Members of the higher education community with an interest in promoting college access and opportunity gathered April 14 in Washington, D.C. for the College Opportunity 2005 conference, sponsored by the National College Access Network (NCAN) and the Council for Opportunity in Education (COE).
The day-long event featured speakers and panelists from associations, postsecondary institutions, newspapers, and corporations, who focused on the issue of encouraging college participation for all students--particularly low-income, minority, and first-generation American students.
The conference commenced with an update on "The State of College Opportunity" from the COE's Colleen OBrien, Sandy Baum of The College Board, and Kati Haycock of the Education Trust.
The experts discussed the current status of higher education as viewed through the lens of opportunity and affordability, and discussed postsecondary education demographics and the challenges facing poor, minority, and first-generation Americans. NASFAA Director for Research and Policy Analysis Kenneth Redd moderated the session.
Haycock noted that in the years since the Higher Education Act was first passed, there have been several shifts in thinking about college opportunity. "In the late 60s and the 1970s, we cared a lot about poor kids," she said, noting that the emphasis on need-based aid was replaced in the 1980s and 90s by an emphasis on excellence, and a trend toward merit-based aid.
She noted that some states and institutions are tackling the problems of inequity and lack of access successfully. Haycock recommended three proven courses of action for increasing college opportunity: mandating that students participate in secondary programs that emphasize college preparation, insisting that all kids are taught the same challenging curricula, and ensuring that students--particularly those at risk of not going to college--be taught by highly qualified teachers.
At the 10:15 a.m. session, experts outlined the various federal programs supporting college opportunity, and provided an overview of the federal TRIO, GEAR UP, and student aid programs. Lumina Foundation for Education's Samuel Cargile moderated. Maria Boss, of the Cleveland Scholarship Program (CSP), discussed CSP's efforts to support various community outreach and early awareness programs, including the TRIO Educational Talent Search program, GEAR UP, numerous scholarship initiatives, and college counseling and advising services.
The lunchtime keynote speaker was Donald Graham, chairman and CEO of The Washington Post Company. Graham was one of the founding members of the DC College Assistance Program (DC CAP), which helps students who are residents of the District of Columbia--and therefore without a state college option--go to Virginia and Maryland colleges for in-state costs.
Following lunch, attendees once again reconvened, this time to hear an overview and update on appropriations, reauthorization, and college opportunity.
Jamie Merisotis, of the Institute for Higher Education Policy, and COE's Arnold Mitchem outlined the HEA reauthorization and fiscal year 2006 budget situation to date--including proposed changes to key financial aid programs such as Pell Grants and Perkins Loans, and educational opportunity programs such as TRIO and GEAR UP.
Merisotis noted that there is some preliminary evidence of a downward trend in access for low-income and minority students, and the prospects for most student aid programs in the near-term most likely include cuts and level-funding.
However, Merisotis commended President Bush's FY06 budget for the proposed increase to Pell Grants of $500 over five years, calling the move "positive and surprising." In essence, the President has called for making Pell an entitlement, rather than a discretionary program subject to overages and shortfalls, he said.
"We have to make a case for college opportunity in quantifiable terms, and show [policymakers] why supporting college access is a benefit to everybody," Merisotis added.
In his presentation, the COE's Mitchem discussed the proposed FY06 elimination of TRIO and GEAR UP, and why policymakers should opt to retain the valuable programs. "These programs were designed to address the social, academic, and cultural barriers to higher education," Mitchem said.
In an afternoon presentation, representatives of several colleges and universities discussed their commitment to economic diversity through the creation of programs designed to reduce financial barriers to college.
In particular, Vincent Amoroso and Ann Trollinger explained the Carolina Covenant program at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. Since fall 2003, the Carolina Convent has pledged to pay the entire tuition of qualified low-income students who are accepted to UNC, without requiring that the student take on loan debt. Trollinger said that since the Carolina Covenant's inception, several other major universities (including the Universities of Virginia, Maryland, Michigan, and Illinois) have made similar pledges to support access.
The moderator, Rick Kahlenberg of the Century Foundation, noted that institutions are increasingly moving toward programs like these to support economic diversity on college campuses. "You are about 25 times as likely to run into a rich kid than a poor kid on the nation's college campuses," he said.
The final presentation for the day brought together three prominent members of the press--Stephen Burd from the Chronicle of Higher Education, Jay Mathews from The Washington Post, and Lynn Olsen of Education Week--to discuss press coverage of college access.
The Post's Mathews said that at major daily newspapers there are generally two types of higher education stories: The "how can my kid get into a selective college?" story or the "will kids in the low-rent part of town get into college at all?" story.
Mathews said that education reporters "have to be more clever to get the low-income stories into the paper."
"The story has to be irresistible," he said, and gave as an example the "Posse Foundation," which takes diverse groups from urban high schools, engages them in rigorous college preparation, and then sends them as a group to some of the nation's top colleges.
The conference ended with a wrap-up by NCAN's Christina Milano and Joyce Smith of the National Association for College Admission Counseling.
By Elizabeth B. Guerard
NASFAA Assistant Director for Communications
Posted April 19, 2005 on www.NASFAA.org, the Web Site of the
National Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators (NASFAA).
Copyright 2005. Redistribution to non-NASFAA institutions is prohibited
Please submit Web Site questions or comments to web@nasfaa.org
