Daily Lumina News 042221

After excelling in high school, Daniela Figueroa looked forward to continuing her success at Miami Dade College. But the size and scope of the institution—the nation’s largest community college, with 95,000 students—all but overwhelmed her.
Fortunately, the college’s “appreciative advising” program—and the personal bond she forged with her advisor—put her back on course.

For 17 years, Valentina Espinosa worked a housekeeping job in a hotel owned by Northwestern University. Despite, the challenges, her work became a bedrock of security and her co-workers family. Now, she may have to find a new family. In March of last year, Espinosa was laid off, as the pandemic decimated travel and the hotels that house visitors. She has been mostly out of work since then, surviving on unemployment payments.
Since the start of the pandemic, higher education has suffered its greatest job losses on record. The Chronicle set out to tell the stories of those affected.

After a jury found former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin guilty in the death of George Floyd this week, educators across the country prepared to help students make sense of this pivotal moment in U.S. history.
The verdict—the culmination of a case that kicked off a historic wave of protests against police brutality and racism—brought some relief that Chauvin would be held responsible for a death that came to symbolize racial injustice in America. But students and educators acknowledge that the verdict is far from a stopping point—and that the fight for racial justice must continue.

Many of today's college students are pursuing their dream of higher education while working—a lot—and sacrificing even basic needs. Sometimes, all that juggling works. But too often, something has to give. And many times, that something is the education that could lead students to better-paying careers and a higher quality of life.
Creative and holistic thinking on the part of Hudson County Community College aims to catch students in danger of falling through the cracks with the opening of an on-campus facility that addresses needs beyond the classroom.