 My name is Kevin Kerry. I'm the Vice President of Education Policy here at New America, which is very pleased today to co-host this discussion with Washington Monthly Magazine. New America and Washington Monthly have a long time collaboration, the production of Washington Monthly's annual college guide and college rankings, which provide a different perspective on what quality and excellence looks like in American higher education. It's an interesting day to be having a discussion about the future of American higher education. I'm here in Washington, D.C., where just a few hours ago, the President Biden announced a framework for the latest version of his Build Back Better agenda, which is reported to include some significant increases in funding for the Pell Grant program for historically black colleges and universities and minority serving institutions and for college completion, but also falls, well short, previous proposals, including proposals for free tuition at all community colleges and larger investments in college completion. So it's, as is often the case, a moment of progress, but still with a great deal to think about and a great deal of work to be done. We have a great panel today. I'm the president of one of America's leading historically black colleges and universities, the director of national service and the undersecretary of education. We'll be here to talk about the Biden administration's agenda and plans for higher education. To start us off, I'm going to introduce Jamie Marisotis, who is the president of Lumina Foundation, a longtime friend and colleague, a supporter of New America's higher education work, and a supporter of Washington Monthly Magazine. Jamie. Thanks very much, Kevin. I'm really delighted to be with you. And as you said, we at Lumina have been enthusiastic partners of both New America and the Washington Monthly for more than a decade. And, you know, I think all three of our organizations are clearly committed to making opportunities for learning beyond high school, available to all. Paul Glastres, who's going to follow me on this panel in just a moment in his editor's note in this year's college guide, I think distills one of the essential questions of our time. He says what's the value of a college degree and how do we measure those institutions that provide those degrees. Paul writes that the true measure must include not only economic security, but also whether women students of color or those from low income backgrounds, reach the level of wealth attained by their more privileged white, high income or male peers. And just to today's news, and I suppose the question for today is, how do we frame the moment that we're in as, as Kevin said the breaking news about the reconciliation bill with $40 billion allocated for higher education workforce is certainly encouraging and so too is the, the top line number of $1.75 trillion. The news cycle continues to spend the narrative that this is a major whittling of where the conversations began, and that's certainly true, but these are still major and in many ways I think unprecedented new investments at a critical time. I want to be honest when the year began I predicted that at some point in the future, the combination of the major money invested through the American rescue plan. Now, possibly though again not definitively emerging as in this reconciliation would be seen in future years as a sort of 100 year flood of money, a unique alignment of resources of political urgency of immediate needs brought on by the pandemic, and of long term goals. So okay maybe it's not a flood, but this is surely no trickle of resources. And even still I think there are some huge missed opportunities here, as Kevin pointed out free community college falling out of the package tells me that the focus on the word free made people forget about the other two words, community college, which are key I think to our near term and long term recovery. The focus on the maximum Pell Grant is important but again shrank from the initial proposal, and this is the support for historically by colleges and universities tribal colleges Hispanic serving institutions and other MSIs was inexplicably paired back as well. There's also new money for completion which I think is a very important development because getting back to a completion agenda by investing in proven track practices that help more students finish their degree. It's an encouraging sign. And other details are emerging that I think we'll hear about at a later point in this, in this event toward a not insignificant investment of money at an important time. So my view is that we've made progress and we shouldn't take it for granted, but we should also recognize the unrealized historic opportunity we had this year to make a significant dent on generations worth of under investment in the people that Paul mentioned in his in his column. These are the workers and families and Americans living in poverty, people who've been crushed by a combination of a global pandemic, political inaction and a rapidly changing world where talent, talent needed to power the human work ecosystem that's rapidly emerging is desperately needed. What we're missing in this policy discussion I think is the real moment of inflection we're at in this post vaccine COVID environment. One that paints a clear and sober picture of who those worker learners are and the historic and contemporary disregard for their futures that I think reflects our collective failure as a society. Many of today's students are older than 25 40% of 10 part time, two thirds are working while attending school. There's currently 36 million adults in the US with some college experience but no degree, and over 50 million adults with only a high school diploma. Many of these students are black, indigenous and people of color. They have families with low incomes. Many of them work and care for family members, more than half of all post secondary students are enrolled in community college associate degree or certificate programs. Our public two year system plays an enormous role in providing opportunity to many of these students, yet community colleges face a revenue gap of $78 billion compared to four year public institutions. With more than one third of all undergraduate students community colleges receive only about $8700 per full time student, roughly half of the 17,500 in revenue that four year institutions take into educate each student every year. These gaps mean that community colleges have significantly fewer resources to invest in student success, which I think compounds and equities across the higher ed system. So many of these schools serve a high proportion of those low income students, students of color first generation students and students who work while enrolled that Paul mentions today community college enrollment account for more than one half of all native American and Hispanic undergraduates, more than 40% of black undergraduates and 38% of Asian undergraduates. The number of students come from families earning less than $20,000 and nearly 70% of families earn less than $50,000. So today's framework announcement is much smaller I think largely because the debate centered on how to pay for it, rather than what it might achieve. In fact, we're going to need to continue to focus on the urgent need to address climate change to improve the lives of young children to improve health care for millions of Americans who've been devastated by a global pandemic, and to invest in the development and deployment of human talent that will power economy and strengthen our democracy at a time of equally urgent need. I'm leaning kind of hard on the doom and gloom button here so let me also say that, even despite these justified feelings of frustration, I still see some promising paths forward. There remain huge significant investments from the American rescue plan that directly and indirectly support students and workers. That's real money that's already out there making a difference. There's still plenty more to be done with those programs. New resources will add to that which is incredibly important. Right some time there's a great deal that needs to be done that can be accomplished with little or no new investment. One example is how we organize the governmental entities that deploy these monies and provide data technical assistance and coordination. We've seen some states, Oregon and Missouri somewhat informally Indiana more formally coordinate their workforce agencies and their higher education offices in a manner that promotes the idea that talent development is this holistic community, and that workers don't think of these two things differently. They just want to access the necessary skill and development to get a good job in advance, and we should approach policy in the same fashion. And maybe the upside upshot of this question is something that we're going to talk about a little later in this meeting about who's deserving of public support for higher learning with a new opening to discuss tying public scholarships to an expansion to national service, an idea that both Paul and I have long embraced tying college support to national service has the added benefit of tapping people's creativity and other capacities, in ways that prepare them for work of the future, while also binding them together through a shared experience. It's worth noting that a AmeriCorps got a hefty billion dollar budget increase in the ARP. So it's a good start. It's a new civilian climate core that aims to put disadvantaged young people military veterans and others to work on environmental projects, while building skills that will help them get jobs in a green energy economy may yet now pass or in the near future. So