Inlay

Certificate programs that leave students drowning in debt should not be exempt from scrutiny https://hechingerreport.org/opinion-congress-needs-to-face-the-ugly-truth-about-cosmetology-schools-that-dont-pay-off/

In the southeastern corner of the state, colleges quickly created workforce training programs in response to a promised new lithium industry. Years later, they’re still waiting for jobs to arrive.

‘It’s not looking good’: The unemployment rate for recent grads is the highest in five years, but AI is not primarily to blame — at least not yet. https://hechingerreport.org/what-its-like-to-enter-the-job-market-in-the-middle-of-an-ai-revolution/

Policies to enroll more children in algebra may be less effective than giving all children a strong start https://hechingerreport.org/strong-early-math-skills-equal-later-algebra-success/

https://hechingerreport.org/opinion-americas-public-regional-universities-paint-a-very-different-picture-of-higher-education-and-should-not-be-overlooked/

TACOMA, Wash. — Noah Herd fell in love with computers as a kid. He taught himself to fix his family’s desktop when it broke and, after learning a programming language, built a video game on his own. But it wasn’t until years later, when he took notice of tech companies offering six-figure salaries to programmers during the pandemic, that he seriously considered a career in coding. “It’s cool to build things with software,” said Herd, a 30-year-old senior at the University of Washington Tacoma majoring in computer science. “It requires more creativity than you think.”

Algebra I is known as a gateway class: Students who pass the course are more likely to take advanced math courses, graduate from college and earn more money as adults. But for many children, their path to success in Algebra I is formed years before they take the class. Third grade math scores can strongly predict which students will go on to pass Algebra I and which ones may struggle. A recent working paper analyzing test scores of over 1.7 million Texas students explored the phenomenon. It found that the gaps in Algebra I pass rates between low-income, Black and Hispanic students and these students’ more affluent, white and Asian peers can largely be traced to how well students master early, foundational math skills.

For generations, we’ve been told that higher education is the surest path to a better life. But too many students don’t feel that way, and often with good reason: They are graduating with mountains of debt and few career prospects. Last summer, Congress wisely ushered in a new era of accountability in higher education when it passed the “One Big Beautiful Bill.” Along with streamlined repayment options for student borrowers, the law includes overdue benchmarks for earnings, designed to ensure that higher education degrees leave students financially better off than if they had stuck to a high school diploma alone.

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — Like many families, Jessica and Adrian Garcia, who live in the mountain resort town of Ruidoso, had to cobble together different child care options for their son when they returned to work after his birth in 2023. Jessica, who works at the local branch of Eastern New Mexico University, and Adrian, a police officer, paid $300 a month for their son to attend daycare two days a week because they couldn’t afford full-time hours. Jessica’s mother also occasionally pitched in to care for the baby. At the time, Adrian had to bargain constantly with his boss to juggle graveyard shifts and child care, and if his schedule changed, his wife and mother-in-law both had to rearrange their own work on short notice to accommodate his.

When Imperial Valley College launched a new program training students to become plant operators and technicians in the emerging lithium industry, Corban Dillon enrolled in the inaugural class. He’d spent the first part of his career working for his family’s courier business in this part of southeastern California, but it faltered after the pandemic and the death of his father. Dillon hoped the new certificate program would give him a leg up as the industry grew to meet demand for lithium, a key mineral in the country’s clean energy transition.

As young sisters growing up in Las Vegas, we didn’t have the language to define our fascination with science. For Angel, it was an early obsession with questions about health and fairness: Why do some people get sick and others don’t? Why do some communities struggle more than others? Why isn’t there always a solution? For Lisa, it was Marvel’s comic-book character Iron Man on our computer screen, planting the seed of invention and helping others. At that point, our interests were drastically removed from a reality where much of our day-to-day life was in a state of pandemic flux.

At a time when polls show two-thirds of Americans think a higher education is no longer worth the price, Forsyth Technical Community College has a message for them. “College,” it says, “could cost you nothing.” The planned marketing slogan is a reference to the most dramatic expansion in more than 50 years of federal grants for education after high school — and the reality that few consumers know they could benefit from the kinds of programs for which hundreds of millions of dollars will be available as soon as this summer.

Harvard faculty have approved a controversial plan to overhaul the college’s grading system, including new limits on how many A’s professors can award. The goal: make an A mean something again. But the debate goes beyond transcripts and GPAs. At a moment of deep skepticism toward elite higher education, some supporters say tougher grading could also help restore trust in institutions like Harvard. In this episode of College Uncovered, GBH’s Kirk Carapezza heads to Harvard Yard, where high-achieving students worried about their futures are pushing back. And we hear from professors divided over a broader question: What are grades actually used for?

This story was published by The 19th and reprinted with permission. Tucked in New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s sprawling universal childcare plan is a little-talked-about milestone: In September, the city will open what appears to be the first free daycare for municipal workers in the country. The center, called The Little Apple, is a pilot program that could prove to be a model for cities across the country that are childcare curious, but not ready to take the big universal swing. Housed in a renovated space on the first floor of the David N.

Higher education is under siege, with many students and parents balking at high costs. In a series of op-eds, university leaders lay out their efforts to keep college affordable. This is the second in the series. Here are some recent conclusions about higher education that are drawing national attention: College is unaffordable and overpriced, highly selective and inequitable, biased and conformist. A recent Yale report highlights these as some of the main public perceptions and concerns driving declining trust in higher education. And yet, as the report correctly notes, elite private institutions like Yale represent only a sliver of American colleges and universities.