Daily Lumina News 040522

The decrease in Hispanic-Serving Institutions and the decrease in Latino student enrollment point to a clear conclusion for Excelencia in Education's Deborah Santiago: Institutions need to invest more and work harder to serve Latino students pursuing degrees.
And even though enrollment is the sole criterion for earning HSI status, Santiago says efforts need to go beyond that. That includes doing more to determine what it actually means to serve and support Latino students, she says.

Traditionally, institutions in Florida are usually accredited by The Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Colleges (SACSCOC).
That could all change with the signing of SB 7044. If that happens, scholars worry the cost and labor of reaccreditation will potentially harm those institutions with fewer resources.

Higher education lags across open expanses of the Rocky Mountain West, where distances to campuses can exceed 100 miles and, in rural Colorado, barely half of high school graduates enroll in college.
Colorado's big universities are taking note. The universities, through their extension offices set up in counties across the state, are using their research, funding, and talent to help connect rural communities.

When first lady Jill Biden stood before attendees at the Community College National Legislative Summit in February to tell them that a proposal for a federal free community college program was dead, the mood became somber.
Even though a federal initiative is off the table, energy for free college didn't die that day. It's been shifting and transforming, finding new life at the state and local levels.

The pause on federal student loan payments has touched the lives of many Americans, but it has perhaps meant the most to the group who stood the most to gain from it—Black women, who shoulder a disproportionate share of the $1.7 trillion student debt burden.

After the California State University system formally ditched the SAT and ACT as admissions requirements last week, the state is now the first—and only—in the United States to have no public university accepting standardized test scores for admissions.
Now the system is creating a new set of eligibility criteria, the first change since 1965. The plan is to focus on student high school grades and life experiences.