OVERVIEW
75,000 Degrees is a community-wide collaborative designed to increase post-secondary attainment by bringing together Mobile’s K-12, higher education, business, and community partners. This collaborative will create a sense of urgency amongst all stakeholders to double the number of citizens with post-secondary degrees/credentials by the year 2030. Achieving this goal requires the use of data, commitment of shared resources and responsibility, and transparently reporting progress.
Talent Hub
The Lumina Foundation, in partnership with the Kresge Foundation, has designated an additional seven communities across the country as Talent Hubs.
Each community will receive $275,000 from Lumina in support of local efforts to educate more people and enable community and education leaders to better meet the specific needs of residents. To date, Talent Hub investments by Lumina and Kresge have totaled more than $10 million.
Joining seventeen other communities selected as Talent Hubs in 2017, the new designees — Corpus Christi, Texas; Detroit, Michigan; Elkhart County, Indiana; Las Vegas, Nevada; Mobile, Alabama; Rio Grande Valley, Texas; and St. Louis, Missouri — were chosen based on their success in creating environments that attract, cultivate, and retain talent, particularly students. Talent Hub are expected to focus intensively on one of three populations deemed critical to meeting Lumina’s goal of raising the nation’s overall post-high school attainment level to 60 percent of working-age adults by 2025: college-age students; older adults with college experience who left school before finishing their studies; or adults with no formal education beyond high school. Read press release
In partnership with Bishop State Community College (MSI), Coastal Alabama Community College and the University of South Alabama, systemic reform is reshaping students’ experiences in enrollment, persistence, and completion. Specifically, the creation of Pathway USA, a transfer agreement between the two community colleges and University of South Alabama, is not only increasing postsecondary access but also showing early indicators of student success. Data is validating the student experience in postsecondary success at all three institutions with trends in the right direction: increased GPA’s among African-American and Pell eligible students who take more credit hours, increased persistence rates, increased co-requisite passage rates, increased completion/transfer student rates and advising reform.
Institute for Higher Education (IHEP)
IHEP’s guidebook spotlights effective strategies of the 75,000 Degrees Talent Hub to advocate on behalf of all people, particularly those disproportionately devastated by both COVID-19 and racial injustice.
Advocating for Change During Time of Crisis shares MAEF’s response in the guidebook as part of the Innovative Strategies to Close Postsecondary Attainment Gaps series.
Our Progress
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Degrees When Due (DWD)
Bishop State and Coastal Alabama Community Colleges have been selected to join Degrees When Due, a national initiative of the Institute for Higher Education Policy (IHEP), to help students who have some college credits complete their degrees.
As two of the colleges and universities from twenty states participating in Degrees When Due, Bishop State and Coastal Alabama will learn best practices in degree reclamation and provide targeted support while re-engaging students who have paused, or “stopped out,” their studies. Bishop State and Coastal Alabama’s participation in the initiative is facilitated through the Mobile Area Education Foundation’s 75,000 Degrees Talent Hub initiative.
Bishop State Community College Degrees When Due Interest Form
Press Release-Degrees When Due
Next Webinar
A Look at the Current State of Student Needs in Alabama
Earlier this year, the Mobile Area Education Foundation partnered with the Institute for Higher Education Policy to implement a survey to better understand the impact of COVID-19 on students. Students across the state completed the survey, and the results pointed overwhelming to basic needs. Join us this week to learn about the details of the survey and its results to better guide your support for students this fall.
When: August 13, 2020, 1-3pm CDT
Hosted by: Institute for Higher Education Policy
View the Agenda
Join from PC, Mac, Linux, iOS or Android: https://auburn.zoom.us/j/92233962366
Or Telephone:
Meeting ID: 922 3396 2366
Dial: +1 301 715 8592 (US Toll)
or +1 312 626 6799 (US Toll)
Unable to attend this webinar but want to keep up with future opportunities?
Sign up for future webinar updates and topics.
About the Series
As Alabama colleges and universities determine the safest strategies to welcoming students back to campus, administrators and staff face a growing challenge to meet the basic needs of students on campus and in the surrounding community this fall.
The Alabama Commission on Higher Education, Mobile Area Education Foundation and Hunger Solutions Institute at Auburn University are partnering to provide a free weekly webinar series for student services administrators and staff of two- and four-year institutions. Webinars will provide strategic for addressing student basic needs in Fall 2020 reentry plans.
