On November 10, 2005, then Superintendent of the Kalamazoo Public School System, Janice Brown announced--to the surprise of Kalamazoo's residents--the beginning of the Kalamazoo Promise. Fully funded by a set of anonymous donors, the Kalamazoo Promise is an urban revitalization program that offers up to four years of free tuition to any public…

Paying for college is a challenge for many Americans and navigating the financial aid process can be very difficult, especially for low-income and first-generation college students. The College Board commissioned research to learn more about students' and parents' knowledge, beliefs and attitudes about the importance of a college education and how…

Study after study demonstrates that low-income students are severely underrepresented in higher education. In fact, the attendance rate of low-income students appears to be declining rather than growing. Individual Development Accounts or IDAs used for postsecondary education can help address the problem. With an IDA, youth can afford to enroll in…

Among countless petitioners to the incoming president, higher-education leaders have sent Barack Obama position statements and requests for action that extol the strengths and accomplishments of this nation's higher-education enterprise but also warn of its increasingly dire financial situation. They have asked that a share of an impending…

Parental expectations have long been studied as a factor in increasing adolescent educational aspirations, often linking these expectations to parental level of education and involvement in academic endeavours. This study further explores this relationship in a statewide Midwestern sample of parents and their adolescent children. Regression…

Within the past 2 decades, the education services industry has been characterized as going through a period of high tuition with an increased reliance on the use of loan financing. This study examines the impact of this high-tuition, high-loan approach, especially as it relates to the role of socioeconomic status on educational choice within…

For increasing numbers of Americans, a fundamental element of the American Dream appears to be at risk. A solid majority consider a college degree an indispensable ticket to the middle class, while even more people believe college is financially out-of-reach for many qualified students. The authors of this report advocate that findings have…

Historically, tuition and mandatory fee rates of all North Dakota University System (NDUS) institutions (except the 2-year campuses) have been less than their regional counterparts. Average tuition and fee increases at NDUS institutions were significantly higher than their regional counterparts in 2004-05, 2005-06 and 2006-07, as a result, the gap…

This report is based on the Access and Support to Education and Training Survey (ASETS), which was undertaken by Statistics Canada in partnership with Human Resources and Skills Development Canada (HRSDC). The ASETS brings together three previous education surveys that covered specific population groups: (1) the Survey of Approaches to Educational…

In several high-profile speeches this year, President Barack Obama has set an ambitious educational goal: By 2020, the United States will have the highest proportion of adults with a college degree in the world. The emphasis on education in both his proposed budget for fiscal 2010 and in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009…

Policy-makers and institutional administrators have long struggled with the question of college and university student tuition fees. In many ways this struggle may be characterized as a negotiation between two distinct policy goals: providing revenue to adequately finance higher education and ensuring student accessibility to higher education. The…

This paper is concerned with the influence of student loans on the accessibility of disadvantaged groups to higher education. Three key conditions are necessary for success, but are often neglected. These are: that effective eligibility and screening criteria are in place and that pro-active targeting measures are employed to reach out to the most…

Researchers have paid scant attention to the opportunities and the barriers associated with across-state study of college-transition policies, although the American states comprise a social system especially well suited for comparative analysis. What sorts of questions should researchers ask about college-transition policies and programs? How…

Notwithstanding the expansion of higher education across the OECD, there continues to be concern about the levels of participation amongst those from disadvantaged backgrounds. In response to this, a new form of financial support for students from low-income families, the "opportunity bursary", was introduced for a limited period in…

This article talks about a new report card on higher education which suggests that, though some states have improved their grades on preparing students for college, nearly all deserve to be on academic probation for failing to keep college affordable. This message was echoed by many of the advocates, researchers, and experts who took turns at the…