Low-Income Students

Every parent of college-aged kids fears the eye-popping complexity of applying for financial aid, but that complexity can actually end the college dream – and the American dream - for some students. In this In the Tank Podcast, New America Managing Editor Fuzz Hogan talks to Education Policy Program Director Kevin Carey and Schwartz Fellow Jason DeParle about some of those stuck students, and discusses how better policy can help fix the crisis.

For nearly a year, the PreK-3^rd Grade National Work Group has hosted free webinars on how to reduce the achievement gap by focusing on children’s early years: pre-kindergarten, kindergarten, first, second and third grades. The last of these webinars, Scale and Sustainability: Implications for State and District Policy, will be held this Wednesday, Jan. 30, from 3 to 4:30 p.m. EST.

In October, DC Action for Children released DC Kids Count, an “e-databook” that graphically maps socioeconomic disparities across Washington D.C. neighborhoods. The maps are detailed and elegant, and demonstrate just how segregated the nation’s capital city remains in terms of race, income, educational attainment, access to healthy food and many other measures.

As President Obama gave his second inaugural address yesterday, many of us couldn’t help but linger over these words:  “We are true to our creed,” Obama said, “when a little girl born into the bleakest poverty knows that she has the same chance to succeed as anybody else, because she is an American; she is free, and she is equal, not just in the eyes of God but also in our own.” 

In a post for the Huffington Post's Education blog, I wrote about the Early Education Initiative's event on January 14 that highlighted three promising strategies for turning around low-performing schools: FirstSchool, AppleTree's Every Child Ready and Cincinnati's

Each January, Early Ed Watch predicts where we will see the most action, innovation and consternation in the year ahead. Here are the hot spots we see for 2013. Notable is the absence of the reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary School Act, otherwise known as No Child Left Behind. Prognosticators don’t give the bill much chance of making progress this year, given stalemates between the two houses of Congress.

The Child Care Development Block Grant, on the other hand, could see some action on Capitol Hill.  Debates on how to evaluate teachers will likely continue to dominate, as they did in 2011 and 2012. And at least one topic has popped up consistently since 2010 when we started this exercise: Head Start reform via the new "re-competition” process.

Yesterday the Early Education Initiative issued a new report by Maggie Severns, “Reforming Head Start.” In addition to this issue brief on Head Start “recompetition,” readers can also access our new Head Start background and analysis page, which was released in September as part of our pre-K expansion of the Federal Education Budget Project.

They are both red states with conservative legislatures. But when it comes to investments in pre-K, Mississippi and Oklahoma have taken entirely different approaches. While Oklahoma has invested in universal voluntary preschool to all families that want to enroll their 4-year-olds, Mississippi is one of the few states in the country that doesn't spend a dime on preschool education for its population, not even for the neediest.

Academic research is sometimes said to “collect dust on the shelf.” A recently published report shows this is not always the case.

The Assets and Education Initiative at the University of Kansas’ School of Social Welfare and the Center for Social Development at Washington University in St. Louis, along with their partners, bridge this gap between research and application. By producing solid research and engaging with policymakers, practitioners, and advocates, AEDI and CSD inform policy initiatives and bring their research to practice.

Morehouse, a private, all-male, liberal arts college, is one of the most prestigious historically black colleges in the nation. With a mission to develop men with disciplined minds who will lead lives of leadership and service, and a notable alumni list that includes Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Morehouse attracts some of the best and brightest. So why has this esteemed, selective institution of higher education suddenly been forced to furlough faculty and staff? The answer proves to be both surprising and unsettling: Parent PLUS Loans.

As I’ve written here before, Parent PLUS loans have increasingly become a burden for many families. While the federal government issues these loans, they are most similar to private loans and require parents to pay a high, fixed interest rate of 7.9 percent (plus a 4 percent origination fee, for a total APR of about 9 percent). Parents borrow these loans on behalf of their college-going children, and must meet minimal standards to qualify (more minimal than for private loans).  Unlike federal Stafford or Perkins loans, there is no cap on PLUS loans. Parents may borrow up to the full “Cost of Attendance” (COA) of the institution.

Here’s the problem: Morehouse is expensive. Its COA for 2011-2012 was around $44,000. Even when taking into account federal, state, and institutional financial aid, its average net price was $23,324. For students from families with incomes at or below $30,000, the net price was $23,036. Think about that. Some families are paying more than what they make in one year to send their children to Morehouse.  And Morehouse attracts a significant percentage of low-income students—almost 50 percent receive Pell Grants.