Monday, March 17College Admissions News

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Troubled by students she’s not reaching — ‘that no one is reaching’

Troubled by students she’s not reaching — ‘that no one is reaching’AUSTIN, Texas — Anne Fletcher worries her students won’t succeed. It’s been more than a year since the coronavirus shut down most college campuses, and many of the problems that emerged at the start of the pandemic still plague Fletcher, who teaches English and developmental writing at Austin Community College. More students than ever have dropped her courses. They’ve been battered first by the virus and, more recently, by a brutal winter storm and a major power crisis. A student who contracted Covid-19 this semester has fallen behind, but every effort Fletcher has made to reach him has been fruitless. Two of her students have been hospitalized with the virus. Several have family members who died or lost their jobs. Others...
OPINION: New leadership at the top should mean big changes for English language learners
Graduate Admissions

OPINION: New leadership at the top should mean big changes for English language learners

OPINION: New leadership at the top should mean big changes for English language learnersWhen I started my career as a fourth grade bilingual teacher, I was given two binders. One included academic standards for my state. The other was filled with the English language development (ELD) standards. My job was to ensure that my students, all of whom were categorized as English learners (ELs), met these grade-level and proficiency standards by the end of the year. This required extra time to create my own lesson plans, adapt our school curriculum and find supplemental materials to help my students connect with the grade-level content. That’s because the curriculum I was given didn’t consider their language needs and was devoid of the cultural richness EL students bring to the classroom. Twenty ...
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Ultimate Guide to College Grants and Scholarships for Minorities

Ultimate Guide to College Grants and Scholarships for MinoritiesScholarships and grants are a valuable tool for students who need funds to pay for college. These programs typically have criteria that consider your background and interests. One major category of gift awards is minority scholarships and grants. Minorities are groups that have historically faced societal disadvantages or challenges due to factors including: ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, religion, and disability. Students whose backgrounds qualify them for these awards can access financial assistance that they don’t need to pay back. Like all scholarships, minority scholarships will usually have additional merit or need based criteria for selection. Minority scholarships are offered by colleges, private organizations ...
Just Admit It: How did the 2020-21college admissions cycle go?
Graduate Admissions

Just Admit It: How did the 2020-21college admissions cycle go?

Just Admit It: How did the 2020-21college admissions cycle go?Our Top Takeaways from the 2020-21 College Admissions Cycle It’s safe to say that the 2020-21 college admissions cycle was unlike any other. Between canceled SAT and ACT exams and campus tours going virtual, the COVID-19 pandemic created several significant changes for applicants over the past year. Now that this application cycle is coming to a close, our college admissions experts are sharing their top insights about the 2020-21 season and what it might mean for future applicants. Keep reading for our team’s top takeaways and, if you’re looking for even more insights, check out the latest Just Admit It! podcast episode. An Uptick in Applications  One of the most noteworthy developments during the 2020-21 admissions cycle was ...
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Ultimate Guide to College Grants and Scholarships for Minorities

Ultimate Guide to College Grants and Scholarships for MinoritiesScholarships and grants are a valuable tool for students who need funds to pay for college. These programs typically have criteria that consider your background and interests. One major category of gift awards is minority scholarships and grants. Minorities are groups that have historically faced societal disadvantages or challenges due to factors including: ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, religion, and disability. Students whose backgrounds qualify them for these awards can access financial assistance that they don’t need to pay back. Like all scholarships, minority scholarships will usually have additional merit or need based criteria for selection. Minority scholarships are offered by colleges, private organizations ...
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Troubled by students she’s not reaching — ‘that no one is reaching’

Troubled by students she’s not reaching — ‘that no one is reaching’AUSTIN, Texas — Anne Fletcher worries her students won’t succeed. It’s been more than a year since the coronavirus shut down most college campuses, and many of the problems that emerged at the start of the pandemic still plague Fletcher, who teaches English and developmental writing at Austin Community College. More students than ever have dropped her courses. They’ve been battered first by the virus and, more recently, by a brutal winter storm and a major power crisis. A student who contracted Covid-19 this semester has fallen behind, but every effort Fletcher has made to reach him has been fruitless. Two of her students have been hospitalized with the virus. Several have family members who died or lost their jobs. Others...
First-Ever RISE Awardee Announced
Financial Aid

First-Ever RISE Awardee Announced

First-Ever RISE Awardee AnnouncedNeed a reason for celebration? In the Recognition Programs Unit of ED’s Office of Communications and Outreach, we have several of them spread throughout the year.  The newest recognition award joining the family, structured to shine a spotlight good work and ignite more positive contributions, while engaging state and local stakeholders with their federal education agency, is the Recognizing Inspiring School Employees award. In April 2019, Congress passed the Recognizing Achievement in Classified School Employees Act enabling the U.S. Department of Education to begin honoring one extraordinary education support professional annually and that fall, ED launched the first cycle of the award, with nominations from governors and state education agencies, often ...
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As a district re-opens, one middle schooler returned to school and another remained home