all of this brings me back to the beginning, the value of a degree, the measures we use to determine which institutions are doing best at delivering on the promise of educational opportunity. These questions need to be answered through the lens of who's being served, and how well institutions serve those who've been poorly served, because in the end, the value has to be measured not just in the wages of learners, but in the equity the outcomes they've achieved as a result of their learning individual wealth and prosperity, and the ability to contribute to our collective well being as democratic citizens, living in a rapidly changing world. So Kevin, thanks a lot for the opportunity to be here and now I'll turn it over to my friend Paul Glasters. I'm delighted that you could join us, Jamie, and what you said about the inequities between different sectors of our higher education system is not only true but I think insufficiently appreciated. And, you know, you're right that the investments in this reconciliation bill have been pared down considerably over the last week or two. We all know the reason for that the Democrats who are doing this totally on their own, don't have the votes in the Senate. There were a lot of compromises that needed to be made with moderate couple of moderate senators. It's also the case that the higher education community was not 100% in agreement on the idea that the money ought to go to programs and schools or the students or the schools that support low and moderate income students and students of color. You know, the four year college, some of the four year college folks were pretty open in there, not supporting the community college free community college proposals so what was, we don't know what the ultimate details of this reconciliation bill are, but as you point out Jamie there's still a lot of money from the big investments in the spring American rescue plan. And I think one of the things that is worth pointing out is the way that Congress in the White House have directed this money. This is a change in the thinking of the federal role in higher education. You know, this is not money being spread equally to all colleges. This is money which is going to drift down to the colleges that do the best job of supporting low and moderate income students. This is a change. And if you want to know which colleges are likely to come out ahead in this, you could do worse than looking at the Washington Monthly annual college rankings because we rank colleges, based on their capacity to help students from low get into college and not only get into college succeeded graduating with degrees that don't cost too much and mean something in the marketplace. We also, unlike some other rankings. Look at things like student engagement, civilian engagement as citizens. You know the role of colleges. It's very important that colleges support the capacity to earn a good living. But it's also important that our investment in colleges as taxpayers incentivize colleges to help students become better citizens to engage in the democracy as and so our rankings measure the capacity of college measure the degree to which colleges recruit students who are in Rossi students who go on to the Peace Corps students who are in AmeriCorps, whether those students vote in elections. And we've been doing that for for almost 17 years now. And as you mentioned, Jamie, we're now seeing a moment of national service. There was a billion dollars in the American Rescue Plan, and it looks like a significant amount of money has survived in President Biden's new framework for the build back better if that bill passes in its present configuration. There could be more money flowing into America's colleges universities through national service than in some of these other programs that got stripped down. So both in terms of the purpose of higher education, what we value in a college degree or post high school degree or certificate, and literally the investments that are going to be made are wrapped up in this capacity in this effort to have have more more of our students understand service to country and and their roles as members of the democracy. So we're delighted you're here. We've got a great panel, just the right panel at the right moment. And I'm going to be introducing our first speaker. Dr. Carrie G. Dixon is CEO and Chancellor of Elizabeth City State University, a public HBCU in Northeast North Carolina that primarily scores highly on the Washington Monthly Rankings. Under her leadership the schools enrollment has risen by 40%. She's held numerous senior administrative positions at various institutions in the University of North Carolina system and earned three degrees from schools in that state so she, she knows North Carolina, and it's just a delight to have her and I'll turn this over to Kevin who's going to be asking her some questions and getting into a little discussion. And if you all have questions in the audience, please put them in the, in the chat function and Kevin and I will be, be keeping our eye on that Kevin. Thanks Paul. Thank you Dr. Dixon so much for joining us today. I'm the president of Elizabeth City State. Long gone on our radar at Washington Monthly we run these numbers every year and every year it's like way up there I think this year it's the number 13 ranked bachelor's degree college in the nation. And for a number of reasons. A large number of program students, your prices are very, very affordable some of the most affordable tuition I think of any public university in the United States. Your faculty makes significant research contributions, your students engage in public service and many of them go on to earn PhD so so tell us how do you do it, and what can other universities learn from Elizabeth City success. Well thank you Kevin and it's quite an honor to be a part of this conversation today a very critical conversation as we think about higher education institutions in our country the landscape that we're all facing right now as far as the pressures to perform and be so I'm very happy to share the story here our journey here at Elizabeth City State University, and you hit the nail on the head, you know, with a lot of things that we've been able to accomplish and where we're located we are historically black college HBC use located in rural North Carolina northeastern North Carolina the very top tip of the north as far as our state is concerned right there on the border of Virginia. And so we have been in existence for 130 years founded in 1891 as a teachers college and since then we've grown our degree programs we offer 27 degree programs. And so, you know where we're located in North Carolina very rural area we're surrounded by 21 counties that are categorized as tier one tier two county some of the most economically distressed counties in North Carolina. So access to a quality education at an affordable price is critical to our success. And so I have to commend our North Carolina General Assembly, who came up with a model for reduction of tuition for institutions in North Carolina and I'll tell you initially I'm not sure if it was going to work. There were people who were for it and people who were against it, based on the perception of a lower price, and also being perceived as possibly less quality because of the lower price. So what we found the first year of NC promise that's the name of the program the tuition reduction program and see promise that we actually started to implement it in fall of 2018. And what we found was totally the opposite. You know people are looking for a quality education at an affordable price, especially in a world where they have options. They have many, many options to obtain higher education degree credentials. And so with North in North Carolina, the North Carolina Legislature put in place NC promise where at my institution and I am one of three who are labeled NC promise institutions within the state, we offer tuition at $500 per semester for in state students and $2500 per semester for out of state students, you can't beat that price point. So a lot of our growth that you that you mentioned that we've seen at our institution has a lot to do with obtaining a quality education at a lower price, but also we had to have a part and take responsibility and couple that with strategic recruitment and being intentional about our recruitment. What we know now looking at the data is the high school graduate percentages, as far as graduation in 2022 are going to decline. And so we have to start looking at those other pipelines, adult learners, military transfer students, all of those pipelines matter when it comes to growth. And so, you know, at ECSU, we want our students to love where they live and learn. And part of that is making sure that they have the resources necessary to be successful. With our employees, we want them to love where they work. And, you know, we put a lot of effort in bringing morale up when I started here at ECSU the university was facing many great challenges to the point where some even refer to it as being on a respirator or life support. And so we've done some some really significant things around transformation and, you know, I'm often called a transformative leader now, because we've ever the do we've been able to do that in three years actually less than three years and you just don't see the type of change that we've seen here in that short period of time. But I've created a mindset around ace, I call it ace accountability commitment and excellence. And I also tell my campus community we must continue to operate with excellence without excuse. And so rowing in the same direction and making sure no one's drilling holes. That is what has been most critical to our success here