News

Rural community colleges respond to health crisis, a look at non-traditional models for students transitioning from training to the workforce and more

• Resources Help Rural Community Colleges in Aftermath of COVID-19 Health Crisis
• An Interest in Innovation: New Grants Explore Non-Traditional Models
• Keith Witham Named Ascendium’s New Deputy Director - Education Grantmaking

Keith Witham Named Ascendium’s New Deputy Director - Education Grantmaking

Ascendium welcomes Keith Witham as our new Deputy Director - Education Grantmaking. He will provide day-to-day supervision and support to program officers across Ascendium’s four focus areas to maximize the impact of investments that support learners from low-income backgrounds.

An Interest in Innovation: New Grants Explore Non-Traditional Models

Ascendium recently made three new grants to explore non-traditional models designed to increase credential completion, employment outcomes and wages for low-income workers. These innovative models each provide critical student success and job coaching supports and employer connections but differ in the ways they work with postsecondary institutions. This is all in support of our focus area to streamline key learner transitions. Through these investments, we hope more learners from low-income backgrounds can find pathways for socioeconomic mobility. 

Resources Help Rural Community Colleges in Aftermath of COVID-19 Health Crisis

Rural community colleges are facing many challenges in the aftermath of the COVID-19 health crisis and Ascendium grant partners are helping meet them. The National Center for Inquiry & Improvement is producing a series of briefs to help colleges strengthen their ability to provide regional stability and upward mobility for their students. The Foundation for Maine's Community Colleges is working to train rural Maine residents for well-paying remote work careers.

Colleges’ Changing Roles in Rural Communities

Rural community colleges are being recognized by Education Design Lab for un-tapped potential and emerging engines of growth in their local communities. Education Design Lab recently received funding from Ascendium to complete a three-year design challenge to develop and pilot transformative new programs for rural learners from low-income backgrounds and their communities.

Remote and Rural

The Foundation for Maine's Community Colleges, supported by Ascendium, is providing rural Maine students with a free training program on remote work. As industries move towards increasing remote work options, this program aims to break down barriers for learners from low-income backgrounds living in rural Maine by preparing them for and gaining access to more remote work opportunities.

Report Proposes Higher Education COVID-19 Recovery Policies

Ascendium is supporting New America and the State Higher Education Executive Officers’ year-long research project to develop a better understanding of the overall effect of the health crisis on the postsecondary education sector. This article shares how their findings are being used to make policy recommendations to ensure a robust recovery as learning transitions back to in-person.

Professional Development in a Pandemic - Part 2

Ascendium supported the University of Wisconsin System with a grant to help students increase completion of math gateway courses. This article is the second in a two-part series focusing on the experiences of mathematics instructors participating in the University of Wisconsin System Math Initiative. They share their methods of removing remote learning barriers to student success in gateway mathematics courses.

Our Vision for Learning and Impact, Ascendium Education Philanthropy on Social Media, New Rural Matters Podcasts and More

• Learning and Impact at Ascendium
• Starting this Month, Find Ascendium's Education Philanthropy News and Info on Social @AscendiumEP
• New Podcasts Shine Light on Rural Voices, Partners

EWA Announces Summer 2021 Class of Reporting Fellows

The 12^th class of Education Writers Association (EWA) Reporting Fellows has been announced. The reporting fellowship program supports education journalists and the work they do to inform the public about issues in education. It is funded in part by a grant from Ascendium.