Daily Lumina News 080521

More than 20 historically Black colleges and universities have made headlines for clearing student debt using funds from the Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Security (CARES) Act. The move illustrates the integral and life-changing role these institutions play in the lives of not only the Black students who attend these schools, but also their families.
In this interview, four students from three HBCUs share what it means to have their debts cleared.

Jaime Barrientos, a psychology student at Los Angeles Mission College, was searching for information on fall classes when he noticed that coronavirus vaccines were being offered during on-campus registration. He hadn’t planned on getting the shot. What changed his mind? The money.
While both the University of California and California State University will require students to be vaccinated for the fall term, community college districts are choosing instead to encourage or incentivize vaccination. Some are offering money, textbooks, or other inducements to get students to sign up.

Past economic slumps have had more of a V-shape: an across-the-board dip followed by a relatively uniform and quick return to pre-recession conditions. This time is vastly different.
After the last economic downturn, Reno went all in on career and technical education. Can CTE and reinvented schools help the city weather the pandemic's K-shaped recession and avert a COVID classroom crisis?

Historically Black colleges and universities are benefiting from record government and philanthropic support these days. There is a deeper respect for the work they do with limited resources, and fights for fiscal parity within their state higher education systems are starting to pay off.
Still, higher education experts say there is no easy way to undo decades of state and federal neglect. Investment in public HBCUs is on the rise, but the legacy of inequity can complicate the reach of those dollars.