at Elizabeth City State University. Thank you. It's my understanding that one of the ways that you've been able to increase enrollment is by really focusing on aviation in training North Carolina first in flight as we all know from the license plate. I don't like competition with Ohio and that status but but you got there first. And so that if that feels like a strategy that a number of successful leaders have employed focusing specializing local industry. Tell us a little bit about how how that happened. Absolutely. So at ECSU, we had a jewel right here on this campus that people weren't talking about. When I arrived on campus in 2017. There was a lot of buzz in higher education around the relevance of HBC use the relevance of higher education in general, and you know a lot of people were writing about it pros and cons but that looks like and so I knew when I came to the state I had to figure out what the niche was going to be what was going to make us different. What was going to make us unique in what we were offering and it was right there right on campus already our aviation program. The issue is we weren't elevating it we weren't talking about it we weren't investing in our aviation program. And so it became our niche I made it our signature program we are the only four year university in North Carolina offering a four year degree in aviation science. The niche was there. And so making it our signature program. We definitely elevated the visibility of this program I was able to get the General Assembly to invest funds where we owned at the time where I started here at ECSU to aircraft. We now own 12 airplanes. Our freshmen are flying as early as spread our you know as early as their freshman year. And you know in working on bringing up and leveraging the visibility of our aviation program. We have attracted people who want to come to the table and be partners and one most recent partner is United Airlines. We received a call from United Airlines and they wanted to partner one of us to be a part of their program. And we knew this was a great opportunity because the FAA has been saying for a number of years now by 2020 they're going to start seeing an influx of retirements in the aviation industry. So to to partner and to to build this partnership with the United Airlines is wonderful. It's a win win opportunity for both our students and United Airlines. And one thing that I admire about United Airlines as well is that they're not just looking for my flight students. They're looking for students in accounting and finance and business. You know they're looking at the entire operation at United Airlines and having our students have opportunities for employment. And I'll tell you Kevin. We just signed this agreement at in September and we already have two of our flight students who have gained positions at United Airlines. So I'm quite proud of that. But you know this is just a great opportunity to show what makes us unique and what HBCs are HBCUs are doing to contribute to business and industry with alumni coming out with strong credentials and strong degrees to go off and pursue their goals and their dreams and whatever industry or business they choose to do so. And so I'm quite excited about where we are with our aviation program and I do hope that your listeners and everyone continues to talk about aviation at Elizabeth City State University and continue to send us students. Those of you who are like me in Virginia if you are at some point driving to the outer banks you don't have to go too far off course to drive by Elizabeth City State and check the university out. So Am I right saying your tuition for out of state is actually lower than some in state tuition for people in Virginia. All right. Yes definitely Kevin and we've actually seen the 95% increase in the number of students coming from Virginia to Elizabeth City State University and you know and that's what I mean people are shopping around for quality and affordability and we have that right here at ECSU and as I said I commend our General Assembly for really taking a risk you know putting ourselves out there to say hey let's try this let's see if it works and it's definitely been successful and I think people are really you know looking at costs these days and really looking at what that might look like for continued credentials in within higher education. You mentioned the General Assembly in North Carolina does have a long tradition of investing in college affordability. But like a lot of states, a lot of partisan politics happening these days and higher education hasn't been exempt from that you know people with different ideas sometimes critiques of public universities. I know you mentioned a few years ago there were some criticisms of the, your university possibly even suggestions there should be a merger of some kind. It doesn't happen clearly you're headed in a great direction but as a higher education leader. How do you navigate your role in a time when even college education now seems to be caught up in this kind of ongoing partisan dispute. In 2014 discussions were being that were taking place at our legislature, mainly on the Senate side in regards to closure of this university because of some of the great issues that the university was facing. There was a significant decline in enrollment significant decline in enrollment audit findings, warning on our accreditation, and things like that that were just really not favorable for Elizabeth C State University. And now, you know those things are in the past, and you know as we continue to build a foundation for the sustainability of ECSU in the future for future generations to come. We have to work with both sides of the aisle. I mean we have to I have been bringing legislators at the state level. Congress persons at the federal level I've been bringing any and everyone who wants to come to the campus to see, because sometimes it's easier to talk about it than to actually see it in person. What I found is when they see it in person they truly understand the needs of the university, so that we can continue to thrive. And I'm really happy you mentioned enrollment. This university was as large as 3,500 students at one point. When I arrived here three years ago, we were barely at 1200 students. So you talk about a significant enrollment decline. You know it brings doubts in people's heads it brings doubts and taxpayers heads, you know we're the public university and you know we want to make sure that we're offering quality, and we're giving opportunity to our citizens. And so you know those are things that we have to take seriously. Those are things that we had to use to navigate a transformative culture here. And you know as a leader at this institution I had to make some really tough decisions, some tough decisions around personnel some tough decisions around how we do things, not using as an excuse this is how we've always done it. But more so looking at how do we prepare this university for the future. Northeastern North Carolina needs Elizabeth City State University to thrive, it needs it we are one of the main economic engines in this region. And so we need to thrive we need to make sure that we're doing what we are responsible for, as far as the operations the business aspect of running the university. And so this has been very critical for us in our success and we keep a mindset of continuous improvement. We've come a long way. I don't want to see us regress. I want us to continue to improve. And so that in itself has changed the view of some of our legislators on both sides of the aisle as far as support of this university because now they see that we're taking this seriously. We've taken responsibility and being held accountable for doing the right thing with the funding that we have and and the more that comes this way you know we have a responsibility to make sure we're intentional about usage, and that is for the betterment of this institution. And I do want to prompt our audiences members who are watching out there. If you do have questions so let our moderators know and they'll pass the questions along to me. In magazine writer Adam Harris who is actually a fellow at New America last year recently published a book called the state must provide which looks at the historical pattern of underfunding is historically back colleges and universities there are a lot of HBCUs like yours that were founded in the 19th century and have never gotten the same amount of money that other institutions within the state particularly in states that segregated students for until not that long ago. As Jamie mentions, there was a proposal from the Biden administration to significantly increase federal funding for HBCUs and today's announcement suggests that there. Some of that increases is still on the table but probably not as much as was originally proposed. So I guess my question to you is, you know, given everything you said about both the times when the university has struggled, and your more recent success. What is the opportunity that we have as a nation if we invest in historically black colleges really just to bring them to where they should have been all along. And what is lost if we don't do that. So I definitely agree. You know they're historically there has been underfunding of HBCUs in our country, as well as in my state and so you know when we think about catching up to where we should be as you mentioned at this time. You know it's it's definitely what we're hearing conversations now at the state level of federal level is definitely a step in the right direction. So we'll take time to make up for those years where institutions experience underfunding when it related to the needs of the institution to operate properly