CHICAGO — Jazmin Mejia went straight from high school to what she thought was the perfect fit at Loyola University, a 30-minute drive from the Chicago neighborhood where she grew up. But Mejia was quickly overwhelmed on the North Side campus of nearly 17,000 students. “The classes were too big,” said Mejia, 18. “I was struggling to ask for help.” A year later, she says college has become much more manageable. Mejia left Loyola’s main campus in favor of the university’s Arrupe College, a two-year program in downtown Chicago that offers associate degrees. Taking smaller classes with instructors ..read more

After four years battling a chain of for-profit cosmetology schools in court, and many more years struggling with debts caused by those schools, about 150 students will receive some financial relief. As part of a settlement finalized this week in a class action lawsuit, La’ James International College, which is based in Iowa, will pay current and former students who joined the lawsuit $1,500 each. It will also discharge debts those students owed to the school and make changes in how it communicates about financial aid. The suit was brought against La’ James International College in 2020 follo ..read more

This special higher education newsletter comes to you from The Hechinger Report’s executive editor, Nirvi Shah. Robert Fitzer was watching news footage of New York City firefighters rescuing people from a Manhattan apartment building on fire, a fire started by a lithium-ion battery in an electric bike.  Fitzer, the associate vice president for public safety at Fordham University in New York, looked at the calendar. It was late 2022. With winter holidays — and the year’s biggest gift-giving season — around the corner, it was possible students would return to campus in January with their ..read more

LEXINGTON, Ky. — Why do rural students have to “beat the odds” in order to get to college? That’s the question Jim Shelton asked his fellow panelists during last week’s sixth annual Rural Summit, a gathering focused on addressing the needs of rural students.  Shelton is president of the philanthropic group Blue Meridian Partners and deputy secretary of the Department of Education during the Obama administration. While rural students graduate from high school at higher rates than their urban and suburban peers, only about 55 percent go directly to college. Those who do drop out at high ra ..read more

After weeks of pro-Palestinian protests and campus unrest, another powerful symbol of higher education faces disruption: commencement ceremonies, with all their iconic images of tassels turned around and caps tossed jubilantly into the air. Now, parents and guests from all over the world are weighing whether to travel in to attend watered-down, smaller commencement ceremonies on campuses with armed guards, student demonstrators, potential graduation interruptions and arrests during protests against the Israel-Hamas war. Related: Sign up for The Hechinger Report’s newsletters! Columbia Univers ..read more

When Christina Zimmerman returned to teaching last year after maternity leave, she grappled with postpartum depression that she says could have led to quitting her job.  But her school’s onsite day care made all the difference, as she knew her daughter was just a few classrooms away. “I can be mom and teacher in the same breath,” said Zimmerman, who teaches fourth grade at Endeavor Elementary in Nampa, Idaho. “I’ve dreamed of teaching since second grade. Truthfully, it’s all I’ve wanted to do, but I also want to be there for my child.” In states such as Idaho and Texas, where funding for ..read more

Our country is facing a severe shortage of nurses, with many U.S. hospitals struggling to meet demands for patient care. By next year, we are expected to face a shortage of up to 450,000 nurses. Allied health professionals such as phlebotomists, pharmacy technicians and medical assistants are also in extremely high demand.  Unless new policies are created to help attract and train new talent, we will never have enough healthcare professionals to fill the gaps in the workforce, and patient care will ultimately suffer. I believe it is critical for policymakers to create new pipelines for health ..read more

It was one of the most significant days in the history of the U.S. Supreme Court. On May 17, 1954, the nine justices unanimously ruled in Brown v. Board of Education that schools segregated by race did not provide an equal education. Students could no longer be barred from a school because of the color of their skin. To commemorate the 70th anniversary of the Brown decision, I wanted to look at how far we’ve come in integrating our schools and how far we still have to go.  Two sociologists, Sean Reardon at Stanford University and Ann Owens at the University of Southern California, have t ..read more

WILMINGTON, Del. — Entrando a un centro comunitario repleto de estudiantes de último año de secundaria, Atnre Alleyne tiene algunos consejos para la audiencia, miembros de la primera clase de solicitantes universitarios que serán influenciados por el fallo de la Corte Suprema del pasado junio que derribo las admisiones con conciencia racial. “Hay que obtener buenas calificaciones, hay que encontrar una manera de hacer lo académico, pero también convertirse en líderes”, dijo Alleyne, el enérgico cofundador y director ejecutivo de TeenSHARP, una organización sin fines de lucro que prepara a est ..read more

Education has become a major battleground for the attempted anti-racist paradigm shift of diversity, equity and inclusion work; mirroring society, this work remains stuck in a cycle of advancement and retaliation. Education administrators at all levels need to act now to resist a rising tide of efforts against social science knowledge. That tide includes bans on state funding for teaching DEI in schools, public colleges and state agencies. Alabama just followed Florida, Utah and Texas in banning state funding of DEI work and DEI positions and programs are being restricted, challenged and canc ..read more