Education and education access are directly connected to economic growth. Despite the dysfunction in Congress, especially over border issues and foreign aid, there are key education bills that can provide not only solutions for the issues they address but also models for getting things done across a range of other issues.

Two pieces of legislation that could improve our economic future by advancing education and workforce development passed the Committee on Education and the Workforce a few weeks ago with broad and bipartisan support, demonstrating that consensus is not only possible and practical but achievable.

The success of these bipartisan solutions could break down walls of division and better the lives of our nation’s students while bolstering our cities’ economies.

In mid-December, the committee approved the Bipartisan Workforce Pell Act, with support from both Republican Chairwoman Virginia Foxx and ranking Democratic member Bobby Scott, who co-sponsored the legislation.

The bill would expand Pell Grants to provide needed tuition assistance for short-term education and training directly linked to career opportunities, easing the costs of attaining the education and skills that all students, and especially low-income students, desperately need.

The bill would also fund access to online learning, further cutting costs and making education more flexible and accessible.  A vast array of students across red and blue states would benefit from the bill’s commonsense approach, as would our community colleges, employers and, by extension, all Americans.

Related: ‘August surprise’: That college scholarship you earned might not count

That same House Committee voted, a bit earlier, also with bipartisan support, to reauthorize the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act. This legislation includes federal funding to support education and skills-based training directly connected to career opportunities and economic success.

This too will directly impact our nation’s community colleges, which are the key engines of economic mobility.

Under the bill, existing Labor Department funding could be repurposed to provide eligible workers with individual, customized education and training accounts, leading to improved career opportunities.

The bill would also specifically address the education and training needs of our incarcerated youth by providing them with the education and skills needed to ease their transition into a stable future. And it would add accountability provisions to ensure that spending for education will lead to concrete job growth. Like the Pell legislation, the bill has broad support among education and business leaders.

Passing short-term Pell along with passing workforce and education legislation would provide a clear pathway from high schools to colleges and careers, ensuring a brighter future for millions of students across the nation.

Both pieces of legislation could potentially pass the House and the Senate and be signed into law early in the New Year. 

Smart investments in Education can be both the answer to governmental gridlock and spur economic progress.

Of course, as is usually the case with legislation that clears committee hurdles, the bills contain small flaws that demand fixes. 

For example, in the Pell bill, one item that could derail passage in the full House and Senate and set back the nation’s commitment to social mobility for students is a provision calling for a reduction in student loan eligibility for students at some of the most selective colleges. Another flaw is that the legislation could open the door to abuse by predatory for-profit colleges. These parts of the plan can easily be fixed to ensure passage.

Passing short-term Pell and workforce and education legislation would provide a clear pathway from high schools to colleges and careers, ensuring a brighter future for millions of students across the nation. 

Related: OPINION: It’s time to put the brakes on student debt and give more students a shot at higher education

We’ve seen bipartisan support deliver dynamic education and economic growth before, most recently when Democrats and Republicans in both the House and the Senate united behind Democratic Senator Chuck Schumer’s CHIPS and Science Act.

That act mobilized efforts to restore American leadership in the semiconductor industry while creating good-paying jobs and reducing the cost of automobiles, refrigerators and computers.

The CHIPS and Science Act, with bipartisan support, also included a huge investment in education research, and became a model for the progress that can be achieved when parties come together to better the lives of the people.   

Now is the time for more bipartisan progress. Passage of these two critical education bills would be a fine start, fueling job creation and bettering the skills and future incomes of our nation’s students, who need our support now more than ever. And the bills’ passage would provide a model for how to eliminate gridlock and address our core economic challenges in a positive manner.

Most polling suggests that the top-of-mind topics for most Americans are the proverbial “kitchen table issues,” led by the economy and its effect on working-class Americans.

These bills address those issues. Americans with the education and skills to be employed in growing industries will earn higher wages, and the increased tax revenues from those wages will support our nation’s schools at all levels. And these bills’ prioritization of our community colleges will help them become an even stronger engine for jump-starting and sustaining America’s growth.

In recent years, it’s begun to seem that dysfunction is the one thing that Washington can be reliably counted on to provide. But let’s not simply accept that Congress can no longer come together to support initiatives that meet our needs and provide enhanced opportunities.

For many years, education issues have divided Americans; these core education bills can unite us. They deserve prompt action.

Stanley Litow served as deputy chancellor of schools for New York City and as president of the IBM Foundation. He now serves as adjunct professor at Columbia University and as trustee of the State University of New York where he chairs the Academic Affairs Committee.

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To Florina Caprita, the mother of three young children, the paralegal studies program at Ashworth College seemed like the perfect route to a much-needed career. The classes were entirely online, and an admissions officer told her she could make small monthly payments toward the $4,465 tuition while she was taking classes, instead of having to pay it all at once.

But in 2018, a family emergency forced her out of school, just six credits shy of her degree. To make matters worse, she fell behind on her monthly payments, which had steadily increased from $25 to more than $200.

She struggled financially for several years as her health declined, but last spring, she got an opportunity to earn a degree at a different college. The problem? Ashworth, a for-profit school in Georgia, refused to release her transcript until she paid – in full – the more than $2,200 that she owed them.

This practice, known as transcript withholding, has become a growing worry for state and federal regulators. Critics say that it makes it harder for students to earn a degree or get a job, which would allow them to earn enough to pay back their debts. But the system of oversight is patchwork; no single federal agency bans it, state rules vary and there are significant challenges with monitoring the practice. That means students like Caprita can fall through the cracks.

In October, the Department of Education released new rules that would bar colleges from withholding a transcript for any semester for which a student used federal student aid money and paid their balance in full. The move was lauded by advocates as a huge step forward in eradicating the practice – but would not apply to any of the thousands of schools that don’t accept federal student aid to begin with, including Ashworth College.

Experts have long criticized authorities for not providing better oversight of these schools.

“Some of these schools exist that way because they would never qualify, and that’s usually because they provide very low value to students, unfortunately,” said Edward Conroy, a senior policy advisor at the progressive think tank New America. “Not in all cases, but a lot of these programs are not lifting people out of poverty, they’re not providing a route to middle class jobs or middle-class income, and so I think sometimes they’re of questionable value.”

Unlike the Department of Education, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau does have jurisdiction over colleges that don’t qualify to receive federal money. And in the past year, the agency has begun investigating colleges for refusing to release transcripts because of a loan balance owed directly to the school.

“If they help me, I can help to pay them. If they withhold [the transcript] from me, then I how can I ever pay them?”

Florina Caprita, who has an outstanding loan from an online for-profit university

In 2022, the agency found that transcript withholding was an abusive practice under the Consumer Protection Act, “designed to gain leverage over borrowers and coerce them into making payments.”

The CFPB has adopted a broad definition of what a student loan is. They include in that category things like payment plans, arguing that those are essentially forms of credit. Money owed for things like unpaid room and board balances or overdue fines, however, is not covered. 

By their definition, Caprita should have been eligible to access her transcript. But she says she called and emailed the college repeatedly to no avail. She even asked to re-enroll in a new payment plan but college officials said their hands were tied and she would have to take up the matter with a collection agency.

“If they help me, I can help to pay them,” said Caprita, who is 44 years old and is hoping to join a Christian ministry. “If they withhold it from me, then I how can I ever pay them?”

Ashworth College did not respond to requests for comment.

