173. MVCAP fyi

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1. Help with Financial Aid as Reimagined by the MTV Generation, by Jacques Steinberg - http://nyti.ms/gN8U5r

‎"Those three ideas are the finalists in the “Get Schooled Affordability Challenge.” It is a national competition staged by MTV and the College Board, with support from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, in which current and aspiring college students were asked to devise better ways to administer and award financial aid."

2. New Research Examines Parent and Student Experiences with the Federal Financial Aid Process - http://advocacy.collegeboard.org/college-affordability-financial-aid/rethinking-student-aid/news/cracking-the-code

"Based on extensive focus-group and survey research with parents & students, the study found that nearly half of the parent respondents did not know the cost of attending a public college in their home state, & only 44% of Latino parent respondents were aware of the Pell Grant."

3. So, Students Don't Learn -- Now What? by Allie Grasgreen - Inside Higher Ed: http://bit.ly/eAoleW

‎"The book and its corresponding report document the findings of research that followed 2,300 undergraduates through four years of college, at 24 unidentified but academically representative institutions, to measure progress in their critical thinking and analytic reasoning skills. The measurement tool was the Collegiate Learning Assessment, which the students took during their freshman, sophomore and senior years."

4. The Financial Aid Information Gap, by Sam Petulla - Inside Higher Ed: http://bit.ly/dHUt1C

"The report from the College Board's Advocacy and Policy Center, "Cracking the Student Aid Code," finds that many parents have little understanding of how much it costs to attend college and of financial aid options -- and that the knowledge deficit is biggest for those who already have the least access to higher education: students from Latino families and from low-income backgrounds."

5. Texas budget draft cuts $13.7 billion in spending, by April Castro - http://t.co/sUAUhbO via @washingtonpost

"The budget draft . . . would cut funding entirely to four community colleges and would generally eliminate financial aid for incoming freshmen and new students. The Texas Grants scholarship program would drop by more than 70,000 students over the next two years."

6. Paying for College With a Duffle Bag Stuffed With Cash, by Lynn O'Shaughnessy - http://t.co/Zgl9dmU

"Do you feel sorry for Ramos? I don’t. And here’s why: If Ramos — or his parents - didn’t want to pay top dollar to attend a public university, the Sacramento resident should have stayed in California where he would have qualified for in-state tuition. Out-of-state flagships like CU are eager to admit students like Ramos, who hail from elsewhere, because they can gouge them. The tuition for Colorado residents is $8,511. For non-residents it’s $29,493."

7. College Board: Families Need Earlier Education About Costs, by Caralee Adams - http://t.co/T0zCYfg

"Knowing about the Pell Grant program depended on level of education and ethnicity. While 82 percent of African-Americans and 81 percent of Caucasians said they knew about the program, just 44 percent of Latino parents did. About 91 percent of parents with a bachelor's degree were aware of Pell Grants, 85 percent of parents with an associate's degree, and 62 percent of parents with a high school education or less, the survey found."

8. Breaking the 'Cruel Cycle of Selectivity' in Admissions, by Jerome A. Lucido - http://chronicle.com/article/Breaking-the-Cruel-Cycle-of/125935/

"For colleges, the cycle is a relentless drive for status, prestige, and revenue, in which the metrics are unequivocal: Applications must increase, test scores must rise, acceptance rates must fall, and enough full payers must attend to finance the institution's goals and aspirations."

9. The 2010 Broad Prize - http://www.broadprize.org/asset/0-30largedistsbetterperform2010.pdf

"30 Large Urban School Districts Show Better Relative Academic Performance Than Their States for African-American, Hispanic, or Low-Income Students."

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