or operate apart. And so you know as I think about some of the needs we have with HBCUs. We have resource needs for programming, you know I'm very thankful for Lumina Foundation and other foundations who have provided grant opportunities for us to focus on student success, and focus on, you know the betterment of our institutions on a academic side and an academic side, but we also have capital project needs you know for a university that's been around 130 years, you know buildings don't sustain forever. And you know so we have capital project needs we have deferred maintenance you know all those things are things that are most critical to our success so when we think about these conversations at the at the federal level with the Biden administration as well as the state you know we need this funding because these institutions are producing amazing alumni are doing great things in our regions and our communities. And so the sustainability of HBCUs and more specifically Elizabeth City State University is just critical, and I even didn't know how important it was until I was on the ground here is kind of easy to talk about it when you're far away. You're on the ground you see the community you see the campus. That's when the perspective comes to, you know, realization of hey you know there are some major needs here that we need to address. So I'm grateful that we have advocates at Elizabeth City State in Washington DC, as well as here in North Carolina with our General Assembly, who did not hesitate to come to my campus, and look and see what I was talking about in the communities and the resources and why funding is important for our campuses and for ECSU. And so I'm quite, you know, optimistic about the direction that we're going. Of course, you know, more money is great. And as an investment in HBCUs, and but we have a responsibility to, we have a responsibility to be good stewards of those funds. What I mean by good stewards is we have a responsibility that when those funds come to look at our needs, prioritize, be strategic, be intentional. You know, when when ECSU received the gift unrestricted from Mackenzie Scott to our surprise that was the best phone call I've received since I've been here in three years. But we also knew that hey we have to do something to invest some of this money into our financial stability. You know this is our future. And to have a gift like that and to have a Mackenzie Scott a philanthropist who we came on her radar because she saw the leadership and the vision. I have a responsibility to be held accountable for doing the right thing with those funds and doing the right thing with carrying out the vision and strengthen in the leadership at Elizabeth City State University and I believe we should do the same with state and federal funds. Yes, I do believe that the investment is very much needed for our institutions. It is long overdue, and we need those institution, we need those funds rather to help give our students the same type of experience they would receive at any other sister institution. The amenities, the buildings, the programming, the labs, the equipment, all of those things matter to the success of our institutions as well. And so I'm just quite, you know, really optimistic that, you know, I do believe we have to crawl before we walk and we're crawling, we're making that first step, and we want to walk and then we want to run. So catch up, you know, as far as the amount of funding that these institutions, HPC use my institution, Elizabeth City State University that we need, and we need those investments because I tell my students all the time, I want them to have a great college experience and one like they're friends with 10 other institutions have and you know what really stood out to me Kevin is when I started making changes on campus and using some efforts and some funding to beautify our campus to make it look better to invest as much as I could with the resources I had. I had to be creative. The student body president at the time came and said, I want a meeting with the with the chancellor. And you know anytime as chancellors and presidents you get a call from a student body president who wants to meet with you you're like oh what did I do wrong. But he and his cabinet came to my office and they said Dr. Dixon we see progress. And I said well tell me a little more you know at that point I was excited tell me a little more about the progress you see, and it was an eyeopening moment for me, because he looked at me and he said, we see fresh mulch around the trees. When he said fresh mulch around the trees, and the students equated that to progress. I knew I had a lot to do on this campus, and there was a lot of low hanging fruit, and these students needed and deserve the very best. So I knew right then and there we could do better. And so I'm just grateful for the support that Elizabeth City State University is receiving at the state level the federal level and I want all of our HBC use to be able to receive that same type of investment, as we continue on as institutions of higher learning, and producing amazing alumni in professions that are just, you know, escalating and doing great things so Kevin thank you so much for, and for asking me that question because I'm very passionate about the funding piece, but I also know that we have a responsibility of being good stewards and using it very responsibly, as well as strategically and being very intentional with our usage and investments for financial stability. Thank you so much. I think that's a perfect place to leave the conversation. We're very grateful for you, your participation. And we're really looking forward to hearing more about the university you're flying freshman. And, and all the other great things that are happening so thanks so much for coming today it's been fantastic. Thank you Kevin. All right, we're going to now move to the next part of our program. And I'm very happy to introduce Somali Nijawan, who is the director of AmeriCorps State and National which is the largest of the AmeriCorps National Service programs, which provide grants to nonprofits public agencies and training tribes higher education institutions, and other organizations. Somali is a former AmeriCorps member herself. She developed and served as the executive director of Stockton Service Corps and helped found City Year Sacramento. And with this I'm going to turn it over to Paul Glasschrist who is going to lead a conversation with Somali. Kevin. Somali, welcome. It's exciting to have you. It's an exciting day to be talking about national service. As we, Jamie and Kevin, and I were saying, the quite a bit of money has been made it through the budget into the into the early at least into the Biden framework for the build back better. And so this is going to be a very exciting time for you for for the agency for national service, generally. Let me begin by asking you. So, you know, a lot of people watching today might not know much about AmeriCorps and related service program they don't necessarily know how they work. They are not aware necessarily that they are a source of a significant amount of tuition revenue for American colleges and universities. Can you give us just a primer. Sure. And just to start, Paul, thank you for hosting this important discussion and for the Washington Monthly's work over many years to highlight the value of higher education and expanding opportunity and building engaged citizens. These are goals that I know you and I share and that are also at the heart of AmeriCorps. So, for those who aren't familiar with AmeriCorps, quick snapshot. AmeriCorps engages 70,000 Americans of all ages and backgrounds each year in sustained service to meet critical challenges and needs in our in our communities across the country. More than 1.2 million Americans have served with AmeriCorps since its inception. Our AmeriCorps members serve in 20,000 locations across the country. They meet a wide range of community needs from mentoring to tutoring students, responding to natural disasters. In the last year and a half battling the COVID-19 pandemic, fighting hunger and homelessness and preserving public lands and supporting veterans and military families and that's just the start there's so much more that they do. So, all of our focus areas we have found that education, that focus area has been our sweet spot with more than half of our members serving in that space so again, teaching, tutoring and mentoring more than 1 million students each year. Our members are doing incredible work. And at the end of their year of service they are eligible for a significant benefit that is our Education Award. So like the GI Bill, AmeriCorps is based on a simple idea that when you serve your country, you get help for education. And after completing their service AmeriCorps members earn a Segal AmeriCorps Education Award that is equivalent to the Pell Grant. This award can be used to pay for college or technical school, or to pay back student loans. And AmeriCorps members have earned more than $4 billion in education awards since 1994. And the awards have helped Americans, you know, I think pursue their dreams of higher education by making it more accessible and affordable. And so, you know, I think that's it's really exciting that we have incredible members and this benefit. And you know, it's exciting to be on this panel today and to be speaking with and to our higher education community today. So I think just want to highlight that we see our higher education community as partners in advancing the common good. We have a long standing connection with higher education, and we deeply, deeply value that connection and we want to make it stronger. Now one way that we've started