The numbers caused concern: 6,000 students who’d registered for fall and winter classes weren’t signed up for spring. It was January, and Los Angeles City College hoped to teach more than twice that number of students starting the following month. So the school recruited more than 100 volunteers—half faculty—to call them. Not just about registration, but for a check-in.

Community college enrollment took a bigger blow than higher ed overall this school year. But as these schools continued the work of enriching lives, some honed strategies for better serving—and retaining—students.

The COVID-19 pandemic has exposed any number of inequities in American life, but probably none more glaring than the widening gap between the haves and the have-nots. A key determination between the two is education beyond high school.

This is abundantly clear in Gallup’s just-released 2020 Great Jobs Report. During the pandemic, the survey found that individuals with education beyond high school were much more likely to be in high-quality jobs earning a steady income—plus have stable and predictable hours, the power to change things about their jobs, a safe work environment, and a sense of purpose and dignity in their work.