A CFPB official acknowledged that it’s impossible to examine the policies of all of the thousands of colleges and universities across the country. The bureau has tried to make enough public statements for institutions to take note and change their policies without additional intervention, the official said. The agency has investigated some colleges for transcript withholding and made them change their practices but has not released any institution names publicly.

The education department’s rule on transcript withholding will go into effect in July 2024, joining other federal and state regulations meant to protect students from transcript withholding.

An education department spokesperson said that the agency plans to adjust its oversight procedures to ensure that schools that receive federal funding are following new regulations and that all student complaints alleging transcript withholding are investigated. Schools may eventually lose eligibility to receive federal student aid if they don’t comply with the new rule.

“It wouldn’t completely surprise me if one of the institutional reactions was, ‘We’re just going to stop doing this, period.’ ” 

Edward Conroy, senior policy advisor, New America

Despite the fact that the regulation only applies to students who have used federal money to pay for their education, advocates hope that colleges will respond in a broader way.

“It wouldn’t completely surprise me if one of the institutional reactions was, ‘We’re just going to stop doing this period,’ ” Conroy said. “The number of students who are paying completely out of pocket isn’t that big; you don’t want to have separate administrative systems.” 

Indeed, that’s what some policymakers have seen happen at the state level. Some states have only banned the practice at public institutions or for debts of up to a certain amount. In other cases, schools are only required to release transcripts for certain uses.

For instance, in 2022, Colorado passed a law prohibiting withholding transcripts from students requesting them for several reasons including needing to provide it to an employer, another college or the military. Carl Einhaus, a senior director at the Colorado Department of Education says that most institutions found it too burdensome to differentiate between which transcript requests were required by law to be honored and which weren’t and have opted to grant all requests.

“They’re not going to bother trying to figure out how to operationalize this very difficult thing to operationalize,” he said.

Starting next summer, the Colorado law also requires institutions to submit data about how many students requested transcripts and how many were withheld. Einhaus said that some schools initially resisted the new law, arguing that it would take away one of their main tools to recover money owed from students. “It will be interesting to see if this really is having an impact on the amount of debt they’re able to collect back,” he said.

But Brittany Pearce, a program manager at the higher ed consulting firm Ithaka S+R, is skeptical that withholding transcripts was ever an effective way to recoup debt. “From a really practical business sense, nobody is winning,” she said.

Correction: This story has been updated to remove the description of Ashworth as unaccredited. It is accredited by the Distance Education Accrediting Commission. 

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When I became a mom, I thought my dream of teaching would have to remain just that: a dream.

Juggling single parenthood was a full-time job in and of itself. I didn’t have the support or resources to pursue the path to becoming a teacher, even though I thought I could be a great one and it was what I so desperately wanted to do.

Barriers to entering the profession are too high.

To become a teacher in California you have to study for, pay for and pass a slew of standardized tests. Then you have to earn your certification through an accredited program involving more tests, classes and student teaching. And then, if you’ve passed all your classes and tests and pay tens of thousands of dollars, maybe you can finally enter the classroom.

How does someone who is already a parent, and not wealthy, manage to do all that?

I am a better teacher because I am a parent, and a better parent because I am a teacher.

I’m fortunate that I found a program that broke down those barriers to entry. I’m now earning my teaching credential through a low-cost program that allows me to work full-time in a classroom; I will graduate debt-free.

With a national teacher shortage looming, it’s time to support students by creating more programs like mine and easier pathways into the classroom for parents.

Related: To fight teacher shortages, schools turn to custodians, bus drivers and aides

Here are some ideas about how we can make the teaching profession more attainable for parents:

1. Pay higher salaries. It’s no secret that being a parent comes with challenges — often financial ones. The average debt load for experienced educators is $56,500. We need to increase pay and make teaching a financially viable profession.
2. Prioritize flexibility in teacher prep programs. My teacher prep program is called TeachStart, and as one of their fellows I receive paid study days. This means that parents like me working toward credentials can study while our children are in school or daycare so we don’t have to give up precious time in the evenings or on weekends.
3. Personal support. TeachStart also provides me with a designated in-house mentor, so I have a point person for questions or concerns and to celebrate personal and professional wins with. TeachStart has also created scheduled times for me to lesson plan and collect my bearings at the beginning and end of each day.
4. Utilize skills parents bring to the table. Years of motherhood can translate directly into classroom skills. My son has made me a better listener. Parenthood is a two-way street: You grow with your child just as they grow with you. Teaching is no different. As a single parent, I bring empathy, understanding and dedication to the classroom. My experience as a mother has allowed me to connect with students and families on a deeper level, fostering a sense of trust and partnership. I appreciate the pivotal role parental involvement plays in a child’s education and actively work to bridge the gap between home and school lives. And I take pride in listening to and learning from my students. We can take these lessons and skills that parents have learned through their experience raising children and allow them to utilize them in the classroom. Our students will be better for it.

Related: OPINION: To solve teacher shortages, let’s open pathways for immigrants so they can become educators and role models

Furthermore, increasing the number of parents leading classrooms could be a key to reducing teacher turnover. Parents who have earned certification have already proven their strength and dedication, which will help them remain in the classroom and, in turn, help improve student achievement.

I want other parents like me to know that with the proper support, they too can pursue a career that fulfills them and makes them better parents along the way.

Being a parent has equipped me with a unique perspective and a deep understanding of the challenges that families of all backgrounds face. I am always learning.

When I ask my son at the end of the day what he learned in school, he knows to ask me the same. I am a better teacher because I am a parent, and a better parent because I am a teacher.

All aspiring educators deserve the same opportunities that brought me to the classroom. If legislators, teacher prep programs and school leaders can commit to breaking down barriers to entry for future teachers, we will all benefit.

Katie Dillard is a TeachStart fellow. She teaches middle school English at Samuel Jackman Middle School in Sacramento.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

The goal is simple: graduate students.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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When the Covid-19 pandemic hit Northeastern Ohio, it was the National Guardsmen and women who stepped up to save the day. They were deployed to emergency food distribution sites, ran massive vaccine clinics, and even filled in at county jails when there were staffing shortages

These are people who have jobs outside the military, but who report to training one weekend per month and two weeks per year, even in the most uneventful of times. When there is a crisis or disaster, these are the people who drop everything else to serve their communities.

These are people who David Merriman, the director of Cuyahoga County’s Department of Health and Human Services, respects immensely. So when the opportunity arose for the county to help them earn college degrees by offering personalized college coaching, he was eager to support it.

Members of the Ohio National Guard already have access to full college scholarships, but many still don’t graduate. Only about 19 percent of  the state’s National Guard members (about 3,000 of 16,000 total members) have earned a bachelor’s degree or higher, compared to 22 percent of all National Guard members and about 37 percent of the total U.S. adult population, according to the most recent data from the military and U.S. Census Bureau.

Getting through college as an adult can be a near insurmountable challenge, even without National Guard responsibilities. Often, adult students have jobs and family caretaking responsibilities. They frequently face financial challenges that result in housing, transportation or food insecurity. School is squeezed into whatever space is left in their lives. 

“There’s no cookie cutter intervention here. If there was, we’d be doing it.”

David Merriman, the director of health and human services in Cuyahoga County

Now, Ohio National Guard members who live in or attend college in Cuyahoga County can receive up to four years of free college coaching designed to help them juggle all these competing priorities and graduate.

The program, which began this September, is a countywide pilot run in partnership with education nonprofit InsideTrack to see if giving National Guard members personalized support can help them take advantage of the existing college scholarship.