Lumina Foundation features Mobile’s Talent Hub in the 2018 Winter edition of the Focus Magazine. Read Story
Lumina Foundation’s Community Partnership for Attainment (CPA) work aims to deepen the impact of cross-sector, place-based efforts to increase higher education attainment in communities and cities across the country. In 2016, Mobile, AL was one of 75 cities selected as a CPA site to assist Lumina in reaching Goal 2025 – to increase the proportion of Americans with high-quality post-secondary degrees and credentials to 60% by 2025.
College and Career Resources are available for parents, high school students, recent high school graduates, first generation college students, or transfer students.
Attainment Agenda Overview video
75K Degrees Blueprint
The 75,000 Degrees Blueprint is a post-secondary attainment agenda success plan which will guide the collective goal of doubling the number of Mobile Citizens with degrees and credentials by 2030. The 75K Degrees Blueprint was released on January 31, 2017 during a public press conference with 50+ community stakeholders present. Click on Blueprint to view.
Members of the Education Commission who were critical partners in the development and launch of the 75K Degrees goal and Blueprint
15 to Finish Campaign
Bishop State is partnering with the Mobile Area Education Foundation to double the number of Mobile County citizens with post-secondary degrees and credentials by 2030 in what is known as the 75,000 Degrees Initiative. As partners in this initiative, Bishop State Community College is encouraging students to take 15 credit hours per semester in order to graduate on time through our 15 to Finish Campaign. This campaign is designed to remove the perception that students should take only 12 credit hours per semester. Bishop State students pledge to demonstrate their commitment to fulfilling the goals of the 15 to Finish Campaign, which are:
TAKE MORE: Make taking 15 credit hours the full-time norm
SAVE MORE: Lower financial cost for students
EARN MORE: Earn income sooner through on-time graduation.
#15toFinish is one of the five Game Changers developed by Complete College America
College Affordability Training
On behalf of Lumina Foundation, the Mobile Area Education Foundation (MAEF) has been awarded a Flex Partnership with uAspire. Flex Partnerships with uAspire offer access to best-in-class webinar trainings in college affordability, designed specifically for practitioners and paired with turnkey tools they can implement with students immediately. MAEF is the first organization in Alabama to receive this partnership which is valued over $6,000.
Financial aid advisors from Bishop State Community College and University of South Alabama are teaming up with counselors from Chickasaw, Saraland, and Satsuma High Schools to participate in the uAspire training sessions with one mission in mind…increase the number of students who attend college.
FAFSA Completion Challenge
NCAN has selected Mobile, AL among 25 U.S. cities to receive up to $40,000 each for the 2018-19 FAFSA Completion Challenge Grant. Through this project, generously funded by The Kresge Foundation and Great Lakes Higher Education Corporation & Affiliates, NCAN challenges each of the grant recipients to increase their FAFSA completion rates by at least 5 percentage points for the graduating high school class of 2019. In an effort to address equity gaps, this Challenge specifically focuses on cities with current FAFSA completion rates below the national average.
The 2018-19 competition builds on the success of the original Kresge-funded 2016-17 FAFSA Completion Challenge.
Seamless Transition
Pathway USA is a collaborative program between the University of South Alabama and select partner community colleges- Bishop State Community College, Coastal Alabama Community College and Mississippi Gulf Coast Community College. This program provides a smooth transition for students to transfer to South. While students are attending the community college, they have access to a USA Transfer Advisor, on campus resources to support academic success, attend Jaguar home athletic events and much more.
WHY 75,000 DEGREES
The Finish Line Has Moved!
By 2020, 65% of jobs will require post-secondary education and training.
While graduation rates are on the rise, only 39% of students are attending college and 1/3 of them enroll in remedial courses.
Only 30.98% of Mobile citizens have a degree or credential.
To fulfill the 30.6% future job growth projected over the next 10 years, we must create 5,000 degrees/credential every year thru 2030.
The demand for physical skills has continued to decline over time. The workforce demands employees with Judgement/decision making, analytic, communications and administration skills.
AREAS OF FOCUS
* Transition from High School to College
* Disconnected Youth
* Dislocated Workers/Low-Income Adults
* K-12 to College Alignment and Collaboration
* Remedial Education
* Economic Development/Business Engagement
SPONSORS
