Working-Class Students Increasingly End Up at Community Colleges, Giving Up on a 4-Year Degree

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Text: Pennsylvania Highlands Community College

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By STEPHEN BURD

Johnstown, Pa.

Beth Fye had always planned to pursue a bachelor's degree in nursing. But now she is not so sure. After three years at Pennsylvania Highlands Community College here, Ms. Fye is due to graduate in the fall with an associate degree and $7,500 in student-loan debt.

She never thought she would have to take out loans. In fact, in her first two years at Pennsylvania Highlands, Ms. Fye, whose mother doesn't work because of a disability, qualified for a maximum Pell Grant of $4,050.

But that all changed when Ms. Fye got married in 2004 and had a baby the following year. The government was no longer interested in her mother's income. Instead her eligibility now rested on her combined income with her husband, a mechanic at Harley-Davidson. So when she returned to the campus in the fall of 2005, she was dismayed to learn that she had qualified for only a minimum grant of $400 to help her cover $2,600 in tuition bills.

Now that Ms. Fye has taken on debt, the prospect of taking on more loans to pursue a bachelor's degree frightens her. "I'd like to go to school to make life better," she says. "But I don't want to be in debt for the rest of my life, especially now that I have a child to take care of."

With the price of four-year colleges increasingly out of reach for working-class students, more of them are turning to community colleges. Many see those institutions as offering a cost-effective way to jump-start their pursuit of a bachelor's degree — allowing them to fulfill their basic requirements at less-costly institutions before transferring to four-year colleges to complete their degrees.

Policy makers are increasingly touting this pathway for low- and moderate-income students. Education Secretary Margaret Spellings, responding to concerns about the declining purchasing power of Pell Grants, as expressed at an appropriations subcommittee hearing in March, said community colleges offered good values that could be covered by Pell Grants. To lower their costs, students could be "starting there rather than at a state university," she said.

But some higher-education researchers believe it is irresponsible to promote such an approach, noting that fewer than half of all students who enroll in community colleges with the intention of transferring to a four-year college — like Ms. Fye — ever do.

"The evidence is that students who start their college life at a two-year college are much less likely to end up with a bachelor's degree," says Michael S. McPherson, president of the Spencer Foundation and a longtime commentator on student-aid issues.

With spending on need-based financial aid flagging, these researchers worry that higher education is becoming increasingly stratified, with low-income and working-class students finding they have no choice but to start out at a community college.

Nicole A. Barry, deputy director of the Advisory Committee on Student Financial Assistance, which advises Congress on student-aid issues, says that "community colleges can be a very good option for students, as they offer a very high-quality education at an affordable price." However, she says, policy makers need to "ensure that students who have the desire can enroll at any institution, and that finances aren't determining where they end up."

Barriers to Success

Anna D. Weitz, president of Pennsylvania Highlands, says the realities of community-college students' lives often create barriers to their success. For example, she says, the majority of the students are working at part-time or full-time jobs while enrolled.

"They tend to be either young people who are working because they need to support themselves and their families," she says, "or they're adult students who work and are going to school part time."

But the lines between the types of students are increasingly blurred. "I'm always amazed when I hear about students here who are going to school full time and working full time," she says. "It just blows your mind."

According to the U.S. Education Department, more than 80 percent of full-time students at community colleges work. Over 40 percent of students at those institutions work 35 hours a week or more.

All that work is extremely detrimental to the progress of those students, Ms. Weitz says, because they tend to become disengaged from their studies.

"Students will come here and they'll run to class and then they'll run to the library to do an assignment, and then they've got to get into the car and go to work. And then, oh, by the way, they have a family," she says. "So that sense of engagement, that sense of focus, for many of them, is lost. And I think that's a major contributor as to why their completion rates are not as high."

Some higher-education policy analysts say that community colleges must shoulder some of the blame for the problems working students face. Analysts say that leaders of these colleges often discourage students from borrowing because they fear that the students will default on their loans and put the institutions' access to student aid in jeopardy. Colleges with default rates of more than 25 percent for three consecutive years can be barred from all federal student-aid programs.

According to the American Council on Education, about 28 percent of community-college students who graduate with an associate degree take out federal loans, and the median amount that they borrow is around $6,000. Comparatively, close to 60 percent of students at public four-year colleges and 70 percent at private colleges borrow, with median debts of about $15,000 and $17,000 respectively.

Ms. Weitz acknowledges that community colleges discourage students from borrowing, but says their motives for doing so are more altruistic. "We assume that at some point in their lives, our students are going to want to continue their education," she says. "But leaving community college being thousands of dollars in debt is not a good thing. It will stop many of them from moving forward."

Ms. Fye couldn't have said it better.