“Every one of them is going to have a different experience,” Merriman said. “There’s no cookie cutter intervention here. If there was, we’d be doing it.”

The coaching targets student’s individual needs. Some might need help figuring out how to navigate the bureaucracy of higher education or balance all their responsibilities outside the classroom. Others might want someone to bounce career ideas off of and help planning for postgraduation life. And the students can reach their coaches in whatever ways work best for them, whether it’s Zoom, phone calls or texts.

“Getting your degree is hard. Completing is hard, right? And that’s for any normal person,” said Jessica Hector, associate vice president of partner success at InsideTrack, which provides the coaches. “Many times, if a student’s not successful in school, it’s not academics, it’s because of all the other things that kind of come into play that pull you away from your long-term goal.”

Roughly 9,600 Ohio National Guard members, or 60 percent, have only earned a high school diploma or GED. Some of them did attend college but did not graduate.

InsideTrack will initially have the capacity to serve roughly 500 students in the program, Hector said, but might increase that number if there is greater interest. And if the program is successful, Merriman and Hector said they hope the coaching can be offered to National Guard members across the state. 

Right now, funding for the program hinges on whether students continue their classes and earn certificates or degrees.

Only about 19 percent of  the state’s National Guard members (about 3,000 of 16,000 total members) have earned a bachelor’s degree or higher, compared to 22 percent of all National Guard members and about 37 percent of the total U.S. adult population.

They’re using a “pay for success” model, meaning that InsideTrack is paid for its coaching services by the social impact investment firm Maycomb Capital. If students stay enrolled and graduate, Cuyahoga County pays InsideTrack, which in turn reimburses Maycomb. The hope is that linking payment to outcomes will drive success.

Public-private partnerships can be complicated, Merriman said, and are only worth it if they are developing services that meet residents’ needs. He thinks this program will do just that. 

Merriman, who also serves on the county’s workforce development board, said that members can gain valuable work experiences from their National Guard deployment. Those experiences, when combined with a college degree, can make them attractive candidates for in-demand jobs. The National Guard members who staffed the outdoor food distribution centers during Covid had to have sharp logistics skills and learned how to use machinery to load and unload the donated food. The members who ran the vaccine clinics now have months worth of valuable work experience in medical settings. 

In addition to helping the National Guard members manage their personal, work, service and school responsibilities, Merriman said he thinks it will be valuable for the members to have the support of someone to help them brainstorm how to use those skills in possible careers. 

“These are prime candidates to fill in demand jobs that, frankly, are essential to our community’s economic stability,” Merriman said. “We have to do something that connects these guardsmen to the jobs that really can lead out of these deployment experiences.” 

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MORGAN CITY, La. — Jenna Gros jangles as she walks the halls of Wyandotte Elementary School in St Mary’s Parish, Louisiana. The dozens of keys she carries while she sweeps, sprays, shelves and sorts make a loud sound, and when children hear her coming, they call out, “Miss Jenna!” 

Gros is head custodian at Wyandotte, in this small town in southern Louisiana. She’s also a teacher-in-training.  

In August 2020, she signed up for a new program designed to provide people working in school settings the chance to turn their job into an undergraduate degree in education, at a low cost. There’s untapped potential among people who work in schools right now, as classroom aides, lunchroom workers, afterschool staff and more, the thinking goes, and helping them become teachers could ease the shortage that’s dire in some districts around the country, particularly in rural areas like this one. 

In two and a half years, the teacher training program, run by nonprofit Reach University, has grown from 50 applicants to about 1,000, with most coming from rural areas of Louisiana, Arkansas, Alabama and California. The “apprenticeship degree” model costs students $75 dollars a month. The rest of the funding comes from Pell Grants and philanthropic donations. The classes, which are online, are taught by award-winning teachers, and districts must agree to have students work in the classroom for 15 hours a week as part of their training.

“We have overlooked a talent pool to our detriment,” said Joe Ross, president of Reach University. “These people have heart and they have the grit and they have the intelligence. There’s a piece of paper standing in the way.” 

Efforts to recruit teacher candidates from the local community date back to the 1990s, but programs have “exploded” in number over the past five years, said Danielle Edwards, assistant professor  of educational leadership, policy and workforce development at Old Dominion University in Virginia. Some of these “grow your own” programs, like Reach’s, recruit school employees who don’t have college degrees or degrees in education, while others focus on retired professionals, military veterans, college students, and even K12 students, with some starting as young as middle school.

“‘Grow your own’ has really caught on fire,” said Edwards, in part because of research showing that about 85 percent of teachers teach within 40 miles of where they grew up. But while these programs are increasingly popular, she says it isn’t clear what the teacher outcomes are in terms of effectiveness or retention. 

Related: Teacher shortages are real, but not for the reasons you’ve heard

Nationwide, there are at least 36,500 teacher vacancies, along with approximately 163,000 positions held by underqualified teachers, according to estimates by Tuan Nguyen, anassociate professor of education at Kansas State University. At Wyandotte, Principal Celeste Pipes has three uncertified teachers out of 26. 

“We are pulling people literally off the streets to fill spots in a classroom,” she said. Surrounding parishes in this part of Louisiana, 85 miles west of New Orleans, pay more than the starting salary of $46,000 she can offer; some even cover the full cost of health insurance. 

Data suggests not having qualified teachers can worsen student achievement and increase costs for districts. An unstable workforce also affects the school culture, said Pipes: “Once we have people here that are years and years and years in, we know how things are run.”

As Gros walks the hallways, she stops to swat a fly for a scared child, ties a first grader’s shoelaces and asks a third about their math homework. Her colleagues had long noticed her calm, encouraging manner, and so, when a teacher’s aide at Wyandotte heard about Reach, she urged Gros to sign up with her. 

Gros grew up in this town — her father worked as a mechanic in the oil rigs — and always wanted to be a teacher. But with three children and a salary of $22,000 a year, she couldn’t afford to do so. The low cost and logistics of Reach’s program suddenly made it possible: Her district agreed to her spending 15 hours of her work week in the classroom, mentoring or tutoring students. She takes her online classes at night or on weekends.

Current employees are also in the retirement system, meaning the years they’ve already worked count toward their pension. For Gros, who has worked for 18 years in her school system, that was an important consideration, she said. 

Pipes said people like Gros understand the vibe of this rural community — the importance of family, the focus on church, the love of hunting. And people with community roots are also less likely to leave, said Chandler Smith, the superintendent in West Baton Rouge Parish School System, a few hours’ drive away. 

His district is the second-highest paying in the state but still struggles to attract and retain teachers: It saw a 15 percent teacher turnover rate last year. Now, it has 29 teacher candidates through Reach. 

Related: Uncertified teachers filling holes across the South 

In West Baton Rouge Parish, Jackie Noble is walking back into the Brusly Elementary school building at 6:45 p.m. She’d finished her workday as a special education teacher’s aide around 3:30 p.m., then babysat her granddaughter for a few hours, spent time with her husband, and picked up a McDonald’s order of chicken nuggets, a large coffee and a Coke to get her through her evening classes. Some Reach classes go until 11 p.m. 

Noble was a bus driver in this area for five years, but she longed to be a teacher. When she mustered the courage to research options for joining the profession, she learned it would cost somewhere between $5,000 to $15,000 a year over at least four years. “I wasn’t even financially able to pay for my transcript because it was going to cost me almost $100,” she said. 

When Noble heard about Reach and the monthly tuition of $75 a month, she said, “My mouth hit the floor.”

