برچسب: programs

Trump wants to cut college access programs for low-income students; California educators are pushing back

Students at a National TRIO Day Celebration at Cal Poly Pomona.

Courtesy of Laura E. Ayon

Around California this summer, low-income and first-generation students are staying in college dorms for the first time. High schoolers are camping beside the Klamath River. Undergraduates are presenting research at a symposium for budding scholars in Long Beach.

All are part of federally funded TRIO programs — like Upward Bound and McNair Scholars — based on California campuses, from rural Columbia College neighboring Yosemite National Park to private four-year institutions in Los Angeles like the University of Southern California. TRIO reaches children as young as middle school, preparing them to enroll in college and providing mentorship, academic advice and research opportunities when they do. In California, the programs served over 100,000 participants in the 2023-24 academic year.

“I really don’t think I could have made it through City College [of San Francisco] without them,” said Ekaterini Stamatakos, 22, a psychology major and TRIO student who earned an associate degree and then transferred to UCLA, where she will start her junior year this year. “I think these kinds of programs really go beyond whatever they might say on their profiles or the paragraphs that they have on their webpages — it really does make such an impact on students’ lives.”

But hanging over TRIO programs like Talent Search and Student Support Services is a Trump administration proposal to eliminate them. If Congress enacts that plan, all TRIO Student Support Services — such as tutoring in reading, help with college applications and workshops in financial literacy — would be defunded starting in fiscal year 2026. Their funding is uncertain until Congress finalizes the appropriations bill later this year.

TRIO, whose name derives from an original group of three programs but now includes eight, has largely prevailed in past funding battles. With an annual budget now exceeding $1 billion, it continues to garner significant bipartisan support. But a White House budget request released in the spring argues that TRIO programs, rooted in 1960s anti-poverty policy, are now “a relic of the past.”

“Today, the pendulum has swung and access to college is not the obstacle it was for students of limited means,” the budget request says. Colleges “should be using their own resources to engage with K-12 schools in their communities to recruit students, and then once those students are on campus, aid in their success through to graduation.”

The threat has mobilized TRIO supporters to redouble a public awareness campaign aimed at persuading lawmakers to maintain the programs. In California, there were about 450 TRIO programs in the 2023-24 academic year, an EdSource analysis of federal data shows, with most of that funding flowing to programs housed at more than 100 colleges and universities.

The proposal to sever funding for TRIO comes as the Trump administration has notched a U.S. Supreme Court victory that clears the way for mass layoffs at the U.S. Department of Education. This month, California joined a coalition of states suing for the release of $6.8 billion in federal school funding that has been frozen by the federal government. Since January, the White House has enacted or attempted a host of other changes affecting areas like financial aid and how the federal government interprets civil rights law.

TRIO programs based on California campuses like Sonoma State University, Cal Poly Pomona and UC Davis each receive millions of dollars annually and are funded to serve thousands of participants per campus, the analysis shows. Smaller TRIO programs, many at community colleges, may work with dozens or hundreds of students on a budget of less than $300,000.

At Cal Poly Humboldt, high school students and rising college freshmen this summer read an August Wilson play before venturing on a field trip to see it performed live at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival. At Cal Poly Pomona, peer coaches prepare presentations for fellow students on such topics as artificial intelligence and summer internships. At Columbia College, a community college 50 miles northeast of Modesto, a TRIO director said she’s worked with everyone from 14-year-olds in dual enrollment programs to 72-year-olds advancing toward master’s degrees.

Decades of consensus meets partisan divides

Studies generally suggest TRIO has a positive effect on academic outcomes, such as enrolling in college or completing a degree. Supporters also tout the success of alumni — some of whom have gone on to become lawmakers, astronauts, and in many cases, leaders of local TRIO programs themselves — as evidence of a positive impact on families and communities.

“I have alumni whose kids are now in college and thriving, or have graduated college,” said Rafael Topete, who leads the TRIO Student Support Services Program at Cal State Long Beach.

But this is not the first time TRIO programs have faced Republican-led challenges. Under President Ronald Reagan, TRIO advocates blocked an attempt to halve the program’s budget. Bipartisan support again thwarted a bid to eliminate TRIO funding during the Clinton administration.

TRIO’s critics point to a U.S. Department of Education-sponsored 2009 study finding that Upward Bound did not have a statistically significant impact on overall postsecondary enrollment. (The Council for Opportunity in Education, which advocates for TRIO and other college access programs, later sponsored a rebuttal study, which found Upward Bound had a strong positive impact on students.)

Two recent U.S. Government Accountability Office reports argue that the federal Department of Education could improve how it evaluates TRIO. The department has said further steps to verify data depend on the agency having adequate staff.

Educational Talent Search and Cal-SOAP students at Cal State Long Beach attend a workshop to help rising seniors get ready for college applications and financial aid. (Courtesy of Jesus Maldonado)

Education Secretary Linda McMahon this spring resurrected such accountability arguments to justify defunding the programs. “I just think that we aren’t able to see the effectiveness across the board that we would normally look to see with our federal spending,” McMahon said at a June budget hearing.

People who work for TRIO programs object to those criticisms. In interviews, many named by memory the metrics they report as a condition of receiving federal funding, like high school graduation rates and college enrollment statistics. “Every year, we report data to verify we are doing what we said we would do,” said Kathy Kailikole, who has had a 30-year career in TRIO programs and currently works at San Diego State University.

There are signs that TRIO remains a point of agreement in a Congress more often divided along party lines. Federal funding for TRIO has climbed from $838 million in 2014 to almost $1.2 billion in 2023. And of the 130 members in the Congressional TRIO Caucus, 26 are Republicans. U.S. Sen. Susan Collins of Maine and U.S. Rep. Mike Simpson of Idaho are among the Republicans who have vocally questioned cuts to TRIO.

Today’s bitter ideological divides may test that consensus.

In May, three Upward Bound grantees outside California received notice from the Department of Education that their funding would not be continued due to conflicts with Trump administration priorities, said Kimberly Jones, president of the Council for Opportunity in Education.

A copy of one such cancellation letter provided to EdSource by Jones said the grants “violate the letter or purpose of Federal civil rights law; conflict with the Department’s policy of prioritizing merit, fairness, and excellence in education; undermine the well-being of the students these programs are intended to help; or constitute an inappropriate use of federal funds.”

Overcoming distance and doubt in rural California

Jen Dyke directs the Upward Bound program at Cal Poly Humboldt where, years ago, she was once a student. Today, she travels hundreds of miles to recruit students from rural Hayfork, South Fork and Hoopa. It’s a region where rural schools often contend with high teacher turnover rates, low math test scores and an uncertain economic outlook, Dyke and her colleagues said.

“Timber is already gone. Fishing is already gone. Tourism is now something that is not super strong because of wildfires,” Dyke said during a lull in Upward Bound’s summer academy, which brings 27 high school-age students on campus to take classes and live in dorms. “So these areas that we serve are, once again, facing dismal futures if we also cut TRIO.”