that is through our Schools of National Service initiative. So nearly 300 colleges and universities across the country have become schools of national service by offering scholarships, credit matching tuition funding for matching tuition funding or other incentives for AmeriCorps alumni. So these institutions, they recognize that AmeriCorps alumni are a valuable asset to their institution, that they bring strong civic attitudes they bring diverse skills, leadership abilities and a demonstrated commitment to service. In the Omega School of National Service, higher education institutions can attract top talent. They can increase their applicant pool, and they can show that they value community engagement so we encourage any college or university to go to the AmeriCorps website and learn more about schools of national service and how they can participate. And of course, we thank the Washington Monthly for making national service part of your annual college rankings. Well, I thank you for the plug and I will add a plug again. Schools that match their AmeriCorps Segal Awards do better on their Washington Monthly rankings. So there's something else in it for for the colleges. That's important to them and we, we urge them to do so. Those Segal Award revenues scenario were slated to rise considerably in the build back better reconciliation bill. But of course we know that the bills, it has been cut back in negotiations. Can you walk us through the latest what do we know about. Well, explain to us how just the mechanics of how these how colleges get tuition dollars via AmeriCorps and then what we what you know of where we are in this reconcile in the framework. So I'll just start by saying, you know, as we all know the legislative process is multi step so I don't want to speculate on how things will progress after today's announcement, but I can share a little bit about what what we've seen already in the course of this. In the last few months in this last year, as it relates to AmeriCorps and just the profound and historic investments that have been made and can also share a little bit about how those education awards translate to the higher education space as well. So, I think Jamie mentioned it earlier, but earlier this year Congress made a historic billion dollar investment in AmeriCorps through the American Rescue Plan Act to address the critical community needs and public health food and security and education. We've moved quickly to expand service opportunities in AmeriCorps we've raised the living allowance for AmeriCorps members. We are supporting the sustainability of our AmeriCorps grantees and we're expanding our outreach to underserved communities and individuals. So, these resources will allow us to expand our impact in new communities and make the resources and the opportunity to serve more accessible to new to new individuals and members of the communities that we serve. In addition to the billion dollars that we received through the American Rescue Plan Act, we also are partnering AmeriCorps also partnering with the CDC to develop public health AmeriCorps, a $400 million investment to respond to the public health needs of the nation and support the recruitment training and development of a new generation of public health leaders. So our application deadline just as a plug the application deadline for public health AmeriCorps is next week. And we're really excited to see the strong interest in this important initiative so you know I think these investments recognize that that America faces a series of unprecedented challenges and that we require a renewed commitment to our communities and that AmeriCorps has a key role to play. So we're excited to see how that role develops with the new Build Back Better Reconciliation Bill and you know have already seen how we're able to take action through the investments of the American Rescue Plan Act and through this initiative in partnership with the CDC. Let me let me push you just a little bit more to get, see if we can get a little bit more detail out of you. The AmeriCorps, the Segal award you said is, is based on the Pell Grant. We, we now have word from the White House that the Pell Grant amounts will go up by, you know, for the average Pell Grant about $500 to $550. Does that mean the Segal award goes up by that much. I'm not sure that I'm ready to say what that exactly looks like but you know it does, you are correct that the Segal award is determined by the Pell Grant so it is something that we will look to see how that how that plays out. And if there's 300,000 as their White House announced today 300,000 new climate civilian climate core members this new thing that that hasn't existed before. That's over a number of years I know but that's 70,000 AmeriCorps members today, 300,000 in a few years and I know that AmeriCorps, that's not all in AmeriCorps in different agencies is that right. You know, I, again, I'm, I have not been in the middle of all of it so I'm probably not the best person to speak to it but I what I will say is, it is, it is a, it is a profound investment, and we have already seen significant investments and, and it is. It is exciting for what, what this will mean for communities across the country, what it will mean for, for, for members that serve with AmeriCorps, what it'll mean for accessibility into our programs and then into the workforce and into higher education so most certainly excited to see what will be available because they are definitely big numbers and a lot of a lot of excitement about what is possible so I think we'll, we'll hold it there. Okay, fair enough now you certain AmeriCorps yourself. You told me your story in yesterday I think it was, and it's a pretty good illustration of the experience. Can you share that story, share your story with folks. Most certainly I would be happy to I, I, you know, I had the privilege of serving as an AmeriCorps member, and I served in my hometown of Chicago I served with a national program called City Year. And it was, it changed my life. I think if you had asked me 20 years ago, if I would be in this position today, if I would be, if I would have committed my life to public service I, I don't know that I would have said, Oh yeah, that's definitely where I'm going. I am the child of immigrants and, and, you know, being a first generation American means that you see the opportunities that maybe your parents present to you or, or, or, you know, that they are comfortable with and so service and volunteerism is very well important and part of the fundamental aspects of, and values of my family and I think my extended community. It was not a career path and so when I served in Chicago. My life changed. I became so much more aware of the community that I call home of the incredible people that live there, and their incredible stories and the importance of sharing those stories. I learned what it meant to be a leader. I gained such incredible skills skills that we highlight about our core members every day project management skills leadership skills all the soft skills of building relationships. And I was inspired to continue to do that work to commit to commit my life to public service to creating opportunity for others and, you know, helping communities and individuals meet their potential so it, it was life changing for me, not just in the experience but also in the benefits that I received, you know, we talked about the Education Award and what this what what the build back, what the build back better reconciliation plan might mean for what might mean for folks going forward and the Education Award meant so many things for me I was able to use my Education Award to pay off my undergraduate loans, which made me feel more comfortable taking on a graduate degree and path and so having that resource was wonderful and then also, you know, serving with AmeriCorps and serving with City Year helped me build my network. You know, again, coming from a family that was new to this country you build your network as you find it and I was able to really build an incredible network of mentors of colleagues of individuals that continue to continue to stay to teach me about the work ahead and and inspire the work that I that I do so I'm, you know, I feel very honored I feel super privileged to have served and to now be serving in this new capacity I, I think my year of service. And the opportunities to launch and lead national service programs was inspired by my AmeriCorps year and that that year continues to inspire me to devote my career to expanding service opportunities and empowering people to create systematic change so I think I feel very grateful for that. And that is, that is great we've only got a few minutes and I've got a couple more questions so I hope you can answer them quickly, but these are, you know, hearing your story reminds me of just some of the findings that I dug up and writing my story that I did for the latest issue of the Washington Monthly about AmeriCorps providing not only those who serve with these financial resources we've been talking about, but also the skills and you mentioned the networks that help them graduate what do we know from the evaluative literature about that. Here so I can give you like a quick set of stats, eight out of 10 alumni say that AmeriCorps benefited their career path. 42% of our alumni who were employed within six months of finding a six months of their service found a job through the networks and connections they had made through their AmeriCorps program and research from the from Arizona State University found that 82% of AmeriCorps host organizations hired at least one AmeriCorps member so we see, we see a lot of ways in which our members are benefiting from their experiences