Daily Lumina News 081821

The issue of stranded credits has captured the attention of the media, states, and the federal government, leading to a growing number of colleges and universities to either end their transcript withholding policies or use donations or federal recovery funds to pay down some students’ institutional debt.
A new report provides a voice to dozens of individuals across the country who are affected by stranded credits, with insight on the challenges they face and the ways that stranded credits exacerbate existing inequities.

How will institutions pay for a hybrid model of remote and on-campus engagement this year? Who would benefit from the federal government’s plan to cancel $10,000 in student-loan debt per person? What are the challenges community-college students faced during the pandemic?
The Chronicle of Higher Education‘s 2021-2022 Almanac offers answers, along with a glimpse of the issues and trends that colleges and universities might wrangle with in the future.

It has become clear that there is a vast and growing disconnect between state and federal postsecondary policies and the needs of today’s learners. Students are not only older than traditional college students but also more likely to be from low-income backgrounds and juggling work and family responsibilities along with their education.
Two college presidents share their experiences of serving adult learners and offer tangible steps that policymakers can take to ensure students get the skills they need to enter into and advance in high-demand careers.

In a world where virtually all good jobs require education beyond high school, new data from A Stronger Nation, Lumina Foundation’s signature report on educational attainment, highlight an urgent challenge that the country must continue to forcefully address.
Key to this year's newly redesigned Stronger Nation site: The searchable data tool has been revamped to offer fresh insights on where we’re making the most progress with post-high school education and training—and where we’re falling short.

Opportunity@Work’s mission is to rewire the U.S. labor market so that individuals Skilled Through Alternative Routes—workers and job seekers they call STARs—can work, learn, and earn to their full potential.
In this podcast, Kelcey Reed explains how his organization wants to help at least 1 million working adults in America translate their learning into earning—plus why his own personal journey inspires his work.

After a year of mostly virtual welcome weeks due to the pandemic, student affairs administrators have been busy organizing and arranging for in-person events.
But even as they prepare for students to come to campuses, institutions everywhere are also revising or restoring their vaccination and masking requirements and ramping up vaccination drives as infection rates of the much more easily transmissible Delta variant of the coronavirus continue to climb.