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Issues

Going to college is part of the American dream, but making that dream a reality can be a complex undertaking. According to the U.S. Education Department's Advisory Committee on Student Financial Assistance, if the gap in “the college-going rates of the highest- and lowest-income Americans were narrowed significantly we would add nearly $250 billion to the gross domestic product and $80 billion in taxes” (Access Denied PDF). On an individual level, government figures show that an average bachelor’s degree recipient between the ages of 25 and 34 earned more than $49,000 in 2001 compared to less than $30,000 for a high school graduate. Over the course of a working lifetime, a college graduate can expect to earn nearly $1 million more than a high school graduate.

Lumina Foundation for Education strives to help policy-makers reach informed decisions on issues of postsecondary education access and success, so that more students can attain their educational goals.

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Lumina Foundation issues:

• Making Opportunity Affordable — The multi-year Making Opportunity Affordable: Reinvesting in College Access and Success initiative is focused on assisting states and institutions in addressing three fundamental problems:
  Stagnant Educational Attainment. The U.S. has slipped from first to eighth among industrialized nations in degree attainment even as our economy becomes more global;
  Escalating Spending. The amount of money that colleges and universities spend to provide education to their students is rising faster than consumer prices and health care costs; and
  Eroding Quality. According to a national study, prose literacy among adults with college degrees dropped between 1992 and 2003.
• Access — Many students face formidable roadblocks to postsecondary education. Financial need, inadequate academic preparation and insufficient information block postsecondary opportunity for hundreds of thousands of capable and motivated students.
• Success — One-third of all first-year students who enroll at America’s postsecondary schools this year will not return to the same institutions next fall. Attrition rates range from a low of 5 percent at very selective schools to a high of 50 percent at some open-admission colleges.
• Adult learners — The demographics of college have shifted. Only one in six postsecondary students fits the mold of the “typical” 18-year-old who enrolls at a residential campus, stays four years and graduates with a baccalaureate degree.

Resources:

• Policy-maker resources — These resources are intended to help state and national policy-makers, education leaders, practitioners and education consumers better understand issues affecting access to a postsecondary education.
• Student Access & Success News — Read the stories of students who have benefited from policy that paves the way to access to postsecondary education. See the faces of experts dedicated to helping people achieve their potential by expanding access and success to an education beyond high school.