it relates to those workforce pathways. And, again, with our new initiative Public Health AmeriCorps we identified it as a, as one of two goals to ensure that we're supporting the development of leaders in the public health space. That's very important point I mean the, there's a great interest as you know in the higher education world in in investments that help students graduate and then find jobs. And what I found in my reporting is, is pretty strong evidence that participating in AmeriCorps and then going on to college makes that student more likely to graduate, and more likely to find a rewarding job so you know there you are. There's a reputation of with some of being a program mostly composed of higher income whites. Is that a fair characterization. You know I think that AmeriCorps is racially diverse, we are racially diverse program and we do work to make sure that we're representative of our communities but we still have room to grow. And so, you know our work is focused on our work now is focused on ensuring that our programs and our members represent the communities in which we serve, and that we are creating ways for the, for our programs to be accessible to those individuals so you know we've already started increasing the living allowance for our members through our funds through the American Rescue Plan. And we are doing some targeted outreach outreach to underserved communities and to ensure that you know we have a targeted recruitment campaign and that we're working to strengthen our post service pathways so I would say that AmeriCorps is diverse and it has room to grow. So I think that's that's probably what I would how I'd respond to that. So, so just to kind of finish up. In addition to these hoped for looks like settled upon investments in raising the Pell Grant and the civilian climate core. What else can Congress do, and what else can states do to make better and bigger programs you will receive. I'm so glad you're asking about what states can do because you know I think a great example and something that we are so excited about was the leadership of state policymakers in Nebraska, who recently passed legislation to offer in state tuition to anyone who serves in AmeriCorps, regardless of where in the country they serve, which is an incredible step, and really creates opportunity for for so many to, to serve and then access a higher education way and so I think that the President of the University of Nebraska said that it was a game this would be a game changer for their workforce, and the economic competitiveness of their state and we're really excited to see how, how other states will follow Nebraska's lead because we think this is a really great, great example of state leadership. So now we've run out of time, I've got about eight more questions I wanted to ask you but maybe, you know, offline, but I think that you know you've really given us a sense of just how important the whole National Service piece, which is important for itself and for the nation is also to those of us who care about reforming and and growing a great higher education sector in this country so thank you very, very much really and the, the, you know, as we said as Jamie and Kevin said, this is an incredible moment that we didn't plan it this way but it turned out that on this day. We have this announcement of out of the White House of the President Biden's framework for the best build back better bill and no better person to help us think about that and and talk about the intentions and and where and how that money might be spent than our next guest and it's James Quall. He is the Under Secretary of Education. He has a long and distinguished record of public service. He was the Deputy Domestic Policy Advisor and Deputy Under Secretary of Education in the Obama administration, where he, among other things led efforts to hold career colleges accountable for excessive debts, and for which he earned both victories and some scars. He also served in policy roles in the Clinton administration and on Capitol Hill, and most recently was President of the Institute for college access and success research and advocacy nonprofit dedicated to affordability in higher education and so James has been, you know, all over the issue of higher education I don't know anyone who knows the policy difficulties and promises more. So, James, you're here, the floor is yours. We want to hear what's going on and lighten us and you know after you some remarks from you, Kevin, Jamie and I are going to get a fire some questions your way. That sounds great. Thank you Paul thanks so much for having me. I'm a student reader of the rankings and the issue that the monthly does every year and higher it's just really a pleasure to be here with all of you. And I was able to catch just the end of what I thought was a really great panel discussion about how we can make sure our students not only get to college but how do they succeed once they're there. The Washington monthly guide makes clear every year there are few institutions that have as much potential to address our most pressing national challenges as colleges and universities do. They boost people out of poverty they raise living standards, they promote tolerance and understanding across our society. It's really absolutely critical to a successful democracy and while there are no silver bullets to racial inequality. What colleges and universities do as much as any institution to promote equal opportunity and help boost people up. Unfortunately though we have some work to do to take full advantage of the potential of higher education and President Biden and Secretary Cardona have directed us to think about three different crises that to work through in the area of higher education and the first is the damage, of course, caused by the COVID-19 pandemic and as hopefully the end of the public health and economic damage draws near. We have a lot of work to do to rebuild on our college campuses where enrollment has fallen by some 700,000 students students who are returning with mental health challenges academic gaps. There's been damage to the financial standing of colleges. So there's quite a bit of work to do there. And my hope is that we will take it seriously enough that we'll be able to prevent a permanent dent or permanent scar in our nation's educational attainment. The second is the student loan crisis and the reality is while student loans are worthwhile investment for many of us. Far too many students are left with loans that leave them worse off than if they had never gone to college at all. And we see the response to college cost has been rising and rising loans larger and larger loans. Many young people struggle to complete. They may not get a credential of value. And even those for whom the system works as intended, they begin their careers in a hole and may need to take years or even longer to climb out of that hole. In particular, the crisis among black borrowers should weigh heavily on our conscience and the system of student debt seems particularly challenging for them given their low household wealth or greater financial need. And we see a lot of frustration in the labor market they face and we see particularly high levels of struggling borrowers in the black community. So, you know, we're looking at how do we make upfront investments in education to make college more affordable for current students and future students. And the president announced today, his framework for building back better, which includes $40 billion in investments. There's a $550 Pell Grant increase for more than 5 million students and expanding Pell Grants to dreamers. We think this increase in maximum Pell Grant is particularly important because it'll help students cover much more of their living expenses. And we also want to make sure that we're connecting students with other services that will help them complete their education like broadband and nutrition assistance. Our president framework also makes new investments in connecting people to good high quality jobs, particularly at community colleges. And it'll expand access to free high quality preschool to more than 6 million children and make the largest investment in childcare in our nation's history. We know that childcare is a particular struggle for many older students who are often parents of their own. And we also see very long lasting benefits from investments in high quality preschool that include substantial increases in on time college enrollment. And those of us at the department are doing everything we can on student debt within the authority we do have and we've announced reforms on public service loan forgiveness a couple of weeks ago that have wiped away some of the tricks and traps that have kept people from the benefits that Congress intended, and we've announced debt cancellation for borrowers who were victims of fraud borrowers whose schools closed borrowers who became totally disabled. That's in the neighborhood of $12 billion of loan forgiveness for hundreds of thousands of students so far. The third and final challenge is one of equity and too many students, especially students of color and low income students attend colleges that don't have the funding that they need. And as a result, the students struggle to reach their goals. President Biden knows that we can't build back better unless all of our colleges are reliable path to a better life. So we're making critical investments such as investing in historically black colleges tribal colleges minority serving institutions Hispanic serving institutions. We want to develop their infrastructure and expanding financial aid at these places, and we want to make sure that students have an opportunity to go to institutions