff said the amount of debt students are accumulating over four years is “sinful” and unnecessary. Colleges and universities must meet the concerns of students and their families, he said.

“A 90-credit baccalaureate degree is a pretty good way to tighten up the bolts,” he said.

is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Stateline maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Scott S. Greenberger for questions: info@stateline.org. Follow Stateline on and .