Cal Poly Humboldt’s TRIO initiatives are among dozens of TRIO programs in California — and more than 500 in the U.S. — that reach participants in predominantly rural communities and remote towns, an EdSource review of federal data found.

Rose Sita Francia, who directs another Cal Poly Humboldt TRIO program called Talent Search, tries to expose students as early as sixth grade to careers that give them a reason to consider postsecondary education. The first step, she said, is to put college on the map for them — literally.

“Many students don’t know where Arcata is, where Cal Poly Humboldt is located,” she said. “And so we have teachers ask us regularly, ‘Will you show us some geography of college-going, and will you talk to us about trade school options as well?’”

Associate degree students at Columbia College tour a Humboldt County forest while on a trip to visit Sonoma State University and Cal Poly Humboldt on Sept. 17, 2024. (Courtesy of Anneka Rogers Whitmer)

Anneka Rogers Whitmer oversees TRIO programs housed at Columbia College, more than an hour’s drive from the two nearest four-year universities, Stanislaus State University and UC Merced. The college’s Educational Opportunity Center serves more than 1,000 people across five counties with just two staff members, who visit places like prisons and social service agencies. The TRIO staff have had to overcome distrust of college degrees, Whitmer said, by offering advice on how to apply for financial aid and where to find vocational training.

“We’re an education desert, no doubt,” she said, “but we just have to think more creatively about how we’re going to reach the folks.”

Ekaterini “Kat” Stamatakos and Ghislaine Maze pose for a photo at the City College of San Francisco commencement ceremony in May 2025. (Courtesy of Ghislaine Maze)

‘It’s easy for students to get lost or discouraged’

The program Ghislaine Maze coordinates at City College of San Francisco may be called the TRIO Writing Success Project, but it does much more than provide writing workshops and embedded tutors in English classes.

“So many students are trying to figure things out on their own, on the fly, with just a few hours on campus,” said Maze, whose program is funded to serve 310 students on a budget of roughly $485,000 a year. “It’s easy for students to get lost or discouraged.”

Tight campus budgets may leave other academic advisers on campus so overbooked that students struggle to get appointments, she said. A trusted TRIO mentor can help navigate financial aid and plan a student’s academic schedule. “That’s where a program like ours kind of fits in,” Maze said.

Before Ekaterini Stamatakos got to City College, she attended four high schools. She thinks she must have missed hundreds of days of school in that time, a consequence of housing instability. She struggled academically, but finished at a credit recovery school.

Stamatakos, who goes by Kat, was retaking an English class at City College when a tutor from the TRIO Writing Success Project explained that it provided feedback on writing assignments, mentorship and a place to hang out at the library, complete with snacks. “This is perfect,” Stamatakos thought. “I’m just going to basically live there.”

With assistance from a writing tutor, Stamatakos earned an ‘A’ in the course. “I don’t think I ever imagined that I would get an ‘A’ after my years of failing classes,” she said.

Source link

18/07/2025
How mariachi programs keep students like me culturally connected in college

Students pass beneath Sather Gate and onto Sproul Plaza at UC Berkeley.

Credit: Steve McConnell / UC Berkeley

As a student of Mexican, Guatemalan and Salvadoran heritage at UC Berkeley, adjusting to life at a prestigious institution has been hard. Too often, my peers assume stereotypes about me and my parents — that I must have grown up poor, that my parents don’t have an education or speak English, that I must be loud and aggressive like the Latinos they see on TV. Sometimes, while walking on campus, I overhear conversations about the need to deport so-called “illegals.” Whenever professors mispronounce my name, it sounds like nails on a chalkboard to me.

Three years ago, I joined Mariachi Luz de Oro. For myself and student mariachis everywhere, our performance is a rejection of this kind of mistreatment and simultaneously a celebration of our heritage.

Today, student mariachis across the state persevere and celebrate Mexican culture at a time when it is being targeted by the Trump administration. The need for cultural preservation among young Latinos is more timely than ever.

Growing up, I was always on stage. But nothing ever stuck. From ballet at the age of 5 to piano at 9 to theater at 13 and even a cover band at 17, I eventually lost interest in every performing art I was involved in.

But as a college freshman in 2022, I finally found one that stuck — mariachi.

Daniela Castillo performs for Mariachi Luz de Oro at UC Berkeley.
Camila Villanueva

In California, Latino students are more likely to have cultural ties to mariachi music. According to the Public Policy Institute of California, Latinos make up 40% of California’s population and 51.4% of Californians aged 24 years and younger. Mariachi programs help students achieve high levels of musicianship while also helping them stay connected to their culture, unlike music programs derived from European tradition, such as classical music or marching band.

This is why I have continued mariachi. No other art form has mattered to me in a way that also speaks to my roots, from preserving the language to being able to sing songs at family events like funerals and weddings.

When I first found Mariachi Luz de Oro, I’d just moved 400 miles away from Gardena in Southern California, the only home I’d ever known. I remember calling my family and then crying once we hung up because I longed to be home so badly.

Mariachi helped cure that. It gave me a community, a learning space and a newfound sense of closeness with my family. I’ll never forget how excited my grandma was to give me a crochet vihuela pin she made for me to wear on my traje de charro, the mariachi uniform. Homemade videos of me performing and singing in Spanish help my parents miss me a little less.

When I first saw Mariachi Luz de Oro perform, I was volunteering at a local Latino community event. The violins swelled, and the trumpets blared as the singer’s Spanish lyrics resonated in my ears. I knew then and there that this was something I wanted to be a part of.

To my surprise, the group offered to lend me a spare vihuela, an instrument similar to a guitar, but smaller. I hadn’t heard of a vihuela before, nor did I know how to play it or any other mariachi instrument. Even though I had no experience, I felt that this was something I needed to do. That day, amidst the chaos of adjusting to my first semester of college, I decided to pick up a brand-new instrument.

Today, I play and sing at nearly every performance we have. I am a member of the student board and helped organize this year’s third annual UC Berkeley Mariachi Conference.

The conference is a weekend-long event that started in 2023. More than 100 student mariachis from various middle schools, high schools and colleges across California are invited to campus. They get to perform in a showcase, build community, and participate in two days of classes taught by world-class mariachi instructors.

Through the UC Berkeley conference, I have met many inspirational student mariachis, including Karen Orozco, a senior at Garfield High School in East Los Angeles, who said that her participation in mariachi in high school prepared her for success. Orozco balances being a guitarist for the school’s mariachi group, Mariachi Los Alanos, and its all-girl group, Mariachi Las Mariposas. Orozco said that most mariachi members at her school plan to attend college and continue playing mariachi music.

“It’s helped us see how much we can achieve,” Orozco said. “It gives us motivation in both academics and performing.”

Orozco and I can both attest to the importance of mariachi programs. Although mariachi has taken a lot of hard work and time, I don’t have any regrets. It has helped me along my academic journey, while keeping me connected to my family and heritage at a time when keeping mariachi music alive is more important than ever.

