This article originally appeared in the Community College Daily and is part of a bimonthly series provided by the National Council for Marketing and Public Relations, an affiliated council of the American Association of Community Colleges.​ Special events are a large part of what community colleges do. This often means competing for coverage and for donors. […]

A report from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation has sparked new discussion about simplifying the process of applying for federal student aid — a move that could eliminate redundancies in college financial-aid offices and encourage as many as 2 million more students per year to attend college. “Today’s process is complex, redundant and does […]

More than one-third of the nearly 3.6 million students who entered college in the fall of 2008 transferred to a different school at least once by the summer of 2014, according to a report by the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center. The report, Transfer & Mobility: A National View of Student Movement in Postsecondary Institutions, […]

Earlier this month, Sen. Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.) and Rep. Bobby Scott (D-Va.) introduced legislation that advances President Barack Obama’s goal of making community college available free of charge to all eligible students. How can community colleges support this bill, and what are its chances of being enacted? Martha Parham, vice president of marketing and public […]

“How Higher Education Funding Shortchanges Community Colleges,” a report released in May by The Century Foundation, says the greatest amount of money in higher education goes to the most affluent students and shortchanges community college students who, for the most part, come from low-income and working-class backgrounds. One of the report’s most discussed figures shows […]

Texas lawmakers have approved a budget that reduces funding for community colleges by 1.4 percent, leaving the state’s schools to make do with nearly $25 million less for the next two years. Steven Johnson, vice president of public affairs for the Texas Association of Community Colleges, says the state’s budget is disappointing — but it […]

A few years ago, with its 50th anniversary approaching, Miami Dade College undertook a comprehensive review of its student services. Shortly after that process began, the college received a Completion by Design grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. “While the grant was nice, it was really more of a catalyst than the driving […]

Playing up the cost-efficiency and the potential boon to area economic development can help community colleges win state-government support for year-round funding. The North Carolina Community College System is using those selling points to promote new legislation that would expand a narrow list of courses that receive funding for summer as well as fall and […]

Last-dollar funding: When it comes to a free college education for America’s students, having a guaranteed stream of revenue is as important for the funding of such programs as it is for the students who benefit from them. “The message to community college presidents is last-dollar funding,” says Mike Krause, executive director of Tennessee Promise, […]

Community college students in Nevada who stop attending class and fail because of it — either because they’re academically underwater or because of a nonacademic reason, such as a new or better job — will collectively cost their campuses millions of dollars, according to a new funding formula implemented by the Nevada Board of Regents. […]