The Great Resignation is upon us. In September alone, about 4.4 million workers walked away from unfulfilling or low wage jobs, looking for more promise, purpose, and pay. Community colleges are stepping up to offer Americans paths to careers, but the route from college to job isn’t always clear.
Nearly 40 percent of adults surveyed by the Community College Research Center either didn’t know about community colleges or weren’t sure the schools provide what is needed. Community colleges are working to increase support for adult students. But simply creating new programs and services won’t make people enroll. National Student Clearinghouse data shows a 14.1 percent enrollment dip in these institutions from 2019 to 2021, a trend that worsened during the pandemic.
Northwest Vista College has received a $75,000 Prioritizing Adult Community College Enrollment (PACCE) initiative grant from the Lumina Foundation to support new and re-entering adult learners, particularly among Black, Hispanic and Latino, and Native American students.
According to Achieving the Dream, the PACCE initiative is designed to identify and scale promising strategies for increasing the enrollment and reenrollment of adult students in high-quality credit and/or non-credit programs.
As part of the grant, the coordinating partner, Achieving the Dream, will provide technical assistance in behavioral design and sustainability of enrollment efforts, as well as facilitate peer learning and the development of a digital toolkit to share lessons with colleges nationally.
According to NVC Vice President for Student Success Debi Gaitan, Northwest Vista College is planning strategies to boost enrollments, increase community-based recruitment and enrollment, and deploy adult-focused marketing and outreach.
All five of the Alamo Colleges District Colleges have been awarded the $75,000 PACCE grant.
Perhaps adult workers are tired. Or confused by a crowded field of training and credential options.
At Lumina Foundation, we’re supporting community colleges that are prioritizing efforts to improve enrollment of adult students. Through the Prioritizing Adult Community College Enrollment grant (PACCE), Lumina is working with Achieving the Dream, Ideas 42, RPK Group and Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors to fund and support 20 community colleges in scaling efforts to increase adult student enrollment. The grant’s emphasis is on Black, Hispanic and Latino, and Native American students.
The participating colleges serve rural, suburban, and urban communities across eight states from New York to California. In total, the schools include more than 250,000 students in both academic and training programs.
These schools are just a small fraction of more than 1,000 community collegesacross the nation that offer programs and services for adult learners. But adults can’t take advantage of opportunities they don’t know about, so we must improve their paths from interest to enrollment to employment. Only then can we turn the Great Resignation into the Great Opportunity.