•••

Daniela Castillo is student at UC Berkeley majoring in media studies with a concentration in global and cultural studies, as well as a double minor in journalism and ethnic studies, and a member of EdSource’s California Student Journalism Corps.

The opinions expressed in this commentary represent those of the author. EdSource welcomes commentaries representing diverse points of view. If you would like to submit a commentary, please review our guidelines and contact us.

Source link

16/07/2025
Service programs could be key to addressing our education crisis

Credit: AmeriCorps Photos

In the spring of 2020, teachers and administrators managed to re-create school in a home setting in days. It was a Herculean accomplishment that received little praise or recognition. Now, with millions of California students back in school, we are confronting another set of challenges. Many students are struggling academically, psychologically and emotionally, and many teachers and administrators are overwhelmed by the new challenges they face.

Thanks to substantial federal and state funding, our schools are operational again, but the needs persist. We now know that even as we continue rebuilding our education system, we must find ways to address the significant academic and mental health needs of our young people while simultaneously providing educators with the support they need to perform their jobs.

To respond effectively to current challenges, schools in California are in dire need of two valuable resources working in tandem: highly qualified teachers and additional support staff in classrooms. The California Service Corps programs consist of #CaliforniaForAll College Corps, #CaliforniaForAll Youth Jobs Corps, California Climate Action Corps, and AmeriCorps California, including California’s Student Success Coach Learning Network. All together, these programs may be part of the solution to both needs. Together, the programs have recruited thousands of talented and committed individuals who are actively working to provide support to teachers, administrators, and most importantly, our students.

California Service Corps members, including the Student Success Coach Learning Network, provide much-needed resources to vulnerable school communities throughout California. The network was created through funding provided by Gov. Gavin Newsom and the state Legislature in 2022.

Service programs are just one of many solutions needed to address the challenges to our education system, and they have been proven to be effective. These programs improve conditions in schools by providing trained, near-peer coaches (often just a few years older than the students) to California’s school communities to mentor some of our hardest-to-reach students.

Working collaboratively with teachers and administrators, service members are embedded within schools and serve thousands of students across the state. Working closely with teachers and counselors, they help improve academic outcomes, provide critically needed social support to kids, and increase teacher retention by reducing burnout.

Our school communities urgently need this support to continue. California has already established dedicated support for and investment in education-focused service programs. As we move through our third academic year of the “new normal,” we must recommit ourselves to supporting programs that uplift our students and drive teacher success and retention.

In the past three years, we have learned invaluable lessons about the role of service programs in addressing the pandemic’s impact on learning loss and student wellness.

Service members are trusted mentors, tutors and role models for students. They welcome students when they arrive at school, make calls home to check on their well-being, provide one-on-one and small-group interventions to those who need extra support, and facilitate afterschool programs.

In rural communities, these additional coaches are critical, as teachers and administrators are often asked to do more with less. By partnering with school staff to provide vital academic, social, and emotional support, service members improve the conditions in school communities so that teachers can focus on teaching.

Additionally, these service programs offer young adults a valuable introduction to careers in education and are creating a much-needed pipeline into the teaching profession and educational careers. These educators are more diverse than the national teaching force overall and tend to stay in the profession longer than the national average. Equally important, they come into schools prepared for the joys and challenges of the profession, trained in holistic student-centered support, and committed to expanding educational equity.

Like California, we need state and federal leaders to continue investing in education-focused service programs as a permanent part of our education and workforce development infrastructure so we can continue recovering from the catastrophic effects of the March 2020 school closures.

Three years later, we have learned so much. We cannot afford to go back.

•••

Josh Fryday is the Chief Service Officer of California, serving in Gov. Gavin Newsom’s cabinet, and Pedro Noguera is the Dean of the USC Rossier School of Education.

The opinions in this commentary are those of the authors. If you would like to submit a commentary, please review our guidelines and contact us.

Source link

10/07/2025
Deficit déjà vu: Revenue whiplash jeopardizes ambitious new programs

Credit: Alison Yin/EdSource

One year ago, we wrote in this space that it was time for an honest conversation about California’s structural budget problems. We noted that despite the record level of education spending the state was planning, the highly volatile nature of state tax revenues could change that good news into bad nearly overnight. Nobody cared.

That our cries about a falling sky were ignored last year wasn’t surprising. We were writing only a few months after Gov. Gavin Newsom had reported a surplus of nearly $100 billion in the May 2022 revision. And, his January 2023 budget still projected a “nothing to see here” vibe, despite shifting into a modest deficit. Things were looking pretty OK twelve months ago. Now they aren’t, and despite the governor’s optimism, the fiscal situation may be bad for some time to come, which is why we are picking up this conversation again. If you care about the future of California’s schools and students as we do, you’ll agree we need to have a serious discussion about supporting our education investments with stable revenue.

The Legislative Analyst’s Office identified a $68 billion “budget problem” in its latest fiscal outlook. The even more dire news, however, came earlier, when its revenue forecasters declared that the state had entered an economic downturn in 2022, resulting in a significant revenue shortfall for budget promises made during 2023-24, and persistent deficits anticipated through 2027-28. On a national level, there is talk of a “soft landing” for the economy. In California, the ride looks to be a bit bumpier.

And predictably, talk of cutting K-12 funding has already started to emerge. We know from the Great Recession that lawmakers quickly cut per-pupil funding, delayed payments to schools, and swapped funding with local governments. We have the Proposition 98 reserve to draw on this time, but the LAO notes that those funds may dry up to get us out of the 2023-24 and 2024-25 budget hole, leaving school districts in a precarious funding situation if the economy worsens.

But, as they say in the infomercials, “Wait, there’s more.” There has been a significant push from state leaders to develop a “continuous improvement” model for California schools. This has meant a significant financial investment — in the realm of billions of dollars — in the recruitment and retention of teachers, new programs that address students’ social and emotional learning needs, and experiments with “whole child” approaches to schooling by funding programs like community schools. The issue is that funding for many of these programs was one-time only. Ignoring the issue of school funding stability means that the state’s strategy to shift learning paradigms is at risk of losing resources in the coming years.

The governor just released his draft budget for the 2024-25 fiscal year with the deficit and education funding featuring prominently. It means that while there will be belt-tightening for schools, much of the gap will be closed by delaying funding to a variety of programs, including preschool, transitional kindergarten and full-day facilities grants, and funding for the UC and CSU systems. The strategy appears to be to fund the status quo this year. Draw upon reserves. Delay some funds here, shift a few billion there. And, generally avoid, where possible, cutting back on special projects funded with one-time funds. Then, hope it doesn’t get any worse.

Notably, the governor’s Department of Finance is projecting a deficit of $38 billion or $30 billion less than the LAO’s figure from five weeks earlier. That isn’t trivial. Part of the explanation is that recent stock market gains contributed to a more positive revenue picture. Major shifts in tax revenue are, as the governor essentially stated, “normal” in California. That is the problem.

