“I am a full-time college student. I focus hard on my education and make Honor Roll every semester. But since COVID-19 occurred, both of my part-time jobs have shut down. I owe my landlord $440 in rent, along with $100 for car insurance. I have no money, not even for food or gas.”

The email, written by a student in a community college in Ohio, underscores the devastating consequences of the vast inequality in higher education. Sara Goldrick-Rab, founding director of the Hope Center for College, Community, and Justice at Temple University, says the pandemic is forcing America to get real about who today’s college students are, and what it takes to help them succeed. 

McKenna Bates bought her cap and gown. She was ready to graduate from George Mason University this spring with a degree in government and international politics. Then, in the span of a few weeks, her classes went online, the school postponed graduation and Bates got a notice to move out of her dorm.

Besides disrupting life for students, the coronavirus pandemic has also disrupted the global economy. And while it changes college seniors’ living arrangements for the short term, it threatens to change the way they will live for decades to come.