Ross, of Reach University, said he often hears some variation of: “I had to choose between a job and a degree.” 

“What if we eliminate the question?” he said. “Let’s turn jobs into degrees.”

Brusly Elementary is quiet as Noble settles down in a classroom. She moves her food strategically off camera and ensures she has multiple devices logged in: her phone, laptop and desktop. Sometimes the internet here is spotty, and she doesn’t want to take any chances. 

It’s the night of the final class of her course, “Children with Special Needs: History and Practice.” Her 24 classmates smile and wave as they log on from different states. They’ve been taking turns presenting on disabilities such as dyslexia, brain injuries and deafness; Noble gave hers, on assistive technologies for children with physical disabilities, last week. 

Reach began in 2006 as a certification program for entry-level teachers who had a degree but still needed a credential. It then expanded to offer credentials to teachers who wanted to move into administration as well as graduate degrees in teaching and leadership. In 2020, Reach University started the program focused on school employees without a degree.

Kim Eckert, a former Louisiana teacher of the year and Reach’s dean, says she was drawn to the program because, as a high school special education teacher, she saw how little opportunity there was for classroom aides in her school to boost their skills. She started monthly workshops specifically for them.  

In growing the Reach program, Eckert drew from her teacher-of-the-year class, hiring people who understood the realities of classroom management and could model what it’s like to be a great teacher. She shied away from those who haven’t proven themselves in the classroom, even if they have degrees from top universities. “Everybody thinks they can be a teacher because they’ve had a teacher,” she said, but that’s not true. 

The 15 hours a week of “in-class training,” which can include observing a teacher, tutoring students or helping write lessons, is designed to allow students to test out what they’re learning almost immediately, without having to wait months or years to put their studies into practice. Michelle Cottrell Williams, a Reach administrator and Virginia’s 2018 teacher of the year, recalls discussing an exercise in class about Disney’s portrayal of historical events versus the reality. One of her students, a classroom aide, shared it with the fifth graders she was working with the next day. 

Noble says she’ll carry lessons about managing students from the bus to her classroom. She was responsible for up to 70 students while driving 45 miles an hour — so 20 in a classroom seems doable, she said. 

She can’t wait to have her own classroom where she is responsible for everything. “Being with the students approximately eight hours a day, you make a very, very larger impression on their lives,” she said. 

Related: In one giant classroom, four teachers manage 135 kids — and love it 

In May, Reach graduated its first class of teachers, a group of 13 students from Louisiana who had prior credits. The organization’s first full cohort will walk across the stage in spring 2024. 

There are promising signs. Nationwide, about half of teacher candidates pass their state’s teaching licensure exam; more than 60 percent of the 13 Reach graduates did. All of them had a job waiting for them, not only in their local community, but in the building where they’d been working. 

But Roddy Theobald, deputy director of the National Center for Analysis of Longitudinal Data in Education Research and researcher at the American Institutes for Research, says far more research is needed on “grow your own” programs. “There’s very, very little empirical evidence about the effectiveness of these pathways,” he said. 

One of the challenges is that the programs rarely target the specific needs of schools, he said. Some states have staffing shortages only in specific areas, like special education, STEM or elementary ed. “Sometimes they result in even more teachers with the right credentials to teach courses that the state doesn’t actually need,” he said. 

Edwards, one of the first researchers to study “grow your own” programs, is investigating whether teachers who complete them are effective in the classroom and stay employed in the field long term, as well as how diverse these educators are and whether they actually end up in hard-to-staff schools. 

“States are investing millions of dollars into this strategy, and we don’t know anything about its effectiveness,” she said. “We could be putting all this money into something that may or may not work.” 

Ross, of Reach University, says his group plans to research whether its new teachers are effective and stay in their jobs. In terms of meeting schools’ specific labor needs, Reach has agreements with other organizations such as TNTP (formerly The New Teacher Project) and the University of West Alabama to help people take higher-level courses in hard-to-fill specialties such as high school math. But while Reach staff look at information on teacher vacancies before partnering with a school district, they don’t focus on matching the district’s exact staffing needs said Ross: “Our hope is the numbers work themselves out.”

In Louisiana, Ross said he believes the organization could put a serious dent in the teacher vacancy numbers statewide. Some 84 percent of all parishes have signed on for Reach trainees, he said, and 650 teachers-in-training are enrolled. That amounts to more than a quarter of the teacher vacancy numbers statewide, 2,500.

“We’re getting pretty close to being a material contribution to the solution in that state,” he said. 

His group is also looking to partner with states, including Louisiana, to use Department of Labor money for teacher apprenticeships. At least 16 states have such programs. Under a Labor Department rule last year, teacher apprenticeships can now access millions in federal job-training funds. Reach is in talks to use some of that money, which Ross says would allow it to make the programs free to students and rely less on philanthropy.  

A straight-A student since her first semester, head custodian Jenna Gros expects to graduate without any debt in May 2024. She expects to teach at this same elementary school. At that point, her salary will almost double.

She said she loves how a teacher can shape a child’s future for the better. “That’s what a teacher is — a nurturer trying to provide them with the resources that they are going to need for later on in life. 

I think I can be that person,” she said. She pauses. “I know I can.” 

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

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Jesse Wiese spent seven years in prison; when he left the Iowa facility in 2006, he thought his debt to society had been paid. While inside, Wiese had earned an undergraduate degree and puzzled over how he might do right in the world. He started studying for the law school admissions test, thinking he could become a lawyer and maybe, one day, a judge.

In 2008, Wiese moved to Virginia to attend Regent University School of Law. He loved it, and he did well. Three years and $150,000 in federal and private student loans later, he graduated, and turned his attention to passing the bar. Like the majority of his classmates, he spent the summer foregoing gainful employment to study full-time for the two-day exam. Except, unlike his peers, passing the bar would not be Wiese’s biggest hurdle to becoming a lawyer. Indeed, he could pass the difficult exam and still be denied a license to practice law by the Virginia Board of Bar Examiners.  Before it considers awarding a law license for any otherwise eligible candidate with a felony conviction, the board holds a character and fitness screening.

For Wiese, it was all a big, expensive gamble — and, in one form or another, is one millions of people with criminal records take every year as they pursue education and workforce training on their way to jobs that require a license. Yet that effort might be wasted thanks to the nearly 14,000 laws and regulations that can restrict individuals with arrest and conviction histories from getting licensed in a given field.

The rules that govern these barriers to entry are patchwork, scattered across federal, state and regulatory codes, and they can vary from field to field within a state. That means some people are inadvertently steered toward training programs that, for them, are dead ends. At other times, as in Wiese’s case, people have no choice but go through time-consuming and often expensive courses before discovering whether they can work in their chosen field. Advocates say these barriers keep people from good jobs, not only reducing their chances of staying out of prison but robbing the nation of their productive labor.

“The focus should be on rehabilitation and putting people back out in the community so they can participate and be productive and thrive in their communities,” said Caitlin Dawkins, co-director for the national re-entry resource center at the American Institutes for Research.

Related: ‘Wasted money’: How career training companies scoop up federal funds with little oversight

Although licensing requirements vary from state to state, about one in five people in this country need occupational licenses to do their jobs — licenses they get only after completing a designated amount of training and education in their fields. In addition to lawyers, professional drivers must be licensed, along with health professionals, public accountants, teachers, electricians, firefighters, social workers, realtors and security guards.