Fixing the state’s structural fiscal problems will be difficult, and all pieces need to be part of the discussion. This includes reforming Proposition 13, accounting for long-term liabilities such as pensions, and broadening the sales tax base to include services. The conversation must include incentives for the state and local governments to save. It could include unconventional elements such as a sovereign wealth fund, or unpopular ones such as a broadly based consumption tax or resurrecting the state’s inheritance tax.

Taking a hard look at how the state funds education needs to happen. Uneven funding means that strategic investments like continuous improvement become two steps forward and a step or two back, then repeat. If we are serious about transforming California’s schools and supporting students with adequate and equitable funding, we need to start talking —and acting — to secure stable funding.

•••

Erin Heys is policy director and senior researcher at the Berkeley Institute for Young Americans, a research center affiliated with the Goldman School of Public Policy at the University of California Berkeley.

Patrick Murphy is director of resource equity and public finance at The Opportunity Institute, a national education policy organization that focuses broadly on cradle-to-career education policy, and is a professor at the University of San Francisco.

The opinions in this commentary are those of the authors. If you would like to submit a commentary, please review our guidelines and contact us.

Source link

17/06/2025
Vocational training programs for special education students teach work, life skills

Jeannette, a student in special education in the Merced County Office of Education’s adult transition program, folds El Capitan Hotel towels as part of a housekeeping training program that teaches work and life skills. For student privacy, the county office did not disclose Jeannette’s last name.

Credit: Courtesy of Merced County Office of Education

As guests check out of El Capitan Hotel in downtown Merced, a group of students wearing Merced County Office of Education (MCOE) shirts or lanyards enter recently vacated rooms to strip the beds, empty the trash bins and vacuum the floors.

For more than a year, students like Alondra Fierros, who always has a smile on her face, have separated and washed the hotel’s dirty linens while Jayden Flores has neatly folded the clean hotel towels into stacks of eight without looking up from the task.

Most of the students, ages 18-22, are diagnosed with varying degrees of autism and/or other disabilities, are in special education in the county office’s adult transition program and learning how to do laundry and clean for the first time.

Despite their limits, the students obtain skills as part of the county office and hotel’s housekeeping program.

“I clean the place, and I take a bunch of dirty bed sheets and towels and put them in the laundry room and wash them,” Flores said about tasks he learned by shadowing and observing housekeepers.

Through hands-on experience at the hotel, students gain skills to work in the housekeeping and hospitality industry — whether at El Capitan or elsewhere — after they graduate. And they develop life skills for adulthood.

Eliazar removes El Capitan Hotel bedding to be washed, one of his duties in a housekeeping training program through the hotel and Merced County Office of Education. Eliazar is a student in special education in the county office’s adult transition program. The county office didn’t disclose his last name for to protect the student’s privacy.
Photo courtesy of Merced County Office of Education

“At this age, we’re really trying to (give them) more experience in the community,” said Laura Fong, an assistant superintendent in the Merced County Office of Education.

Vocational training programs have traditionally tailored jobs around special education students’ needs, such as a Fresno restaurant with modified cash registers to accommodate students who can’t read.

This is not the case with Merced County’s program which, instead, integrates students into the housekeeping career, making it one of a few in California and across the nation to do so. The program now serves as a model for other districts aspiring to integrate students with disabilities into careers and society.

From model room to real world experience

The office of education launched the housekeeping training program in October 2022 for its special education students to gain work and life skills in a real world setting, Fong said.

Before the program’s creation, students practiced their skills in an “isolated” mock hotel room, which worked for a while, Fong said.

But it wasn’t enough. The students couldn’t apply what they learned to their life because those skills weren’t being used in a real-world environment. They weren’t observing housekeepers’ work, and therefore couldn’t comprehend the logic behind the tasks they were being instructed to do. They weren’t working alongside employees, so they weren’t learning how to interact with others or the proper ways to behave in a work setting.

The county office sought a collaboration with the hotel, which had built the hotel room replica.

Fong said the yearlong program is critical for the students “to be in the actual field,” get on-the-job training and be able to model employees’ behavior, which in turn provides them with real-world experience while allowing them to interact with others.

How county office’s training programs work

Once Merced County special education students finish their shift at a training site, they return to the classroom or visit another training program for the remainder of the day. In class, one of their tasks is to formulate their resume to include their on-the-job training experience.

Working in the actual hotel “really teaches them responsibility,” said vocational trainer Lorie Gonzales, who accompanies the students to their training programs to supervise and assist them, if needed.

With Gonzales checking their uniforms and attire before a shift, students learn that they must dress appropriately for a job. They learn about the importance of being on time because they’re expected at the hotel for their respective shifts and must clock in once they’re there.

Hotel staff are primarily responsible for training students for the housekeeping tasks, said Robin Donovan, managing director of the hotel.

The students remove dirty sheets and linens, vacuum and straighten rooms, so a housekeeper only has to make the bed and clean the bathroom. Once the housekeeper takes over, students sort, wash and dry the laundry, then vacuum the hallways and stairways and wipe down art and other fixtures mounted on the wall.

The work skills, such as changing sheets and cleaning, become independent living skills that students need in their personal lives, Fong said.

“We want them to be prepared. Not only can they go out and find a job in this industry, doing this work, they can also transfer those skills to living on their own, independently,” she said.

Meg Metz, director of people and culture at El Capitan, said the hotel staff were at first worried about how they’d adapt to working with the students. Now, however, the staff looks forward to working alongside students, Metz and Donovan both said.

Donovan added that hotel staff enjoy their shifts with the students who they say are reliable and hardworking and bring positivity to the workplace.

“They do quality work,” she said, “and with the biggest smiles.”

But the social interactions extend beyond connecting with hotel employees. The partnership with the hotel allows students to engage with hotel guests as well, including those who may still be in their rooms.

“When I come to work here in the hotel, I say, ‘Knock, knock. Housekeeping,’” Flores said as he knocked on a third floor hotel room door.

Gonzales, the vocational trainer, has coached the students on being courteous whenever they run into guests in the hallways and stairways. The students, for instance, tell guests to use the elevator first, Gonzales said.

Expanding opportunities for students with special needs

The housekeeping program isn’t the only vocational training program for individuals with disabilities in Merced County or the surrounding Central Valley communities. Since opening in the 1980s, Wired Café has been a coffee shop where adults with disabilities gain skills that prepare them for the workforce, according to Fong. It is owned and operated by Merced County’s education office as well. Students learn and grow as they take orders and fix and serve smoothies, lattes or sandwiches.

Mimicking Wired Café, the Fresno County education office established Kids Café in 2017 as a work-based learning environment for special education students, county office leaders Christina Borges and Liza Stack said.