that are culturally affirming and of high academic quality and invest in leaders like Dr Dixon, and those Elizabeth City State College opportunities that they present for black students. There's also about our college completion fund, which will create a new grant program to invest in evidence based wraparound services and students supports at public and private nonprofit institutions. The truth is, you know, we know how to help students succeed at much higher rates than they do now. And the question is, can we apply the data and evidence to help those students succeed. We look forward to Congress getting a bill to the President's desk so we can start on bringing all this work to bear. And, you know, I know this is not the end of the road the President will keep working very hard for the rest of his term to build on this progress. Now, as important as these programmatic and budgetary changes are, and I would argue they are landmark changes, but alone they're not enough we have to think about changing what we value in higher education and this is where I really appreciate the work of New America and the state of the country. And for too long the conversation higher education has been about the best resources colleges in our country and those are the envy of the world. But sometimes rankings like the US News and World Reports, you know, reward institutions for rejecting students, rather than being inclusive. There's a contest that's based on an institution's superficial reputation and metrics like alumni donations don't necessarily tell us much about a college's value as we try and fight for racial equity and upward mobility. So, you know, as President Chris Eisgruber or Princeton who by the way leads the top ranked university in the US News were last week. Some colleges avoid doing difficult but valuable things, such as admitting talented lower income students who can thrive at college, if given appropriate support in favor of the easier strategies more likely to add points to the US News formula. So, orienting our colleges to value privilege as prestige, higher costs over affordability and selectivity over inclusivity just doesn't serve the interests of our nation well. So our work should and in the Biden administration it will focus on the millions of colleges students who attend under resourced inclusive institutions the local community colleges and universities that are doing tremendous work and lifting away the barrier students base on education beyond high school to creating welcoming and comfortable environments where all students can thrive. And I think work like the Washington monthly's in the new Americas, which pays a stronger emphasis on the share of low income students earning degrees and the career outcomes of alumni move us closer in that direction and it's changed the conversation and it's shown college leaders that there's more than one set of values that they can use to guide their institutions. Those of us in the Biden administration will be working hard every day to support and honor the work of colleges and universities whose missions focused on inclusivity affordability and quality. We think those schools are critical to building the kind of country we want to be so stay tuned we have a lot of work ahead of us in a long road to make that vision a reality, and I look forward to the conversation. Thank you James insightful and, as always, I want to let my colleagues Jamie and Kevin in on this and ask some questions of you I know I've got a million but I want to don't want to hog the stage Jamie Kevin, please step forward. Hey, James I have a question. The, the, you mentioned the college completion fund which was part of today's announcement. You know the original proposal was for a fund, almost, you know very large fund in the tens of billions of dollars that might have been almost akin to a like a title one for higher education I believe where we are now is a much smaller number that wouldn't really allow for that kind of like formula distribution So with a smaller, shall we say more focused college completion funds. How will the Department of Education make sure that money is maximally useful to increasing college completion. You know it's a great question Kevin and I think we're starting to think now. You know, we've had the legislative language about an hour so. We're not being very patient with us. But you know I think what our interest is is, you know we see a system that is excellent at innovation and whatever challenges are higher education system has. There's someone on a campus somewhere who's found an excellent way to do it. I think what we're not as good at is identifying that thing that works and systemically applying it to try and improve student outcomes across the board. And we're not as good at working across dope pipes whether created by federal programs or the boundaries of a particular college to try and make things more more cohesive from the perspective of a student so those are the problems we're interested in in trying to address with these resources and I think what we're going to be looking at is, how can we get the biggest bang for the buck for the money that we do that. And I was wondering, you know in my opening remarks I talked about how we should be celebrating what we're learning today in terms of what what was announced and some of the narrative obviously is what didn't happen and and also sort of much of the debate has been about where does the money come from as opposed to what what the impact is of all this work. You know, three quarters of the of the dollars that's being allocated is being reported as being between Pell and workforce which I think is really exciting. Both are just huge priorities. So the question is with the, the work around HPC us and and minority serving institutions HSI travel colleges with the work and completion some of the other efforts. How are you thinking about the other major actor in the system which is states, and how states can now or in the future be enabled and and brought into this, this important moment, because it feels like we've got an opportunity here for a different and stronger federal state partnership that I think is exciting to consider. Yeah, I think that's a really important question, Jamie and I appreciate your raising it, you know higher education has always been thought of as a partnership between the federal government and states. And yet we've seen, not only federal programs like the Pell Grant failed to keep up over time but we've seen states disinvest over time, especially during recessions and then the money doesn't come back when times are good. So it's really exciting that higher education got some economic support during the hard times. Last year and early this year I hope that becomes the new normal. But I also think we need to explore how can the federal government engage constructively with states around the things that states can do. Three quarters of our students attend public colleges and universities. So how do we think about the state role in building an equitable higher ed system, resourcing all of their colleges and universities adequately. And then, you know, helping with some of the questions like transfer and developmental education that are really beyond the power of an individual college to address. I want to pick up a little bit on what Kevin said about the completion fund. Can you give us a little, we've had the language for an hour but you thought about this, this idea for quite a long time. Explain a little bit about how it might work. And I'll give you an example that we've written quite a bit about in the Washington monthly. And that is the ASAP program, which is a comes out of a CUNY school it's spread. Thanks to grants from Lumina and others to some other colleges in other states but, you know, has really not become has not gone viral, even though I think it would because this is a wraparound a program of wraparound services for students at, you know, lower income students that has had phenomenal success at getting students to graduate. So much so that it's the ROI for the school. And it, you know, it actually goes down. Yet it requires some upfront costs. And so the way states, you know, Jamie mentioned, you know, states have their own formulas for how they allocate and what they count as as success. So long with a way of saying, using that as an example, how would this completion fund help get the ASAP program and other proven methods like it into more colleges into more states. Well, I'm glad you brought it up and ASAP program is perhaps the best known certainly the most studied. And I think is a really an important proof point that shows that, you know, even students from low income background and academic gaps can graduate at much higher rates if we make the right investments in them. And I think what's important about ASAP and there are some others coming along now which have a similar model bottom line say the course project quest. You know they start with thinking about all the needs of student path so it's not just financial but you're also trying to address the academic gaps the personal needs the career outcomes. You're really taking a comprehensive look at student needs. And then the second thing is, it's centered on some kind of human to human relationship. So these programs are really trying to build some sort of advisor or coach who knows the student well, and becomes a portal for information now the coach may focus on academics or they may focus on careers. Sometimes the program differs but they are able to help the student connect to other resources across campus. You know the ASAP program it is expensive as you said it is less expensive for graduate. It does recoup substantial portion of that