According to a 2020 study by the Institute for Justice, a nonprofit law firm, 31 states allow licensing boards to deny applicants based on their character alone for at least some occupations, leaving room for denials based on any criminal behavior, no matter how minor or how far in the past. Advocates say it’s not uncommon for people to pursue training programs and submit their licensing applications without recognizing the risk. Just 21 states allow people with criminal records to ask licensing boards whether their records will disqualify them from getting a license before enrolling in any required training.

Yet the case for education as a counter to recidivism is so convincing the federal education department earlier this month announced a massive expansion of Pell grants for people pursuing higher education from behind bars. About 30,000 of these individuals are expected to get $130 million worth of the federal aid each year, a cost that researchers have found is far less than detaining reoffenders.

Higher educational attainment is directly correlated with a lower likelihood of being reincarcerated, as is stable employment. Both pieces of evidence have swayed policymakers nationwide. The Institute for Justice found 40 states have eased or eliminated some of their laws keeping people with criminal records from getting employment licenses since 2015. Yet with every type of license bearing its own local, state or federal limitations, many thousands of collateral consequences remain.

Wiese, now 45, went to prison for armed robbery of a bank. He passed the bar on his first try and moved on to the character and fitness screening required because of his prior conviction.

“It was like a mini trial,” Wiese said. He flew people in to serve as character witnesses in front of an initial committee, which ultimately recommended he be licensed. “I was like, ‘Awesome! This is amazing.’ Then their decision was unanimously overturned.”

The Virginia Board of Bar Examiners wasn’t convinced Wiese should be allowed to practice law, considering his criminal history. It told him to reapply in two years. He did, but the same thing happened — there was an initial committee recommendation for licensure followed by a state board denial.

“They said it may be impossible to prove rehabilitation,” Wiese remembered. He appealed to the state supreme court, but it ruled against him, too.

The Virginia Board of Bar Examiners did not comment on Wiese’s case or how the agency considers prior criminal history in its licensing decisions.

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

Many of the county’s laws seem to dictate that the lives of people with criminal records are governed by two competing beliefs — that crimes are proof of character flaws that can never be outgrown and that a criminal sentence should be the full extent of any punishment.

The view that crime is proof of character, which can never be reformed, has received legal support for at least 125 years. The U.S. Supreme Court first affirmed the right to discriminate against people with criminal records in an 1898 decision in Hawker v New York, which held that “character is as important a qualification as knowledge.”

Ronald Day came across this court decision while writing his dissertation as a doctoral candidate in philosophy at the City University of New York. Day has been involved in prisoner re-entry work for about 15 years, since he finished his own sentence and found himself navigating life on the outside. He received his doctorate in 2019 and now serves as vice president of programs for The Fortune Society, an education, service and advocacy organization focused on criminal justice and re-entry.

“The focus should be on rehabilitation and putting people back out in the community so they can participate and be productive and thrive in their communities.”

Caitlin Dawkins, co-director for the national re-entry resource center at the American Institutes for Research.

Day’s time in the archives introduced him to the ongoing legal dispute over the rights of those who are incarcerated, or who used to be incarcerated, taking him on a journey from the Supreme Court’s views in 1898 to the fallout from a 2015 decision by New York District Court Judge John Gleeson. Gleeson ruled in favor of expunging the conviction of a woman who had committed healthcare fraud and, after serving her sentence, found her record a constant barrier to getting and keeping jobs as a home health aide. In approving the expungement, Gleeson wrote, “I sentenced her to five years of probation supervision, not to a lifetime of unemployment.” But even support from the district court judge who sentenced her wasn’t enough. A Federal Court of Appeals overruled Gleeson.

According to the Institute for Justice study, in five states, including Arizona, Tennessee and Virginia, any licensing board can deny an applicant based on a felony, even if it’s completely unrelated to the license. In 30 states, an arrest alone can disqualify applicants. In seven states, there’s no right to appeal after a license is denied.

When the Virginia Board of Bar Examiners denied Wiese’s license a second time, he was told he could try again in two years, but that he would have to re-take the bar because so much time had passed. With the support of his wife, Wiese took time off to study, and passed the test a second time. Once more, he applied for a license, jumped through the hoops at his hearing and was recommended for a license.

But for the third time, the state board denied his application.

Related: Prisons are training inmates for the next generation of in-demand jobs

Wiese appealed the decision of the state licensing board, again taking his case to the Virginia State Supreme Court. This time, it ruled in his favor. Ten years after graduating from law school, Wiese got his license to practice.

Looking back, it didn’t seem like a triumph.

“In my younger days, I would say you can overcome anything. You can outwork it,” Wiese said. He doesn’t believe that anymore. “This is called the second prison. Literally, you walk out of one and you walk into another one.”

Sometimes people with criminal records reach out to him and say they heard about his case and they want to go to law school too, but Wiese doesn’t think he opened any doors. “I feel bad for the next person that’s coming in line behind me,” he said.

31 states allow licensing boards to deny applicants based on their character alone, leaving room for denials based on any criminal behavior, no matter how minor or how far in the past.

Because the laws and regulations are so scattered, they can be difficult for anyone, not just those exiting prison, to navigate. Every field has its own state-level licensing board and related policies. “Just because of the lack of coordination, they’re often unknown for even the people who are responsible for administering and enforcing them,” said Dawkins, of the American Institutes for Research. 

In some states, people serving time can fight fires as part of a prison work crew but can’t get licenses to work as firefighters in local fire departments after they get out. They can cut hair in prison but can’t get cosmetology licenses on the outside. They can do landscaping on city property through a prison work crew, but — with a criminal record — can’t get a government job.

Cosmetology, in many states, is considered “second-chance friendly” and a good path for people coming out of prison. In Virginia, by contrast, applicants can be denied cosmetology licenses for having specific misdemeanor convictions or any felony.

Related: Propelling prisoners to bachelor’s degrees in California

A number of organizations across the country have stepped up to advocate for policy change and to support those with criminal records as they seek to rebuild their lives outside of prison. Jobs for the Future this year put out a framework called “Normalizing Opportunity,” calling on policymakers to remove barriers to employment for formerly incarcerated individuals.

“There’s a multiplying effect there,” said Brandi Mandato, a senior director at Jobs for the Future who helped write the framework. “If we don’t have access to good jobs, we don’t have access to health care, housing, all of these things that are important to launching a life and building community and keeping people safe.”

Such advocacy has bipartisan support. John Koufos, who has led criminal justice advocacy work at organizations across the political spectrum and himself navigated re-entry, said the effort to eliminate employment barriers has galvanized one of the most diverse coalitions in criminal justice.

Just 21 states allow people with criminal records to ask licensing boards whether their records will disqualify them from getting a license before enrolling in any required training.

“[Occupational licensing] serves as an exclusionary barrier to people and to prosperity,” Koufos said.

At a time with very low unemployment and major demand for skilled employees, advocates say the business case for eliminating these barriers is as strong as the humanitarian one.

Wiese is now the vice president for research and innovation at Prison Fellowship, an organization that helps individuals and families affected by incarceration and which gave him his own sense of purpose and possibility while he was in prison. Early in his career with the organization, Wiese managed a caseload of about 70 men who were navigating re-entry. Over and over again, he saw them stop chasing their dreams, confounded by barriers to stable employment. The message they got, he said, was “don’t take the initiative.”

“It really limits people’s ability to make a difference and to contribute,” Wiese said, “and we miss out.”