Krystal vacuums a hallway at El Capitan Hotel. Krystal is one of about 20 students in special education in the Merced County Office of Education’s adult transition program who is participating in the county office and hotel’s housekeeping training program. For student privacy, the county office did not disclose Krystal’s last name.
Photo courtesy of Merced County Office of Education

In their uniforms and aprons, students working at Kids Café complete a variety of tasks, including: preparing and serving food, such as pizza, sandwiches and salads; sweeping or mopping the floors of the restaurant; clearing and wiping the tables after customers leave; stocking inventory; laundering; baking and packaging cookies or scones; weighing and bagging chips; and working the cash register.

The Fresno County office adjusted aspects of the restaurant to accommodate students’ needs and abilities, thereby fostering independence and ensuring student success, Stack said. Restaurant modifications include visual task cards with pictures as well as step-by-step instructions, color-coordinated towels for different cleaning tasks, and a modified register in which 4C means four slices of cheese.

How Kids Café operates

The café provides two-hour shifts for most special education classes during the school year, with longer shifts offered over the summer and winter breaks. Students with special needs living in one of Fresno County’s 30 regional areas for special education services and enrolled in a county-operated program can participate. Participating students may have autism, be deaf or hard of hearing or have emotional disabilities, to name a few. Thirty-three Fresno County special education students, up from 19 last school year, have worked at the restaurant so far this school year.

Starting around July 1, the Fresno County education office will partner with local businesses throughout the county to provide other types of vocational training for students with disabilities and offer employment opportunities in maintenance, facilities and technology at the county office.

“We’re really looking to expand into those areas to give students something more than just restaurant work,” Borges said about integrating students into existing businesses rather than only designing programs for them. “We want to go beyond our students being in one restaurant at one location.”

Much like the Merced County housekeeping training program, Fresno County’s planned expansion would create more vocational training that integrates special education students into careers, rather than tailoring jobs for students — a move that, Borges hopes, will show businesses the value of these students.

Even the California Department of Rehabilitation has worked to close the employment gap for people with disabilities and, in 2022, launched an initiative with the Institute for Workplace Skills & Innovation), a workforce development organization, to employ people with disabilities in allied health care, clerical and manufacturing jobs as part of the Ready, Willing and ABLE program.

In August, the department and organization again partnered to establish Career Launchpad, a vocational skills and career transition program for students with disabilities — an often “overlooked and undervalued” community, a media release at the time said.

Students with disabilities are valuable to the workforce

Overall, vocational training programs such as those in Merced and Fresno exemplify how valuable students with disabilities can be to the workforce, leaders of Merced and Fresno counties said.

“Our students being seen as active, valued members of society is one of the most important things that comes out of this,” Stack said.

Flores, one of the Merced County students, aged out of the housekeeping training program in December when he turned 23. Gonzales, his vocational trainer, said she had hoped his employment with El Capitan Hotel would continue, especially because he could work independently in the training program. The hotel was unable to hire him because they had no open positions. He now participates in the Haven Program, a community-based center serving adults with disabilities.

“I hope in the future, there’s more businesses that will hire them after they graduate,” Gonzales said. “… They’ve proved to us that they are capable.”

As Merced and Fresno counties implement and expand programs throughout their communities, Borges hopes the community’s attitude will change toward students and individuals with disabilities.

“Our students with disabilities,” she said, “have a role in the workforce.”

Source link

15/06/2025
Eliminating programs that improve higher education access is a huge mistake

Mayra Puente speaks at a legislative briefing on Capitol Hill on the TRIO programs in May 2025.

Courtesy: Mayra Puente

President Donald Trump’s “skinny budget” proposal aims to eliminate a group of eight federally funded programs known as TRIO that support higher education access and success for individuals from “disadvantaged backgrounds.”

Eliminating these programs would be a huge mistake.

How was I, a daughter of migrant farmworkers whose parents have limited formal education and live in poverty, able to beat the odds and land a faculty position at a selective university in the U.S.? TRIO.

A recent study investigated whether becoming a professor was driven by socioeconomic status. The researchers surveyed 7,218 tenure-track faculty members at research-intensive institutions in the U.S. across eight academic disciplines between 2017 and 2020. They found that nearly one-quarter of the faculty had a parent with a Ph.D., and over half had a parent with a graduate degree. They also found that white professors were more likely to have a parent with a Ph.D. compared to Black and Latino faculty. Only 1% of Latina women have a Ph.D.

As an undergraduate student at UCLA, I participated in the Ronald E. McNair Post-Baccalaureate Achievement Program, one of the federal TRIO programs the Trump administration seeks to cut. Research demonstrates that the McNair Scholars Program is highly effective. Students who participated in the program were 78% more likely to enroll in graduate school than other low-income students.

Could I have applied to graduate school, obtained a Ph.D., and landed a faculty role without the McNair Scholars Program? Maybe. But the reality is that the majority of low-income, first-generation Latino college students like myself are unaware of the hidden curriculum of academia. Many of us are unable to rely on our parents for academic and career guidance, and we often lack access to mentors who can help us navigate the graduate school process.

The McNair Scholars Program introduced me to graduate school and the pursuit of a Ph.D. and a career in educational research as a possibility, and provided mentoring on creating and conducting empirical research studies, research, writing and conference presenting experiences, tutoring for graduate school tests, fee waivers for graduate school applications, feedback on graduate school applications, understanding graduate school and funding offers, a network of professional support at the university and beyond.

Additionally, as a researcher of higher education access and equity for first-generation rural Latino students from migrant farmworkers and low-income backgrounds, I have examined the effectiveness of other TRIO programs, like Upward Bound and Talent Search, in exposing and preparing students for college. In one qualitative research study on California’s Central Coast, a student shared, “Sometimes, I couldn’t imagine being a student from a different tiny, small town where I just didn’t have a college and career center, EAOP (Early Academic Outreach Program), and Upward Bound to help me.”

Other research finds that Upward Bound students are more than twice as likely to earn a bachelor’s degree by age 24 than other groups. The Council for Opportunity in Education also reports high success rates for students participating in other TRIO programs, including Student Support Services, Talent Search, Veterans Upward Bound, Educational Opportunity Centers (EOC), and the McNair Scholars Program.

How can something that is empirically proven to be effective be deemed “wasteful”?

The elimination of TRIO programs threatens knowledge production, innovation, and the education of current and future generations of students, who are becoming increasingly diverse and would greatly benefit from the continued existence of TRIO programs.

TRIO programs also provide services to low-income students, first-generation college students, students with disabilities, and military veterans. Higher education access, made possible through TRIO, is a means of achieving economic and social mobility, which benefits local communities, regions, and the nation as a whole. More importantly, the creation and continued support of TRIO programs is a testament to this country’s commitment to equal educational opportunity and justice for all.

Congress must reject the elimination of TRIO programs if it hopes to see a highly educated and diverse professional workforce in this country. TRIO alumni, estimated to be over 6 million by the Council for Opportunity in Education, should sign the collective TRIO alumni letter and call or write to their respective House of Representatives and Senate offices to urge them to protect and fully fund TRIO programs in the 2026 budget. TRIO alumni and others can share their TRIO success stories on social media using the hashtags #ProtectTRIO and #TRIOWorks.

