Obama announces American Graduation Initiative

7/27/2009 11:29:08 AM

President Barack Obama announced earlier this month a historic federal investment in community and technical colleges.  The proposed 10-year, $12 billion federal infusion is aimed at helping an additional 5 million Americans earn degrees or certificates from community and technical colleges by 2020.

The initiative consists of several components:

Community College Challenge Fund – A proposed $9 billion over 10 years for implementation of institutional reforms. Initially the fund provides grants on a competitive basis. It then evolves into a program that allocates resources based partially on formula and partially on performance/competitive grants. The fund is aimed at encouraging partnerships, building dual enrollment programs, implementing innovative remedial/developmental programming and providing wrap-around student services. The Challenge Fund implies the creation of substantial new accountability measures to assess college/program effectiveness.

Online Skills Laboratory – U.S. Departments of Defense, Education and Labor will collaborate to create online courses that will be freely available through community colleges. The Department of Education will distribute grants to institutions, including 4-year universities, to develop courses that will then be offered by community colleges. $50 million per year will be invested over 10 years. At this point it is unclear what subject areas might be covered by the online courses.

Modernization Fund - $2.5 billion for construction and renovation.

College Access and Completion Fund – Resources to invest in innovative efforts to improve retention, graduation rates and close achievement gaps. Examples include performance-based scholarships, learning communities, funding formulas based on student progress, programs for working adults, etc. These resources would come from the $9 billion mentioned above.

Much of President Obama's proposal has already been incorporated into legislation, The Student Aid and Fiscal Responsibility Act (H.R. 3221).

We will provide more information as details are available. 

Read more from Inside Higher Education.