Lumina Foundation is committed to increasing the proportion of Americans with high-quality degrees, certificates and other credentials to 60 percent by 2025.
With the coronavirus forcing nonessential businesses to close and colleges to shutter their campuses and clinics, students in the final stages of work-based training find themselves in limbo.
Many of these individuals come from low-income families. Some programs can be completed in a year or less, which appeals to students with limited funds looking for a quick entry into a job. Those students were counting on jobs they assumed were just months away but now seem just out of reach.
Working in the intensive care unit during a pandemic is not the only thing giving Jessica Esparza anxiety these days. Her very future in the United States remains precarious: She is one of roughly 700,000 beneficiaries of Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program. These individuals could eventually lose their work permits and protections if the U.S. Supreme Court rules the Trump administration has authority to end the program.
For DACA recipients on the front lines of COVID-19, the uncertainty is an extra layer of stress as they work through an already stressful situation.
The coronavirus pandemic isn’t just an inconvenience for many of Lehigh Valley’s college students. It’s left some teetering on the edge financially, putting their academic studies in jeopardy.
The region’s colleges and universities recently responded by creating student support funds that higher education officials can tap to help students with urgent financial needs like buying an e-textbook or getting a reliable internet connection.
Stanford University senior Michael Ocon has been living in a tent in his parents' backyard. After his college closed because of the coronavirus pandemic, he moved to his parents' two-bedroom house.
The coronavirus pandemic has disrupted the lives of some 20 million college students, as campuses are shuttered across the nation. Many of those young people are continuing their studies through online classes.
But, the shift has affected some more than others.