The narratives and empirical evidence of the effectiveness of TRIO programs are overwhelming. My path to the professoriate is mainly due to federally funded TRIO programs.

•••

Mayra Puente is a rural Latina, assistant professor of higher education at the Gevirtz Graduate School of Education at the University of California, Santa Barbara, and a Public Voices Fellow of The OpEd Project.

The opinions expressed in this commentary represent those of the author. EdSource welcomes commentaries representing diverse points of view. If you would like to submit a commentary, please review our guidelines and contact us.

Source link

13/06/2025
California Community Colleges approves 6 new bachelor’s degree programs

Dental hygiene program at Fresno College.

Credit: Fresno City College

Six additional bachelor’s degree programs have been approved across California’s community colleges, the state chancellor’s office for the college system announced.

With the approvals, there are now 39 bachelor’s degree programs that are being offered or will soon be offered across the community college system.

The latest programs to be approved include respiratory care at Antelope Valley College, paramedicine at College of the Siskiyous, dental hygiene at both Cypress College and Oxnard College, paralegal studies at Santa Ana College and respiratory care therapist at Victor Valley College.

“Through the Baccalaureate Degree Program we are broadening the reach of higher education and skill development to a greater number of students by offering affordable and quality opportunities close to home,” Aisha Lowe, an executive vice chancellor for the college system, said in a statement.

There are now 32 different community colleges across the state with at least one bachelor’s degree program. A few colleges have multiple offerings, including Antelope Valley, Cypress and Santa Ana with their latest approvals.

The number of bachelor’s degrees being offered across the community colleges will likely continue to increase. In January, colleges submitted another 13 program applications that are currently under review.

Under a 2021 state law, the community college system can approve up to 30 bachelor’s degrees annually, across two cycles each year. The degrees are all offered in high-demand career fields such as dental hygiene and automotive education.

By offering those degrees at the community college level, students can earn a bachelor’s degree for a fraction of what it costs to get one at a four-year university. In some cases, the degrees are also more accessible, since there are some community colleges offering them in parts of the state where there isn’t a University of California or California State University campus.

To get approved, the programs must first go through intersegmental review, a process in which the California State University and the University of California systems get to say whether they object to the degrees. Under state law, the programs can’t duplicate programs that are offered at UC or CSU.

That has been a point of contention, particularly with CSU, which has raised duplication concerns about several programs that community colleges have proposed, something that has delayed the approval process. Currently, 11 programs remain under intersegmental review.

Community college officials say they are working with CSU officials to establish a better process for resolving those disputes more quickly in the future.

Because the community colleges can’t create bachelor’s degree programs that are already available at CSU and UC, they have been prevented from offering degrees in some fields with worker shortages, such as nursing. Newly proposed legislation aims to change that: Senate Bill 895 would allow 15 community colleges to begin offering bachelor’s degrees in nursing.

Source link

06/06/2025
Homeless infants and toddlers largely unenrolled in early ed programs

Teacher Marisol Garcia Del Ruiz holds up a book in English and demonstrates the words for emotions in Spanish at a Head Start class in Norwalk in September 2015.

Sarah Tully, EdSource

Enrollment in early childhood development programs can mitigate some of the consequences of homelessness among infants and toddlers, but only 1 out of 9 of these children are enrolled in such programs, according to a recent national report.

In California, 1 out of 6 are enrolled.

An increasing number of families with infants and toddlers are homeless, with many staying in shelters, motels, temporary homes or living unsheltered, according to federal data included in the report from SchoolHouse Connection, a national homeless advocacy organization, and Poverty Solutions at the University of Michigan.

Researchers indicate that there is no single reason for increasing homelessness because each family’s situation differs; however, the rates have been exacerbated by the end of pandemic-era eviction protections. Infants and toddlers are most at risk of evictions, according to a report published in October by the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

In California during the same program year, there were over 1.6 million infants and, of those, more than 55,000, or 3.27%, experienced homelessness. Less than 10,000 of the homeless infants and toddlers were enrolled in an early childhood program, leaving tens of thousands of children without educational programming and potentially also unconnected to supportive resources to help their families find stable housing.

The report relied on census data to estimate how many children under age 3 were experiencing homelessness across all 50 states.

Homelessness rarely ends in a linear fashion, meaning that the infants and toddlers experiencing homelessness during the 2021-22 program year, whose data was used for the SchoolHouse Connection report, may well be the same young students in unstable housing today. Understanding the data may help shape how schools support students in need, particularly given that homelessness often has long-lasting effects on academic development.

“The younger and longer a child experiences homelessness, the greater the cumulative toll on their health and well-being,” the report authors wrote. “In fact, the impacts of homelessness on young children, including on children’s school readiness, can be long-lasting, even after families are stably housed.”

To estimate the prevalence of homelessness, authors used “the percentage of first graders identified as homeless in each state,” a number they indicate is conservative since advocates have long shared that homeless youth remain undercounted.

The data on Early Head Start came from the Head Start Enterprise System, while local educational agency enrollment information was gathered using Ed Data Express, a site that holds data collected by the U.S. Department of Education.

The report further detailed which type of early childhood program the enrolled children in California were attending.

During the 2021-22 program year, there were 915 infants and toddlers enrolled in a home visiting program, 2,883 enrolled in an early Head Start program, and 5,887 who were being served by a local educational agency.

In California, the low enrollment rates translate to just 1 in 6 infants and toddlers experiencing homelessness being enrolled in a program.

While infants and toddlers may not be enrolled in a local educational agency, such as an elementary school or a county office of education program, some districts have implemented programs that help support the siblings of homeless children who are attending school.

For example, Greenfield Unified School District in Monterey County has used pandemic-era federal funds to offer baby items as donations, so that families in need could be identified and supported even if their infant or toddler was not yet enrolled in a district program.

Those federal funds, however, are set to expire within the next year, leaving school staff unsure of whether they will be able to continue offering those services.

Over the last two decades, Congress has amended certain requirements to access federal early care, education and homelessness programs in order to increase the enrollment of homeless children and families. For example, homeless families have additional time to provide immunization records when enrolling in Head Start programs, which also have the flexibility to reserve slots for homeless families.

Despite these changes, homeless infants and toddlers remain overwhelmingly under-enrolled.

The report offered recommendations on homelessness prevention and eliminating the program enrollment gap, such as improving the quality of data on homeless children who are accessing child care subsidies, and targeting housing vouchers toward families with children and expectant parents who are experiencing homelessness, among other items.

Source link

06/06/2025
Trump’s budget would reduce Pell Grant awards and work-study programs
A commencement ceremony at California State University, Fullerton, in 2021.

