Daily Lumina News 060123

As an alternative to affirmative action, colleges from California to Florida have tried a range of strategies to achieve the diversity they say is essential to their campuses. Many have given greater preference to low-income families. Others started admitting top students from every community in their state.
But after years of experimentation—often prompted by state-level bans on considering race in admissions—there’s no clear solution. In states requiring race-neutral policies, many colleges have seen enrollment drops among Black and Hispanic students, especially at selective colleges.

The expansion of the Second Change Pell Grant program represents more than a second chance for students who are incarcerated.
Done right, this could be a pivotal moment for higher education to also revamp the postsecondary experience for other underserved learners, including those coming from under-resourced rural areas and environments that lack college preparation programming.

Many religious colleges and universities are wrestling with thorny questions over whether to maintain their religious identity and just what that identity really means for their operations and mission.
Clark Gilbert of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints delves into the role of religion in higher education and why he believes religion is central to addressing some of the most vexing challenges facing colleges and students today.

For months, the Biden administration’s ambitious plan to discharge billions of dollars of student loan debt has been on ice, blocked by lower courts, its fate left in the hands of skeptical conservative justices on the U.S. Supreme Court.
Decision day is fast approaching. And the stakes are high, with 43 million people eligible for up to $20,000 in debt relief.

More college students say emotional stress is taking a toll on their academic success. The impact is more challenging for certain groups of students, including those with physical disabilities or chronic illnesses, those with mental health conditions, and even two-year college students relative to four-year students.
Institutions are increasingly aware of the interplay between stress, mental health, and physical health—and many are investing in wellness resources in order to get in front of what’s been described as the college mental health crisis.

Across the country, public colleges and universities have opened diversity, equity, and inclusion offices to help attract and support a broad range of students. But in recent months, those efforts have been targeted by conservative state legislators who paint them as discriminatory.
The latest state to jump on the anti-DEI bandwagon: Texas.