As a district re-opens, one middle schooler returned to school and another remained home Get important education news and analysis delivered straight to your inbox BROCKTON, Mass. — It was starting to feel like a normal seventh grade lunch at West Middle School. After several days of eerily quiet cafeteria reunions, the din from the cafeteria could be heard far down the hall. The plexiglass dividers that sectioned off the lunch tables into four socially distanced stations no longer intimidated the kids; they shouted across them — or chatted happily together in one of the quarters when teachers turned their backs. Twelve-year-old Isabella Rogers sat at one of the tables, grateful for the noise (“I like playing the drums and I like being loud”) and happy to be reunited with two...
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As a district re-opens, one middle schooler returned to school and another remained home

As a district re-opens, one middle schooler returned to school and another remained home Get important education news and analysis delivered straight to your inbox BROCKTON, Mass. — It was starting to feel like a normal seventh grade lunch at West Middle School. After several days of eerily quiet cafeteria reunions, the din from the cafeteria could be heard far down the hall. The plexiglass dividers that sectioned off the lunch tables into four socially distanced stations no longer intimidated the kids; they shouted across them — or chatted happily together in one of the quarters when teachers turned their backs. Twelve-year-old Isabella Rogers sat at one of the tables, grateful for the noise (“I like playing the drums and I like being loud”) and happy to be reunited with two...
Moving Forward with a New ED.gov
College Rankings

Moving Forward with a New ED.gov

Moving Forward with a New ED.gov A new ED.gov is coming. The transformation is already underway and includes a brand-new look-and-feel and a critical rethinking of how we effectively communicate online. The goal: a digital experience where you can find what you need, discover things you did not know, and leave feeling satisfied.  Step 1: Plan In the fall of 2019 ED began planning for the redesign of ED.gov, creating a number of internal Innovation Teams charged to lead the effort. The teams rewrote web governance policy, created new standards, and began developing the roadmap for the future. ED also hosted an open innovation challenge calling for input from across the country to help shape the design of the new ED.gov. The result was an ED.gov prototype that would define our path forward....
Record numbers of students, but no government funding rise
College Rankings

Record numbers of students, but no government funding rise

Record numbers of students, but no government funding riseNETHERLANDS A record number of over 300,000 bachelor and masters degree students enrolled at Dutch universities and universities of applied sciences for the 2019-20 academic year, according to preliminary figures released by the association of Dutch universities VSNU. The association calls on the government to invest more in higher education, so that universities can keep up with the continuous growth in student numbers, writes Janene Pieters for NL Times.The number of students enrolled at higher education institutions in the Netherlands increased by around 4%. International students now make up 20% of the student population, according to VSNU. There was a sharp increase in the number of students registering to study in the natur...
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PROOF POINTS: Why reading comprehension is deteriorating

PROOF POINTS: Why reading comprehension is deteriorating Get important education news and analysis delivered straight to your inbox The number of eighth graders who said they read 30 minutes or more a day, besides homework, declined by 4 percentage points between 2017 and 2019. Credit: Photo by Allison Shelley for EDUimages Before the pandemic, eighth graders’ reading comprehension declined substantially. Since then, scholars have been trying to figure out why their scores dropped so much between 2017 and 2019 on a highly regarded national test known as the National Assessment of Educational Progress or NAEP.  Researchers at the American Institutes for Research, a nonprofit research organization, are digging into whether kids are reading less — perhaps distracted by their ...
College Planning

Rutgers Law student government to student groups: Promote critical race theory or lose funding

Rutgers Law student government to student groups: Promote critical race theory or lose fundingCAMDEN, N.J., May 17, 2021 — Need more funding for your club at Rutgers Law School? The Rutgers’ Student Bar Association can help — but only if you put on your critical race theory lenses first.Today, the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education called on Rutgers University, home of the largest public law school in the Northeast, to rescind an SBA requirement that forces student groups to host certain ideological events in order to be eligible for student fee funding.  “The Rutgers student government is holding student group funding hostage until students commit to a particular ideology,” said FIRE Program Officer Zach Greenberg. “Students shouldn’t be forced to choose between their club’s fu...
College Students Find the Silver Lining in a Pandemic
Financial Aid

College Students Find the Silver Lining in a Pandemic

College Students Find the Silver Lining in a Pandemic It was the year of college without the college experience. No packed stadiums and arenas. No intimate, small-group seminars or serendipitous encounters with strangers. No (or fewer) ill-advised nights of beer pong and partying. It is not likely, if given the choice, that many college students would opt for the past year of distance, separation and perpetual wariness. Still, perhaps surprisingly, for many students, there was much that was gained, as well as much that was lost, in their unwanted suspension of campus life during the coronavirus pandemic. Madison Alvarado, who graduated from Duke University this month, could no longer enjoy the camaraderie of painting herself blue and the giddy tumult of Duke basketball, which to her was...