Credit: Cal State Fullerton/Flickr
- New “K-12 Simplified Funding Program” is effectively an elimination, advocates say.
- Proposal eviscerates programs for low-income students in both K-12 and higher education.
- Funds for disabled students increased, but shift to flat funding is concerning to educators.
The Trump administration is proposing the biggest cuts in a half-century to federal financial aid by reducing Pell Grant award amounts for low-income college students, plus the government’s contribution to the Federal Work-Study program. Fewer students will likely enroll in college and achieve a degree as a result, college officials say.

The cuts are included in a proposed 15% reduction to the U.S. Department of Education’s budget, totaling $12 billion in cuts to K-12 and higher education, plus sweeping changes to how remaining funding would be distributed.

The president’s initial budget, issued on May 2, foreshadowed programs in danger of cuts or eliminations, but specifics remained vague until late last week with the release of new details.

The budget is still under review by the Senate, which could change the administration’s proposal in any direction.

Advocates, however, remain pessimistic and warn that this education budget request is only one aspect of the larger budget and policy concerns.

“The biggest thing is what happens in the Senate with budget reconciliation,” said Rob Manwaring, a fiscal and policy analyst at the advocacy organization Children Now.

The proposal eviscerates funding for programs that support students experiencing homelessness, rural students, English learners, and more. However, President Donald Trump would maintain Title I, which provides supplemental funds to schools in neighborhoods with concentrated poverty, at the current $18 billion.

K-12 funding

Funding for the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) is slightly higher in the budget request, but advocates are concerned that federally mandated costs are rising faster than federal funding.

Manwaring said special education, for instance, is “one of the fastest growing costs for school districts,” due to a rise in students being screened and diagnosed with disabilities, plus costs associated with the resources provided.

The budget request lists funding for special education as an “increased investment,” but a consolidation of various programs supporting students with disabilities ultimately amounts to flat funding.

This type of funding “is further reducing the federal government’s role in supporting special education” because it does not account for variables such as cost-of-living increases, costs of salaries and benefits for educators, a rise in disabled student populations, and other such changes, Manwaring said.

At risk of elimination are hundreds of millions for programs that support the education of migrant students, teacher training, education research and English learners.

The proposal includes pooling together 18 grant programs currently funded at about $6.5 billion into a single $2 billion block grant. It is titled K-12 Simplified Funding Program and the administration argues it will allow states and local education agencies flexibility in how funding is allocated.

Those 18 programs include:
- Education for Homeless Children and Youths (EHCY)
- Assistance for Arts in Education
- Statewide Family Engagement Centers
- American Civics and History Education
- Comprehensive Literacy State Development
Advocates say the consolidation amounts to elimination.

“It’s just another way of saying ‘we’re eliminating funding,’” said Barbara Duffield, executive director of SchoolHouse Connection. “Whether the funding is zeroed out because the line item is zeroed out or whether it’s zeroed out because supposedly it’s put into a new block grant, the program doesn’t exist anymore.”

Part of the problem with the consolidation plan is the removal of targeted funding, she added.

California’s Local Control Funding Formula, or LCFF, provides an example of how the federal consolidation plan could play out: While schools receive funding for several vulnerable student groups, the stream is not only often limited in how it can be spent, but is also shared among students with widely varying needs. This has historically led to insufficient funding for students who require much greater support, according to the Learning Policy Institute.

Lack of targeted funding for vulnerable student groups, such as students experiencing homelessness, fails to address the specific types of support that students may need in order to keep attending school, Duffield added.

“Who’s doing the outreach and awareness? Who’s going knocking on the doors of motels? Who’s going to shelters?” she asked, listing a multitude of tasks that homeless liaisons, funded in part with federal dollars, take care of.

Students experiencing homelessness are one student group with a specific federal policy outlining supports that schools are required to offer. In their case, it’s the McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act.

Advocates are raising questions about whether the proposed funding changes could impact other federal policies.

“Will the requirement go away if the funding goes away? That is where the ambiguity of what the information that’s been shared so far is: Will there be changes in law that accompany changes in budget?” Manwaring said.

How higher education is faring

California college leaders said the proposed changes and cuts to federal financial aid programs, including TRIO programs, the Pell Grant, and federal work-study, would make it more difficult for students to enroll and complete their degrees.

TRIO programs — such as Upward Bound, Veterans Upward Bound, and McNair Post-Baccalaureate Achievement — aim to help disadvantaged students enroll in and complete college. Its funding, over $1 billion across 10 programs, would be fully eliminated.

In project year 2024-25, TRIO funded almost 450 projects in California, according to an EdSource analysis of grant award data for all eight TRIO program types published by the U.S. Department of Education. Together, projects in California received about $150 million to engage more than 100,000 student participants and train 556 staff members.

The White House proposal would also reduce the maximum Pell Grant by 23% — nearly $1,700 — from $7,395 to $5,710. The administration defends the proposed cut, saying that not reducing the maximum amount “would put the program in an untenable financial position,” and contends that the maximum award will still cover the average full amount of in-state tuition and fees for community college students. The budget summary says that overall funding levels have not kept up with broader eligibility requirements approved by former President Joe Biden.

The proposed cut to the Pell maximum grant is the first in more than 30 years and certainly the largest by far in the more than 50 years of the program’s existence, according to federal records. Very modest reductions to the maximum award were made in 1993 and in the early 1980s.

Additional changes imposed in the House’s reconciliation bill would strip any Pell Grant eligibility from many part-time students and change the number of minimum credits students need to get the maximum award from 12 credits per term to 15.

Such a large reduction in the maximum grant would be “troubling” and, together with the possible eligibility changes, would mostly impact low-income students and shut off more of them to the financial aid they need to attend college, said Allie Bidwell Arcese, senior director of strategic communications and engagement for the National Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators.

In California, 24% of community college students, 35% of University of California undergraduates and about 42% of California State University students receive a Pell Grant, which is available to low-income students.

The White House proposal would also reduce funding for Federal Work-Study by $980 million and eliminate the Federal Supplemental Educational Opportunity Grant. Those changes would be less impactful to California students but still significant. To employ students in work-study jobs, colleges would have to put up 75% of their pay; currently, they contribute only 25%. With both the CSU and UC already facing cuts in federal and state funding for next year, it’s unclear whether they could afford such an increase in matching money to sustain work study at current levels.

More than 41,000 students in California participated in the Federal Work-Study program in the 2022-23 award year, according to an EdSource analysis of Federal Student Aid data. Their earnings include almost $95 million in federal compensation.

In addition, more than 252,000 California students received Federal Supplemental Educational Opportunity Grants. The federal share of those awards was about $131 million.

In the San Diego Community College District, more than 12,000 students receive a Pell Grant. The proposals put forth in the White House’s budget request and the House reconciliation bill would have devastating impacts on the district’s students, said Chancellor Gregory Smith.

Roughly 4,000 students in the district get the maximum award and would lose out on about more than $1,500 annually. An additional 4,500 students take fewer than eight credits and could forgo their Pell Grants entirely under the House’s bill. Smith said he expects many of those students will end up dropping out if the proposed changes are enacted.

