Daily Lumina News 081222

As community college students return to their campuses in California, many will find one new resource to count on: a hub where they can seek support in meeting their basic needs.
The resources differ from campus to campus, but most will help students with housing and food insecurity. Some campuses will also help students pay for auto insurance, find low-cost medical care, secure internet access, and apply for public benefits.

In a speech made at a conference attended by university and college presidents and other officials in higher education this week, Education Secretary Miguel Cardona called on college leaders to change how they approach student success.
Cardona also unveiled new initiatives from the Education Department to boost completion rates at historically Black colleges and other minority-serving institutions, including a $5 million competitive grant program and the expansion of the Project Success initiative.

A searing new report from a congressional watchdog says the U.S. Department of Education is slow to identify when a college closes and doesn’t always provide students the information they need to obtain a closed-school discharge of their federal loans.
Slow recognition when a college closes means borrowers aren’t informed about their discharge options until months later, limiting their ability to make timely and informed decisions about educational and financial options, the report states.

Though students come to college to prepare for a good job, they don’t always know how to find one when they leave. Employers worry about the preparedness of today’s graduates and about how to attract workers with skills for the future.
The current environment calls for a renewed focus on career readiness, experts say, one that approaches the connection between the classroom and the workplace with fresh eyes.

Hundreds of thousands of recent high school graduates are heading to college this fall after spending more than half their high school careers dealing with the upheaval of a pandemic.
In anticipation of higher needs, colleges from New Jersey to California have been expanding “bridge” programs that provide summer classes, often for students from lower incomes or those who are the first in their families to attend college. Programs previously treated as orientation are taking on a harder academic edge, with a focus on math, science, and study skills.

A new project from Ithaka S+R hopes to help students blocked from their transcripts reenroll at one of eight colleges in northeast Ohio. Called the Ohio College Comeback Compact, the program will enable students to reenroll even if they owe their former college money that led to their transcript being withheld.
The work aims to support students and show colleges that creative solutions to debts owed to institutions benefit both the institution and the student.