The cost of higher education is a major headache for people, even years after graduation. A program in Washington State aims to make borrowing for college a little easier.
State lawmakers passed a measure this year that will establish a 1% interest rate student loan program. It will start with a one-time investment of $150 million from the state, after an actuary has analyzed the plan.
The bill’s sponsor, State Rep. Pat Sullivan — D-Covington — said the state had a big budget surplus this year.
“We had a decent amount of one-time money,” Sullivan said, “and I really thought putting it in a student loan account for 1% student loans made perfect sense. Timing was everything. simply perfect.”
The state had a $15 billion surplus to work with in the 2022 session.
Most Republicans voted against the legislation, saying the money should have gone back to Washingtonians through tax breaks.
Washingtonians owe an average of about $33,000 in student debt, according to the Student Loan Hero website. Sullivans said debt burdens people long after they leave college.
“Interest rates are too high,” Sullivan said. “You have graduates unable to take out a loan even for a car in some cases, and buying a home is out of reach given how much debt they are graduating with.”
The Biden administration is considering forgiving some of people’s student debt — possibly up to $10,000.
Sullivan – who is also the majority leader at the State House – said it was great, but his 1% loan scheme is about helping students get ahead.
“It will help a lot of students, but that’s in the future,” Sullivan said, “and so until the federal government can come up with a better solution for students, they’ll continue to go into debt.”
A report on how the program might work in the long term and what level of funding it might need is due on the governor’s desk on Dec. 1.
Support for this report was provided by Lumina Foundation.
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Higher education experts are promoting a new way to rank colleges and universities, offering an Economic Mobility Index (EMI) to measure whether the school is creating a pathway to the middle class, instead of traditional rankings.
The non-profit think tank Third Way released its EMI rankings this spring, and California State University-Los Angeles and California State University-Dominguez Hills took the top two spots in the United States, along with California State Universities in Bakersfield, Stanislaus, Fresno and San Bernardino in the top 10.
Nicole Siegel, assistant director of education for Third Way, said this is because they provide the greatest return on investment for the greatest number of students.
“The reality is that selectivity and historical prestige have long been prioritized over student achievement,” Siegel argued. “But if the primary goal of post-secondary education is supposed to be to catalyze increased economic mobility for students, we need to elevate the schools that are actually successful in achieving that goal.”
The top 10 schools in EMI are all Hispanic-Serving Institutions (HSIs), where Hispanics make up at least 25% of the student body. Some highly selective schools such as Harvard also offer a large increase in earning potential, but they serve very few low-income students.
Research by the Excelencia in Education group showed that in the United States, 559 schools qualify as HSI and 66% of Hispanic students are grouped in 18% of schools.
Alam Hasson, acting vice provost at Fresno State University, said one of the secrets to their success is a personal approach to student retention.
“When we admit a student, we commit to doing everything we can to make sure they do as well as possible,” Hasson said. “And every student is different.”
The school with the highest percentage of Hispanic students in the state, at 92%, is Imperial Valley College. Schools with the highest number of Hispanic students include East Los Angeles College, California State University-Fullerton, California State University-Northridge, and University of California Riverside.
Support for this report was provided by Lumina Foundation.
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A University of Michigan is seeking to make it easier to earn a bachelor’s degree after attending community college by removing barriers to access, such as artificial limits on transfer credits.
Wayne State University in Detroit puts all transfer students on equal footing by accepting all credits earned through applied, technical, or professional studies, including community colleges.
Mark Kornbluh is provost and senior vice president for academic affairs at Wayne State. He noted that the average family income at Wayne is lower than at most other colleges and universities in Michigan.
“It’s kind of ingrained in our DNA,” Kornbluh said, “that we support students who have drive and interest, but who come with fewer resources to begin with. So partnering with community colleges is really important there because it cuts the cost for college degrees significantly.”
Kornbluh previously said that students can only transfer 12 vocational training credits, like training to become an EMT, for example. But some of these programs require 60 credits or more.
He said removing this artificial boundary will allow these students to pursue studies such as public health.
Ahmad Ezzeddine is the Vice President of University Student Affairs and Global Engagement with Wayne State. He said this policy will help people who may have started a degree or diploma, but change their minds and choose to pursue a bachelor’s degree.
He added that collaboration with teachers for the program is essential.
“The intention of this initiative is not to compromise the quality, integrity or rigor of our programs,” Ezzeddine said, “but to remove what we sometimes think are artificial barriers and allow students to pursue and progress towards their degree”.
More than 40% of undergraduate students nationwide begin their postsecondary education at community colleges, and at Wayne State, approximately 45% of the student body are transfer students.
Ezzeddine said he hopes these credit transfer changes will remove barriers for even more students.
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Illinois is taking steps to increase higher education opportunities for people across the state.
Gov. JB Pritzker signed two higher education bills into law on Tuesday. One will create new support staff to help students find and secure financial aid, and the other will require schools to create equity plans to remove barriers for students from underrepresented communities.
Emily Goldman, senior policy officer for the Partnership for College Completion, said the measures will help students stay enrolled once they enter college.
“These bills are really about ensuring that students in Illinois have access to the resources they need, to access and persist in college,” Goldman explained.
The Illinois Council on Higher Education (IBHE) reports that total enrollment at public universities in the state increased from 2019 to the most recent academic year, although the total number of enrollment for undergraduate students has fallen slightly.
Black student enrollment at public universities in Illinois is also down just over 1% from the 2020-2021 school year, according to the IBHE. Goldman pointed out that the declines are at least partly due to rising tuition fees, which she attributes to a decades-long trend of underfunding public universities.
“While we’ve seen that cost increases in universities and colleges have leveled off since 2015,” Goldman noted. “The affordability of a college education is perhaps still the biggest barrier for many students.”
According to a report by Goldman’s organization, black and Latino students in Illinois have been routinely barred from public universities in the state as tuition nearly quadrupled from 1999 to 2018.
The state reports that overall college enrollment among black students, including at for-profit and out-of-state schools, has dropped about 40% over the past decade.
Support for this report was provided by Lumina Foundation.
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