investment by retaining students at a higher rate. You know I think at the dollar figure we're talking about. It's going to be hard to make a nationwide ASAP or a massive expansion of this program like we had hoped so I think we're going to need to continue to make that case to Congress. But I do think there's a lot of things that we can do to put in place some of the foundation for colleges to make those kinds of investments themselves to make sure that they're aware of the compelling evidence here. And it's not just something that has worked at one place in New York it's something that's worked across the country and we're seeing more and more examples of the strategy working. James will you say a little more about the centrality of community colleges and in the agenda, you know again looking at the framework with the significant investments in workforce and pal being three quarters of the dollars. Obviously a lot of that is ultimately going to benefit students at community colleges. I'm thinking about the, the near and longer term investments in community colleges as part of the overall agenda to achieve the outcomes that the administration is trying to achieve. Yeah, I mean, I would note we're making, you know, a lot of investments I think it's a balanced portfolio when you look at hell grants and aid for HBC use and MSIs and the student loan relief. I think there's a lot in the presence package for all sectors of higher education that said there is something particularly important I think about community colleges which serve almost half of students are open to students from all walks of life and background and there's something special to every student whether it is, you know a student who's looking to go on to earn a four year degree and a graduate degree or a student who is looking for a quick credential and a quick reentry into the job market or, or even a student who needs adult basic education or ESL services so, you know I think there's just something really American about the commitment of these institutions across our country to being welcoming and to promoting equal opportunity and upward mobility. James, am I right in saying again in reading the just announced framework that came out today that the proposal is for the increase in the Pell Grant to be limited to public and nonprofit colleges and universities, which would be a, in a way, a significant change in sort of the structure of federal student aid which has historically always been open to any title for eligible institution, including for profit colleges, can you, am I correct in saying that and can you talk about that. Yeah, that is my understanding of the legislative texts. Yeah, that the Pell Grant is prioritizes, you know the five and a half million students who are enrolled at, at public and nonprofit colleges. We know, James that the, one of the premier offerings of the Biden administration going back to campaign was this free community college proposal we know that it, couple of weeks ago the president announced, it probably wasn't going to make it into the package to in fact not make it into the package. But the White House has also said that he's not giving up. What does that mean. Well, you know, presents around for at least three more years, hopefully longer. And so we're going to have other opportunities to push our agenda on on Capitol Hill. And, you know, I know how important community college free community colleges to him personally, and I know he's going to keep fighting about it. So, you know, it's a little hard to say right now exactly what the legislative window is going to be or what the opportunity or strategy is going to be but I know he's going to want to turn over every stone to try and find ways to make progress on that idea. Can I ask a little bit more James about some of your efforts at the department on the regulatory front, what your priorities are. You've talked a little bit about the public service loans. Give us a give us some insight on where you're headed on the regulatory and front. Well, you know, I think the unfortunate situation is that federal student loans do have protections for students against fraud against permanent disability, against having low incomes and include subsidies for public service. But the reality is if you look at those programs, even when we know someone is eligible for that. Most of the students, in some cases the large majority of students don't get that assistance that's intended. So it's really important to us to try and make a to take a very close look at why that is and so on the regulatory side. We're taking a look, you know, you mentioned public service loan forgiveness will be looking to build on the temporary waivers that we announced a couple weeks ago, but we're also going to be taking a look at income driven you know what is fair to ask for student loan repayment for borrowers with low incomes. We're going to be looking at interest accumulation rules, and all of these things across the board to make sure that we're doing what we can within our authority to make it affordable to repay loans. And I think that's really going to complement the efforts of Rich Cordray at FSA to really focus on the implementation side. So it would be a mistake I think to think of this just as a policy problem, because given all the protections we have now we still prior to the student loan pause had a million people defaulting every year. So we need to think about, we need to think about whether those benefits are actually reaching borrowers as intended and be very careful about that. You know in the coming weeks we'll have more to say about some of our consumer protection agenda but we're working on putting back in place some of the safeguards against predatory practices and very low quality colleges that unfortunately were appealed by the previous administration. I think we do have some questions from the audience. One of the good things about this new technology is that if your question begins with, this is more a comment than a question it just gets filtered out automatically, and we don't even see it here. Welcome comments. So the question is, can the undersecretary address ideas for helping rural students create more higher ed pathways and legislation that ties these efforts to economic development. Yeah, I think that's really important and that is, you know, Jamie you asked about community colleges oftentimes community colleges are really anchors in these rural economies, and you know their places that a student goes to a community college and gets the skills they need for a good job they stay in that community more often than not or more often than those who go off to the four year university so I think that is another asset. Another reason that we want to build on these on these community colleges and the bill includes some $10 billion to invest in community colleges. And some of it is other other training entities are well to try to build up those job programs building on the successful tact. The success of the program outstripped I think the catchiness of the name but the tact program to create partnerships between community college and industry to create those kinds of good jobs. Point of personal privilege. James I know you have long been an advocate of better data to coming out of the Department of Education to inform researchers and and magazine editors like myself who produce rankings. The previous administration. Put out some program level data like data on like majors at colleges, unfortunately took away a key measure for us and that is meeting earnings by institution, what's the average earning of a graduate. And there's lots of other things we've long called for. The ability for the department to match data so that we on a student basis as opposed to these big surveys and we could get much more fine grain data also on race. Can you tell us just a little bit about your agenda. There at the department and whether we're going to get better data. There will be better data. It's definitely a high priority for us to look at what we're doing to the college scorecard what we're doing to the FSA data center, and we're looking for new opportunities to inform researchers and students about about higher education and about our programs I'll mention to one is that there's authorized us now to collect information about race and gender on the FAFSA, and that will give us over time, the ability to talk about student loan outcomes graduation outcomes employment outcomes in a disaggregated way. And I think that's really important I'm, you know I'm concerned that not only are there graduation rate disparities but even among graduates there are likely to be disparities among career outcomes and getting that data out there. That will help students make informed choices but also will help colleges try and close those gaps. A second step is we're creating a position of chief economist within the Department of Education we're very fortunate to have Jordan Matsudara here he will be the first chief economist and so that will be a office dedicated to data and analysis, and trying to make sure that, you know, internally decisions based upon the best possible evidence, but also keep pushing forward on an agenda to get data out and inform the public discussion. All right, I think that takes us to 330 which is the end of our event. James under secretary qual thanks so much for taking some time out of what I'm sure is a very busy day to come talk to the panelists in our audience. Thank you to everyone who is participated, our other panelists to Washington monthly long time partner, and to thank you for watching for supporting this event and our work. A lot of great work, great discussion. Thanks everyone for coming. Thanks so much Kevin.