Daily Lumina News 062322

Charity Machado had her first child, Cali, at the age of 15. She was determined, however, to make it through high school and then college. Earlier this month, Machado graduated from the nursing program at California State University Stanislaus.
Machado is the exception. More than half of parenting college students drop out before attaining a degree or credential. For these families, graduating during a pandemic is a special victory. Their experiences also shed light on how California could better support the growing ranks of student-parents.

College and university enrollments—particularly at community colleges—continue to plummet. Have they bottomed out? Will they recover if the economy cools off as expected? Has enrollment dropped to a new lower plateau that’s likely to be the baseline going forward?
Education and policy experts explore the reasons behind current enrollment declines and offer insight on what may be ahead.

Last year, Mott Community College in Flint, Michigan, faced every institution’s worst cybersecurity nightmare: its network was breached and taken down, users were effectively locked out, and sensitive information had been compromised.
What can other colleges learn from MCC’s experience? One is the realization that bad actors are usually several steps ahead of you.

Some students take their $65 college sweatshirts for granted. Others can’t imagine owning one. Ruby Tapia never forgot that reality.
Tapia is the chair of the Department of Women's and Gender Studies at the University of Michigan. In this essay, the scholar/activist writes about the barriers she faced as an undergraduate at an Ivy League school and how the support of several caring faculty members gave her the confidence to thrive.

Some 39 million adults under 65 have left college without completing a credential. But in the 2020-21 academic year, just 2.4 percent re-enrolled in class.
For institutions and states, understanding who, exactly, is returning to college can help them develop strategies to attract and graduate other stopped-out students.

The Pell Grant program turns 50 today. Since its creation in 1972, the program has helped more than 80 million students pursue their college dreams.
But even the grants’ greatest proponents could have scarcely imagined the impact of the program on American higher education—and society at large.