WASHINGTON, D.C. – The Obama administration made major cash infusions to community colleges and Hispanic-Serving Institutions on Monday through grant programs meant to spur innovation and prepare students and displaced workers for high-tech jobs that pay good money.
The largest award was the long-awaited $500 million grant to a select group of community colleges or community college-led consortiums through the Trade Adjustment Assistance Community College and Career Training initiative.
The winners include institutions or consortiums from the District of Columbia and 35 states, which will all get at least $2.5 million for training programs. States that didn’t win will be contacted by the initiative’s administrators to develop a qualifying project that will immediately get $2.5 million as well.
The grants are meant to enable institutions to expand their capacity to get students prepared for jobs in fields that range from advanced manufacturing and transportation to health care and STEM fields, said officials at the U.S. Departments of Education and Labor. The $500 million is the first installment of the $2 billion the Obama administration has pledged to community colleges.
Higher education experts say that, while the Trade Adjustment Assistance initiative may not yield results immediately, in the long term it will prepare students for jobs in areas where growth is anticipated. They also say it will reshape the way community colleges operate.
“I saw investments that are really trying to shake up the way community colleges do business in a way that’s going to align the operations better with the jobs that are going to be available to people in the economy,” said Louis Soares, director of the Postsecondary Education Program at the Center for American Progress, a nonprofit organization that promotes “progressive” policies and programs, referring to the grantees.
“There’s a lot of scale there, a lot of change in the proposals, which leaves it incumbent on the partnerships and the departments (of Education and Labor) to make sure the change that is intended takes place,” Soares added.