This story about career licenses was produced by The Hechinger Report, a nonprofit, independent news organization focused on inequality and innovation in education. Sign up for our higher education newsletter.

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COVENTRY, England — When she finished high school, Helen Kinchin got what was supposed to be a temporary job, after which she planned to go to college.

Fourteen years later, she was in the same job and had two kids, but still no degree.

That’s when Kinchin, now 36, found a way to finally resume her education in a way that was fast, simple and comparatively cheap.

She enrolled at a university where students can start at any of six times during the year, take just one subject at a time for the same four hours every weekday and end up with a bachelor’s degree in three years. There are no electives; just about the only choice is whether to go in the mornings or the afternoons.

It’s a routine that can make life easier for exactly the kinds of people universities are trying to recruit in many countries where enrollment is declining, including the United States. Getting child care is simpler for student parents when they have a predictable schedule, for example, rather than classes that meet at different times on different days. And not all students care about electives or extracurricular activities; a growing number just want to graduate.

Related: Some colleges start to confront a surprising reason students fail: Too many choices

This assembly-line-style approach also vastly lowers the cost of doing business for the university, called CU Coventry, which doesn’t have to juggle faculty assignments or classroom space or offer many of the extras other institutions have added over time that don’t have anything to do with education.

It’s an example of how a “no-frills” higher education can be cheaper, faster, simpler and less intimidating for students at a time when going to college has otherwise become more complicated, with all kinds of add-ons that push up prices.

“When we started, we stripped things back,” said Ian Dunn, the affable, white-bearded provost, who sits in a pink hoodie in a lunchroom filled with blond wood and natural light. “We’re very much focused on transactional learning — the systematization of the teaching approach and the way in which we employ people to work in that model.”

The library, for instance, has only books connected to the subjects of the classes. There are no athletics, though students can participate in the broader activities of the parent Coventry University nearby or pay extra if they decide to use the gym. And faculty don’t do research; they only teach.

“We fit around the lives of students rather than making them fit around us,” Dunn said.

It wasn’t entirely out of the goodness of their hearts that administrators here created a low-cost university. The program was spun off a decade ago by the then-169-year-old Coventry University after universities in England were allowed to raise tuition to a maximum of £9,000 a year (since raised to £9,250, or about $11,750) — nearly triple the previous amount — and encouraged to compete for students.

“This was an existential moment for a university like ours,” Dunn said. With tuition being increased by so much, “we felt there was a whole potential demographic that was going to be pushed out of higher education with that change.” The customers administrators feared they’d lose included “more disadvantaged students or students tied to their locations because of financial or personal responsibilities.”

So the university “thought about how we would design a model where we could control the cost of the delivery of education so we could offer back to the students some of that savings.”

Related: In Japan, plummeting university enrollment forecasts what’s ahead for the U.S.

CU Coventry — originally called Coventry University College — set its price at £4,800 a year, about half of what the top universities charge, for degrees in subjects including business management, accounting, cloud computing, marketing and public relations, tourism and hospitality management and early childhood development and learning. It has since added campuses in Scarborough and London.

Though some students come straight from high school or after a gap year, the average age is 35. “Mature,” they’re called, in England.

A small but growing proportion of students at U.S. universities are also older than the traditional 18 to 22. They’re among the more than 40 million adults who have some college credits but no degrees, and who recruiters are going after as enrollment falls. Among the top reasons they haven’t come back, according to a Gallup survey: cost and family responsibilities.

Those are two things CU Coventry has tried to fix, with its comparatively low tuition and daily four-hour classes.

Related: Bachelor’s degree dreams of community college students get stymied by red tape — and it’s getting worse

“People can study while having obligations, family obligations. You don’t have to sacrifice your life,” said one student here, Mabel Makombore, who works part time while in school. “We’re all struggling financially,” she said.

This West Midlands city’s dominance in auto manufacturing made it a German target during the Blitz, an attack still visible in the ruins of the cathedral — left as a memorial — but those factories and the jobs they represented are mostly gone.

CU Coventry students talk of other advantages in addition to the price, including each term’s focus on a single subject in what Dunn referred to as a “modular delivery” system. “We’re only doing one thing at a time,” said Kinchin, who just graduated with a degree in applied bioscience and is moving on to get a Ph.D.

The idea, generally known in England as block teaching, has begun to spread. It has been adopted in the last few years in some form or another, and for all or some students, by the University of Suffolk, Manchester Metropolitan University, the University of Plymouth, De Montfort University in Leicester and UA92 in Manchester, a school cofounded by Lancaster University and former members of the Manchester United football club for people from disadvantaged backgrounds who might otherwise not go to college. It’s also being used in Sweden and Australia.

Many also like the strict pathway that allows them to stay on track to graduation. That’s something being tried by a few universities in the United States, too, where students find themselves drowning in choices — a situation only getting worse as schools have added tens of thousands of new programs in an effort to attract more students, who end up with more credits than they need to graduate and spend more money on and time in college.

U.S. students at four-year universities, on average, accumulate 15 credits more than they need to graduate, and at community colleges, 22 credits more, according to the advocacy group Complete College America.

Having to learn a crush of subjects simultaneously was among Ashkan Bahgozen’s fears about going to college while balancing the job of managing his family’s café. “I was very intimidated about courses overlapping,” he said. He just wanted to get a degree.

That’s a surprisingly widespread sentiment among CU Coventry students.

Related: Trade programs — unlike other areas of higher education — are in hot demand

“You can focus” on your principal discipline, said Makombore, who is studying accounting and finance after having previously started and never finished a degree in fashion, business and marketing at a more traditional university in London. “You’re not going backward and forward and mixing things up.”

Her classmate, Monika Myslewska, 33, added: “My main advice is don’t go to university right out of school. Wait until you know what you want to do.”

CU Coventry is not for everyone. For example, many people want to explore topics in college outside of their majors. Around 30 percent of the school’s first-year students drop out before the second year, a spokesperson said. (The figure is misleadingly high because it includes the number who enroll and never start.) Still, that’s lower than the combination of first-year students at U.S. universities who drop out or don’t show up.

But the CU Coventry model, Kinchin said, frees students from having to find their own way through endless numbers of electives, and keeps them focused on the end goal.

“When students start off, they might be less confident. But by the time they finish, they’re quite confident,” she said.

That’s Bahgozen’s story. “If you met me four years ago, I was a shy, quiet kid” who had to take access courses, he said — the equivalent of remedial classes in the U.S., for students who don’t meet college-level academic requirements. Now he’s finished his degree in management and leadership with a “first,” or first-class honors, the highest level. He has begun a job in the United States for the Liverpool-based Everton Football Club’s soccer schools.

Related: The latest group to get special attention from college admissions offices: men

From the university’s point of view, said Dunn, giving students choices “adds lots of cost. Part of the expense of running a university is the complexity of timetabling and scheduling and personalizing that to the individual.” That makes CU Coventry’s fixed format cheaper to provide.

This doesn’t mean that some administrators at the college haven’t tried to raise tuition. That has happened at least once, Dunn said — during a management meeting he did not attend.

“I behaved appallingly at the next management meeting,” he said, “and we brought the price back down.”

This story about the cost of college was produced by The Hechinger Report, a nonprofit, independent news organization focused on inequality and innovation in education. Sign up for our higher education newsletter.

The post One college finds a way to get students to degrees more quickly, simply and cheaply appeared first on The Hechinger Report.

