Lumina Foundation is working to increase the share of adults in the U.S. labor force with college degrees or other credentials of value leading to economic prosperity.
David Harrison shares something in common with many of the students who attend Columbus State Community College. He is a first-generation college student. It's a label that comes with its own set of challenges: Financial stressors. Balancing family needs with academics. Navigating the unfamiliar on your own.
But it's also something that gives him perspective on what community college students need and what community college can do for them.
The California State University system launched a direct admissions pilot last year, offering qualifying high school seniors at school districts in Riverside County admission to 10 of its institutions. The program turned out to be an unqualified success: The number of graduates from the district who enrolled at a CSU campus this fall jumped nine percent.
Now the system is expanding the program, thanks to legislation signed last month. One scholar says the practice may soon become the “new norm.”
Artificial intelligence is restructuring the labor market faster than colleges can update a syllabus. The traditional degree-to-job pipeline—once a reliable proxy for workforce readiness—is no longer aligned with how skills emerge, how roles evolve, or how people actually enter the AI economy. Across research labs, labor-market analytics firms, and impact-investment portfolios, a new reality is coming into focus: The future of work may run on pathways, not just credentials.
Higher education is now in position to build the infrastructure that connects learners to opportunity—guided by real-time data and regional labor demand.
Higher education works when it delivers value for students and employers alike. That means rewarding jobs that lead to career advancement, individual and shared economic prosperity, and civic engagement. But what determines a degree or credential of value? And what can be done to provide opportunity for everyone?
Lumina Foundation's Jamie Merisotis answers these questions and more in this interview about the future of higher education and jobs.
Public colleges and universities across the United States are confronting a severe financial squeeze as federal funding cuts, declining state support, and enrollment uncertainties converge to create what education leaders warn could be a prolonged fiscal crisis.
At least 15 states proposed or enacted cuts to higher education funding during 2025 legislative sessions, according to this Pew Charitable Trusts analysis. Many institutions face the prospect of layoffs, tuition increases, and reduced services as traditional revenue sources erode.
International students—who often pay the full sticker tuition price—are a crucial segment of the higher education sector, particularly at a time when the number of high school graduates in the United States is expected to drop and colleges are operating on increasingly thin margins.
U.S. colleges enrolled more foreign students than ever before in the last academic year. But leaders at newly surveyed institutions say that enrollment is now falling.
