The Massachusetts Senate has proposed free community college for all residents, but educators say an influx of new students could overwhelm the system.
The MassEducate plan invests $75 million in new spending to cover tuition and fees and creates a fund for emergency costs, like child care, which can derail a student's graduation.
Sen. Jo Comerford, D-Northampton, called the program a win for social equity and a boon for the state's economy.
"We know that earnings increase, we know health increases, we know opportunity increases with every degree that someone gets," Comerford outlined. "Beginning with community college."
The state's new "millionaire's tax" would fund the program, but educators in the state's 15 community colleges said they are already struggling to retain faculty, whose salaries are more than 50% behind those in California, the state with the cost of living most similar to Massachusetts.
Comerford pointed out the state is working to rebuild the community college system, which has been underfunded for decades. Educators said without more money to hire and adequately pay more staff, including admissions and mental health counselors, students are being set up to fail.
Claudine Barnes, president of the Massachusetts Community College Council, said her full-time members are already overworked and most have additional part-time jobs to make ends meet.
"I get the sense that they want to basically see how we weather the storm of an influx of additional students and then they might decide to give us more money," Barnes observed.
Still, Barnes argued debt-free community college would be a game-changer for lower-income and first generation students, and schools are already drawing up contingency plans should the program survive budget negotiations.
Comerford added a proposed rapid task force would work to improve staff retention and working conditions and would include educators and others from the Department of Education.
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Texas Tech University and the online public-school TTU K-12 are teaming up to offer high school students an opportunity to earn a bachelor's degree in six years.
The partnership creates the Texas Tech University College Preparatory Academy.
High school students who enroll in the academy can earn their high school diploma and get college credits by taking dual enrollment courses.
After graduation, students can earn a bachelor's degree in leadership studies in just two years at a four-year university.
TTU K-12 Principal Cari Moye said enrollment is open, and the courses begin in August.
"Lots of high school students are taking dual credit," said Moye. "A lot of them are participating in programs where they can get an associate's degree, and we just wanted to take that one step further and give them an opportunity to start right into that bachelor's degree."
Moye said students don't have to enroll in the academy to take advantage of the college credit courses.
TTU K-12 is a state-approved online kindergarten through 12th grade school. It started in 1993 and currently has an enrollment of about a thousand students - approximately 600 are in high school.
Moye said many families choose online schools because of convenience and flexibility.
In addition to traditional homeschoolers, their students have families who are in the military, live overseas, and travel a lot.
She said the self-paced courses in the academy will prepare students for their college journey.
"When you're able to take those courses in high school, you know, you're still living at home, you're not paying for those on-campus expenses" said Moye. "And it's ultimately saving you time to earn that four-year degree. So, if you're able to get two years ahead while you're still in high school, and then just have the remainder left once you get onto campus."
Students who start the program in their freshman or sophomore year can earn more than 60 college credit hours.
Support for this reporting was provided by Lumina Foundation.
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Officials at Dartmouth College say a massive campus decarbonization project will serve as a real-world classroom for students interested in sustainability.
The school is investing an initial $500 million to overhaul its aging heating infrastructure, with a goal of reaching net-zero emissions by 2050.
Dartmouth Sustainability Director Rosi Kerr said students today expect their schools to be climate-friendly spaces.
"We can view everything," said Kerr, "including this massive infrastructural change, through the lens of 'how might we leverage this as an educational opportunity for our students,' and really engage them in a process that's going to have to happen all over the world."
Kerr said some students will get hands-on experience with the various technologies required for the campus energy transition, while others will study the cultural and community impacts of the growing green economy.
Dartmouth is betting big on sustainability, and the decarbonization project is the school's largest infrastructural investment in its more than 250 year history.
School officials have set an initial goal of reducing emissions by 60% by 2030, and are adding initiatives to reduce energy consumption and improve energy efficiency.
Kerr said students see the need to prepare for a climate-impacted future.
"And also see a huge amount of opportunity in tackling climate change," said Kerr, "who see that there's going to be many jobs associated with the transition from our current ways of doing things to lower carbon ways of doing things."
Research shows the number of renewable-energy and environmental jobs grew by more than 200% over the last five years, and that demand for workers with green skills will already surpass the available worker supply by 2026.
Support for this reporting was provided by Lumina Foundation.
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The University of Wyoming is scrambling to address a major funding cut state legislators passed in a footnote to the state budget.
During this year's session, Wyoming lawmakers banned appropriation dollars from funding the University of Wyoming office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion. The office has fostered inclusivity in race, sex, national origins and gender identity since its founding in 2017, providing resources for language assistance, Americans with disabilities, religious accommodations and more.
The University of Wyoming is not alone in facing such cuts. Since 2021, more than 150 bills have been brought to state legislatures aimed at academic freedom and university governance, according to a new paper from the American Association of University Professors.
Isaac Kamola, associate professor of political science at Trinity College and director of the association's Center for the Defense of Academic Freedom, said academic freedom is vital for higher education to serve the public interest.
"The teaching and research that takes place within those institutions has to be free from external pressures," Kamola argued. "To ensure that what takes place in the classroom and in research, pursues truth wherever it leads, not where those with political and economic power wishes that it leads."
Opponents of DEI initiatives said they lead to fear and resentment but Kamola noted the office closures are among several trending threats to higher education, including banning critical race theory, weakening tenure or accreditation and mandating content.
A working group provided suggestions to the University of Wyoming on how to proceed including continuing DEI funding through private support, under a changed name or reorganizing under a different university office. Kamola observed when Texas universities took a similar approach, they were told they were in violation and a round of layoffs followed.
"We can imagine that something similar might happen, where the political operatives that are behind these attacks on DEI will want to see blood in the water," Kamola stressed.
The working group's report asserted the DEI office grounded its work in the Wyoming Constitution.
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