Sergio Bocardo-Aguilar was hungry. A first-year student at the University of California, Davis, he worked at a fast-casual restaurant, but still couldn’t afford food. After his shifts, he would ask his friends for snacks or leftovers. Some nights he went right to sleep instead of having dinner.

Bocardo-Aguilar wondered if public assistance programs could help him. But he didn’t qualify for the federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, known as SNAP or food stamps. He worked two fewer hours per week than the program required — 18 instead of 20.

Because it’s hard to put in that much time on top of a full course load, “the work-hour requirement is really annoying, especially for a lot of students, like me,” he said. “I definitely think it should be eliminated, especially for students.”

That work rule was loosened for students during the peak of Covid-19 but has now been reimposed; at least one member of Congress says that nearly a million students are at risk of losing SNAP benefits as a result.

Now, under the deal to avert a default on the national debt, more work rules are being added to SNAP and other benefits programs. Advocates say that these types of restrictions are deterring Americans from going to college and getting higher-wage jobs.

Federal benefits programs are largely designed to exclude college students. Even if they meet SNAP’s income requirements — less than $1,473 per month for a single person — college students don’t qualify for benefits unless they work 20 hours on top of going to classes or meet other conditions such as caring for a dependent child under age 6.

Not only does this leave students hungry, say experts and advocates, it discourages SNAP recipients who are not already in college from enrolling.

Related: How the promise of free college doesn’t always help low-income students

College graduates with an associate degree earn on average 25 percent more over their lifetimes than people with only a high school diploma, and bachelor’s degree recipients get the kinds of jobs in which they generally make 75 percent more, according to the Georgetown Center on Education and the Workforce. Changing SNAP rules to encourage education, rather than just employment, could help more people improve their circumstances, critics say.

“Higher education is workforce development,” said Carrie Welton, who directs basic needs and anti-poverty policy at The Institute for College Access & Success. “Government programs should be the last entity that should be restricting things that we know work.”

As states try to increase the number of adults with degrees and credentials, advocates say easing work requirements for programs like SNAP, at least where students are involved — rather than the current trend of adding more — could put recipients on a path to prosperity and make them less likely to need government assistance in the future.

“If these individuals are able to get these credentials, these bachelor’s degrees and other vocational credentials, they could get off these public benefits and be able to get to a family-sustaining wage,” said David Croom, associate director for postsecondary success for parents at the Aspen Institute. “We want to incentivize people getting high-quality credentials relatively quickly in an affordable way.”

SNAP isn’t the only program that advocates say discourages education in favor of work.

Take the federal Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program, or TANF: States have leeway over how they implement the program, but a certain percentage of TANF recipients in each state need to be working to meet federal rules. That means coordinators avoid directing too many recipients into education, said Bryce McKibben, senior director of policy and advocacy at the Hope Center for College, Community and Justice at Temple University.

“The federal financial aid system, like Pell Grants and our student loan program and state and institutional aid — those programs are intended to help the most low-income folks in our country make their dreams possible,” McKibben said. But eligibility restrictions “make it so that those folks would have very severe consequences for themselves or their families if they wanted to enroll in higher education.”

Related: Why are prices rising more for lower-income college students than their higher-income peers?

The focus on getting program recipients employed comes largely from a desire to make them self-sufficient and no longer in need of aid. But experts say that a degree or credential could help achieve that while generating other economic benefits for states.

Parker Gilkesson previously worked with people in North Carolina to determine their eligibility for programs such as TANF. In some of the state’s counties, leaving a job or reducing hours to attend college is specifically singled out as a reason TANF recipients could lose their benefits.

In her experience, the policy “would just force people to push education to the side and go on and get a lower-wage job and perpetuate a cycle,” said Gilkesson, now a senior policy analyst at the Center for Law and Social Policy.

For current students, the work requirements can make it more difficult to do well in school and graduate. Students who work while in college are 20 percent less likely to finish their degrees than classmates who don’t, according to new research.

“It does take away from their academic studies,” said Brandi Simonaro, who co-directs SNAP outreach for public colleges as a project director at the Center for Healthy Communities at California State University’s Chico campus.

When she was a student, Simonaro was on CalFresh, the state’s SNAP program. Working more than 20 hours, as required to continue getting benefits, “really affected my ability to be present on campus,” she said. “Going to office hours was a struggle.”

Aaron Kunst, another co-director of the outreach program, said he worked with a student who was both homeless and employed, but still failed to meet eligibility requirements for CalFresh.

Outreach coordinators like Simonaro and Kunst can help students navigate the sometimes-dizzying experience of applying for federal benefits. Often, students think they are ineligible, even if they’re not, as government websites paint a discouraging picture. Without help, the complexity of the requirements and the number of hoops students must jump through, including an interview, can become barriers to access.

Students who work while in college are 20 percent less likely to finish their degrees than classmates who don’t.

“Most people are just going to see the list of rules and be like, ‘Forget it. I just don’t have time to deal with that bureaucracy,’ ” said McKibben. As a result, they choose not to attend college or apply for benefits.

Ivan Roberts, a student at Bowie State University in Maryland, said he believes he has been eligible for SNAP, but doesn’t know where to turn for help in applying. He has applied for SNAP three times but has never heard back. Without support, he has had to choose between paying to resolve holds on his student tuition account or buying food. That has gotten in the way of his academic progress, he said.

“If I had the money to take care of school and the money to sustain myself just to meet my individual needs, a lot of the problems I did have with school would have never arose,” Roberts said.

Related: The latest group to get special attention from college admissions offices: men

During the peak of the pandemic, students were able to receive assistance if they were approved for work study or if their parents were not expected to contribute financially to their educations. But with the public health emergency declared over, those exceptions ended on June 10.

And although the debt ceiling deal between the Biden administration and congressional Republicans will expand access to SNAP for young adults who age out of foster care, it will also raise from 50 to 54 the age at which older adults receiving SNAP are required to work and make it harder for states to exempt families of any age receiving TANF from the work requirement.

Politicians typically don’t want to be seen extending benefits to students who appear poor but are being supported by their families, advocates say. Benefits programs are also some of the most costly federal initiatives.

“The student rules were put in in the ’70s over concerns that upper- and middle-income kids, who looked temporarily poor because they were in college but were actually being financially supported by their parents, would be able to access SNAP,” said Welton. “Some of those concerns are I feel like not only a red herring but also fairly unfounded in terms of what the data tell us.”

“Government programs should be the last entity that should be restricting things that we know work.”

Carrie Welton, The Institute for College Access & Success

 More than half of all college students are considered independent, according to an analysis by the Institute for Women’s Policy Research. Nearly 30 percent of those at four-year colleges experienced food insecurity during the pandemic, the Hope Center reports.

“Today’s students are not the traditional students of years past,” said Satra Taylor, who directs higher education and workforce policy and advocacy at Young Invincibles, an organization focused on young people. “They’re independent, they’re student parents, they’re undocumented.”

Amelia Federico, who uses the pronoun they, is a student at Metropolitan State University of Denver who has been receiving SNAP benefits since March. Federico works, but said they don’t know if they’ll be able to continue receiving SNAP once requirements for students are reimposed.

“That would add a lot more stress onto my plate that I quite frankly don’t have the room for,” Federico said. “It would leave a big question in my mind of, ‘How am I going to get food?’ ”

Related: ‘The reckoning is here’: More than a third of community college students have vanished

Some policymakers are working on expanding eligibility. U.S. Rep. Jimmy Gomez, D-Cal., reintroduced a bill last month that would remove SNAP’s work requirement for students. The bill, called the EATS Act, for Enhance Access to SNAP, faces an uphill battle in Congress.

