Daily Lumina News 030722

More than 2 million students attend California’s community colleges, which are often considered a launching pad for students to start a path to a bachelor’s degree.
But when it comes time to transfer to a four-year college, too few are successfully making the jump. What’s keeping students from transferring? Educators and students weigh in.

Amazon's expanded Career Choice program—which pays college tuition for the company's hourly employees—represents a movement across higher education to enroll more adult learners and increase the share of the U.S. population with some education beyond high school.
For colleges, the program puts the institution on the radar of more local students. It also helps schools more directly meet the needs of the area’s workforce.

More colleges are making concerted efforts to change long-held policies that thwart student success and degree completion.
The shift in culture is a departure from a time when students were left to sink or swim. It’s also about the practical need to keep campuses afloat as overall enrollment plummets.

President Joe Biden may have tabled his bid for universal free community college, but states and municipalities are keeping the momentum going with new or expanded programs to cover tuition.
At least seven tuition-free initiatives have publicly launched since November. Many state leaders are upping their investment in postsecondary education as a part of their economic strategy.

Colleges and universities have significantly increased their hiring of Black and Latino presidents since the renewed Black Lives Matter movement took hold in 2020. How meaningful is the increase—and will it last?
This week’s episode of The Key explores those questions and the underlying data with two national experts.

McDaniel College has a policy on legacy preferences in admissions, but it’s different from the norm.
It started its legacy program not with alumni children, but with educators’ children, in 2017. McDaniel gives $30,000 a year for four years to anyone whose parents work at a K-12 school or at a community college. In 2019, it added two other legacy programs for veterans/active-duty military and for alumni.