“The likelihood of many of them being able to complete college would be very low,” he said. “So many of our students are in difficult financial circumstances. One bad break — car breaks down — or a medical emergency — will likely force them to have to stop their education.”

At CSU, where more than $1 billion in Pell Grants was distributed to more than 200,000 students in 2023-24, officials estimate that 60% of Pell recipients would see their awards reduced or eliminated altogether under the White House proposal.

A number of CSU students also stand to lose out if the cuts to the opportunity grants and work-study are enacted. Almost 40,000 students were awarded the opportunity grants, and 6,300 participated in Federal Work-Study in 2023-24.

At UC, students and officials in recent years have advocated for the maximum Pell Grant to be doubled, arguing that the current ceiling for the award doesn’t meet student needs and forces many to take out loans. UC was thus “deeply concerned” about the White House proposal, said UC spokesperson Omar Rodriguez, particularly as the system also deals with disruptions to federal research funding.
Source link
05/06/2025
‘Serving adult learners’: California community colleges are expanding short-term career programs
Joanne Scott, left, practices pharmaceutical compounding, part of Mt. San Antonio College’s short-term vocational pharmaceutical technician program.

Michael Burke/EdSource
Top Takeaways

Short-term vocational certificates, especially those in health fields, are growing across community colleges.

At Mt. San Antonio College, 83% of students complete the programs on their first try.

Officials see vocational training as a way to recover enrollments, which dropped sharply during the pandemic.
Joanne Scott had been without full-time work for about two decades and was struggling to reenter the workforce. Then she learned this year about a short-term pharmacy technician program at Mt. San Antonio College in eastern Los Angeles County.

Scott, 45, is a stand-up comedian who performs about twice a week in Los Angeles, usually at The Elysian Theater in the city’s Frogtown neighborhood, but was looking for a more consistent paycheck. She and her husband have twin 11-year-old boys, and Scott wanted to contribute more.

“Obviously, being a performer is not steady,” she said.

Scott thought something in the medical field would be promising because of the high demand in the job market. She landed on the pharmaceutical program in part because it fit her schedule. The noncredit program is just 20 weeks long, and classes are during the day, allowing Scott to still perform comedy in the evenings. Students who get their certificate often enter the workforce right away as a pharmaceutical technician, either at a retail location like Walgreens or within a hospital.

The program is one of 48 short-term vocational programs that Mt. San Antonio has added in the past five years as part of an effort to serve more adults and prepare them for the workforce. Most of the new programs are in health fields, but the college has also added programs in areas such as tax accounting, welding and appliance repair.

It’s reflective of a growing trend across the state’s community colleges to target more programs at adult students who, because they often work or have family to support, have less time for school than traditional-aged students do. College officials say that enrolling those adults is one way to reverse steep pandemic declines across all populations.

Serving large portions of the San Gabriel Valley and Inland Empire, Mt. San Antonio has prioritized noncredit vocational programs because many adults in the region are interested in upskilling or finding new careers, said Martha Garcia, the college’s president and CEO.

“If we look at trends for our traditional students, 18 to 24, that population is decreasing,” Garcia said. “I’ve analyzed our demographics, and if I want to impact this community at the greatest level that I can, I need to focus on serving adult learners, because that’s where we have the greatest level of need.”

The number of adult learners in the community college system took a massive hit during the pandemic: Head counts for students age 35 and older declined by about 25% between 2019 and 2021, an even higher rate than students in the 18 to 24 age range.

Those enrollments have, however, been steadily recovering in recent years, especially among students aged 35 to 44, who are now enrolled near their pre-pandemic levels.

One of the reasons for that is the expansion of short-term, noncredit vocational programs.

The programs are tuition-free for students, which is common for noncredit programs across the state. That helps the community colleges compete with for-profit colleges and other institutions that offer their own short-term programs, often with much higher tuition rates.

The colleges also benefit because they receive state funding for students enrolled in noncredit programs.

In 2023-24, community college enrollment statewide in noncredit career programs rose to nearly 82,000 full-time equivalent students, up about 37,000 from pandemic lows and also much higher than pre-pandemic levels.

Mt. San Antonio now has 89 noncredit vocational programs, and about 83% of students who enroll complete their chosen program on the first try. That’s much better than the percentage of students who typically finish longer degree programs at California’s community colleges: Fewer than 1 in 10 students complete an associate degree or transfer to a four-year university within two years of enrolling, according to the Public Policy Institute of California.

Most of the vocational programs at Mt. San Antonio have a limited number of spots and are open to students with a high school diploma or equivalent on a first-come, first-served basis. The college’s licensed vocational nursing program has more stringent admission standards, requiring students to submit high school transcripts, write a personal statement and demonstrate basic skills competency.

On a recent Tuesday morning on the Mt San Antonio campus, Scott and other students in her program were practicing pharmaceutical compounding, a process that involves mixing or altering drug ingredients to create a medication. In a classroom on the other side of the campus, students in the medical assistant program — another noncredit vocational program — were practicing cleaning minor wounds on one another.

Many of the programs also include an externship, essentially an unpaid internship with a local employer in which students shadow employees or get additional hands-on training. Pharmacy technician students complete a 120-hour externship at a retail location or at a nearby hospital such as Casa Colina in Pomona. Students who do well in their externships often get hired right away, said Amy Kamel, the instructor for the pharmaceutical technician program.

Whenever Mt. San Antonio designs a new vocational program, it’s typically based on labor market data and filling a need, said Diana Lupercio, the college’s director of short-term vocational programs.

“One of the main questions that students will ask us is, what can I do with this? They want to make sure it’s going to lead to a job,” Lupercio said.

Other times, students enroll as a first step to a more advanced degree, like going to pharmacy school or a registered nursing program. Registered nursing programs at California’s community colleges are typically competitive, with the number of applications often exceeding the number of available spots.

Sabrina Hernandez, 29, enrolled in the medical assistant program because it seemed like a “good stepping stone” to a career in health care. Hernandez, who is considering becoming a nurse, initially attended Fullerton College after high school and dropped out to work. She recently finished the medical assistant program at Mt. San Antonio and has started applying for jobs, which she’s hopeful will give her a better sense of whether she wants to continue on her current path.

“I thought this was a good way to make sure I actually like being in a hospital,” she said. Hernandez eventually plans to return to college if she can get admitted to a registered nursing program and is hoping her new certification will bolster her application.

Scott, the pharmaceutical tech student, has some interest in pursuing a more advanced degree and going to pharmacy school, but isn’t certain because doing so would lead to a more stressful career.

For now, she is going to class from 8 am to about 1:30 pm each Monday through Thursday and hoping to land a job at a hospital, which she said she would prefer to a retail job because she’d be interacting with doctors and nurses rather than directly with patients.

“I’m just looking forward to a reliable paycheck,” she said. “All my friends are performers who are poor, and I’ve been texting them saying, ‘You gotta go back to college.’”
Source link
04/06/2025