Several states have chosen to try to help benefits recipients get as much education as they can while staying within federal guidelines. In Kentucky, for instance, a program called Ready to Work recruits TANF beneficiaries to enroll in the state’s technical and community colleges. The program supports work-study placement so recipients and the state can meet the requirements under the law.

Even if they meet SNAP’s income requirements, college students don’t qualify for benefits unless they work 20 hours (on top of going to classes) or meet other conditions.

“The state of Kentucky made the decision up front to encourage their TANF clients to take advantage of education and training as a pathway out of poverty,” said Shauna King-Simms, director of the program.

Retention rates for Ready to Work students are equal to or better than those of other students, King-Simms said, even though TANF clients are parents with very low incomes (a two-person Kentucky family needs to make less than $1,021 per month to get TANF).

Federico, too, thinks education can be a path to economic stability. But when the choice is between going to classes or the food bank, doubt begins to creep in.

“There have been times where I’m like, ‘Is this worth it?’ ”

This story about food stamps for students was produced by The Hechinger Report, a nonprofit, independent news organization focused on inequality and innovation in education. Sign up for our higher education newsletter.

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Edward Cavaciuti was happy with his old life. For 25 years pre-pandemic, he DJed for a living in Delaware, Pennsylvania, New York, New Jersey and Maryland. He cleared $1,000 a week – at least – doing what he loved. 

“COVID literally ruined my business,” said Cavaciuti, a single father to a 15-year-old son. “I needed something a little more reliable with no college required.” 

Cavaciuti figured why not use the 6’ 2,” 220-pound frame he was blessed with to earn a living doing security. 

He got hired at Securitas USA in 2022. But to secure his job, he needed to complete a course and a licensure exam. In came Delaware Technical Community College via its continuing education/workforce training program. Cavaciuti took one course and passed a test, and his license is good for five years.

“There was no prior experience needed as a guard, and I was just looking for something different,” said Cavaciuti, who admits that he hated school and was never much interested in college.

“COVID literally ruined my business. I needed something a little more reliable with no college required.” 

Edward Cavaciuti

To fill private and public sector job vacancies, a growing trend in community colleges has been for students to take short-term, less expensive certificate programs. These middle-skill positions could help balance labor shortages and keep workers competitive for life-sustaining gainful employment. Politicians including former President Barack Obama and companies like IBM and Google have called for workplaces to eliminate de facto degree requirements, which take years to earn. 

Today, Cavaciuti makes a salary comparable to what he earned as a DJ and can earn overtime, if he wants to work more than 40 hours.

“Our goal in the division that I oversee is to get folks trained, get them credentialed, and then employed,” said Paul Morris, associate vice president for workforce development and community education at Del Tech. 

In 2022, Del Tech awarded 4,500 certificates and credentials. Some of the school’s most popular programs are in fields like health care and nursing, welding, HVAC and construction, and heavy equipment operator, Morris says.

Del Tech, which has partnerships with 650 companies, structures its programs based on job listings in the state and statistics from the Delaware Department of Labor.

Community colleges that offer the most successful certificate programs put in the work to address labor shortages and create opportunities for students to learn marketable skills for in-demand industries, says Joseph Fuller, professor of management practice at Harvard Business School in Cambridge, Massachusetts. They hire teachers for certificates and other programs who have prior industry experience. 

These schools, he notes, track graduate progress by checking with employers to validate if their training prepared them for new jobs. 

Fuller is a co-author of the recently published study “The Partnership Imperative: Community Colleges, Employers, and America’s Chronic Skills Gap,” based on surveys of community college and business leaders in 2020. 

The study found that educators and employers don’t see eye to eye on what the other contributes to workforce development. Only 21 percent of community college leaders strongly agreed that their schools were producing work-ready employees that employers needed. Only 26 percent of employers strongly agreed that community colleges were producing the workers that they needed.

Fuller likens the most successful community colleges to major league baseball teams, while less successful schools that never change what they offer, update curriculum, or develop partnerships, are Class A teams.

He says there is “a very real difference” at schools such as San Jacinto College in Houston; Valencia College in Orlando, Florida; or Wake Technical Community College in Raleigh, North Carolina. “The significant majority of schools,” he said, “aren’t as deep or as attuned to employers.”

In 2022, technology giant Intel announced a $20 billion investment to build two chip plants in Ohio, which will create thousands of jobs. It also pledged $100 million toward educational institutions to build employment pipelines. One of those schools was Lorain County Community College in Elyria, Ohio.

One of Fuller’s “major league” schools, LCCC is consistently recognized nationally for student outcomes and successes. It offers 65 free fast-track certificate programs, which can be completed in 16 weeks. More than 1,500 students take a mixture of noncredit and credit offerings, some offered exclusively online. LCCC also offers a one-year Earn and Learn program that combines classroom work and an apprenticeship with a local company. Some of those high-demand industries include automation, cybersecurity, software development, and computer-aided machining. 

“We do a lot of listening and learning from our students, from our graduates, from our employers,” said Marcia Ballinger, president of Lorain County Community College.

Working adults with family commitments and complex lives can’t just enroll in a two-year program, says Ballinger. Some students also have confidence issues: They think they aren’t college material and doubt they can be successful. 

“We thought, ‘What if we break it up differently so that we can engage them where they’re at?’” Ballinger said. 

Forty percent of participants in the 16-week program are students of color, double the demographic makeup of the county, Ballinger says. Recruiting efforts by LCCC have created relationships with local churches; the Urban League; and El Centro, a Latino nonprofit organization. 

The driving question, Ballinger said, is: “How can we reach adult learners where they are, connect them to short-term programming that we’re going to wrap our arms around them for those 16 weeks?”

“Our goal in the division that I oversee is to get folks trained, get them credentialed, and then employed.”

Paul Morris, associate vice president for workforce development and community education at Delaware Technical Community College

After the 16-week program, students can move on to the yearlong Earn and Learn credit program – and then, if they wish, work toward their associate degree and bachelor’s degree. 

One of those students is Joshua Eschke. Now 20, he had a tumultuous first year at the University of Toledo, which included the death of a family member. He went back home to North Ridgeville. He had been offered a scholarship to LCCC after successfully completing college courses there while still in high school.

“I reached out to them and asked if I could get that same scholarship,” Eschke said.

He got it, and he’s not looking back. Eschke initially enrolled in the one-year Earn and Learn certificate program in microelectromechanical systems, which he is still completing.

He took classes his first semester and now combines those with work at Rockwell Automation, an industrial automation Fortune 500 company that partners with the school. He works as a quality process technician in a plant where they make circuit boards. 

“I’m in the one-year program, but I think I’m going to end up doing the bachelor’s,” he said.

Eschke went from nothing to making $23 an hour, which he says he is saving and helping his girlfriend get her degree in early childhood education. His only prior work experience had been making DoorDash deliveries and working as a tour guide.

“For only one semester and a certificate that is pretty amazing,” Mr. Eschke said.

© 2023 The Christian Science Monitor

This story about credential programs was produced by The Christian Science Monitor, as part of the series Saving the College Dream, a collaboration between Hechinger and Education Labs and journalists at The Associated Press, AL.com, The Dallas Morning News, The Seattle Times and The Post and Courier in Charleston, South Carolina, with support from the Solutions Journalism Network. Sign up for Hechinger’s higher education newsletter.

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