Local leaders joined roughly 45 Chatham University faculty on Thursday evening to formally advance a union organizing effort that began this fall after the university made a series of cuts to trim a multimillion-dollar deficit.

The faculty met at Larimer’s East End Brewing Company to sign cards declaring their intent to unionize. If at least 30% of the university’s roughly 135 full-time faculty sign them, the National Labor Relations Board will hold an election. Chatham also has the option to voluntarily recognize a union, without an election, if there’s evidence that a majority of faculty want representation. 

About half of the full-time faculty had signed cards by Friday morning, an organizer told PublicSource. Roughly a third of the faculty were present at Thursday’s event.  

The event – graced by Pittsburgh Mayor Ed Gainey and Allegheny County Executive Sara Innamorato – was one step forward in what could be a lengthy process. If successful, the faculty will be a local of AFT Pennsylvania.

“This is a really exciting night for us. We’ve been working up to this point for many months now,” said Jessie Ramey, an associate professor and organizer with Chatham Faculty United. “We’ve been working really hard with our faculty colleagues to make sure that everybody feels like they are a part of what we’re doing.”

The event was organized by Chatham Faculty United, which is seeking to achieve unionization for the full-time faculty. The group believes that unionization will allow faculty to have greater influence in university governance; protect their pay and benefits; and benefit from a formalized grievance process. 

This summer, Chatham reduced faculty benefits and cut some salaries to trim its deficit, which the university has said stands at $6 million. Professors told PublicSource in November that the university’s response to the deficit renewed a previously simmering interest in unionizing and “really underscored how powerless we are.” 

Much of the organizers’ work so far has focused on connecting with faculty and explaining the benefits they believe a union could bring. Jennie Sweet-Cushman, an associate professor and organizer said the group will visit Chatham’s three campuses after Thursday to ensure all interested faculty can sign cards. The organizers will contact the National Labor Relations Board soon, she added. 

“We’re hoping to have a really strong showing with the cards so that we can make that case for voluntary recognition,” Sweet-Cushman said. “We would really love it if that happened. Nobody wants this to be a contentious thing. Nobody feels like the university should be spending money trying to fight it.”

Bill Campbell, a spokesperson for the university, did not provide comment on the union effort to PublicSource by press time, and did not say whether the university would voluntarily recognize a union. 

Gainey said in an interview during the event that his administration would like to write a letter to the university’s Board of Trustees stating that unionization is “for the best interests of not only the school but the city.”

“I’ve said from day one, if you want to make the quality of your workplace better, it’s important that you’re able to collectively bargain,” the mayor said. “A lot of times what happens is, we don’t listen to our frontline employees. When you have a union, you don’t have a choice.”

Innamorato also voiced support for the nascent union effort. “We need to make sure that the people who make institutions like Chatham great are taken care of,” she said. Councilor Erika Strassburger, who represents Squirrel Hill where Chatham is located, also attended.

The union effort, if it advances, may be more challenging for the faculty than for workers in other industries. A decades-old decision from the U.S. Supreme Court determined that full-time faculty members at the private Yeshiva University were managerial employees; the case has made unionization very difficult for similar faculty at private universities.

A more recent ruling from the National Labor Relations Board, however, offered standards for determining whether faculty are managerial employees. A local victory that followed this ruling bodes well for the group. Full-time faculty at the private Point Park University reached their first tentative agreement on a union contract in 2017. 

Sweet-Cushman said the organizers have met with labor attorneys and feel strongly that they would not be considered managerial employees under the ruling. 

The organizers are optimistic that their effort will be successful. But regardless of the outcome, they’re committed to serving as “a forum where faculty can build community,” Sweet-Cushman said. 

“Our work doesn’t end,” she said. “We’re eager to keep building those bonds and being supportive for our colleagues.” 

This story was updated on Jan. 26 at 9:55 a.m. to reflect a final count of the cards signed during the event.

Emma Folts covers higher education at PublicSource, in partnership with Open Campus. She can be reached at emma@publicsource.org.

The post Gainey, Innamorato back Chatham faculty union push at East End card-signing appeared first on PublicSource. PublicSource is a nonprofit news organization serving the Pittsburgh region. Visit www.publicsource.org to read more.

The Community College of Allegheny County has lost more than a third of its student body since the pandemic derailed the lives and aspirations of current and prospective students. But this fall, enrollment at the college stabilized.

Pencils Down
How plummeting enrollment and low success rates at the Community College of Allegheny County harm students and the Pittsburgh region

Just over 10,500 students enrolled at the college, known as CCAC, according to data from the institution. That’s about a 0.4% increase from last year. Nationwide, community colleges reported a 4.4% increase from the previous year, preliminary data from the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center shows. 

“We’re out of the pandemic, people are getting better equipped to take in-person classes now. They feel like things are coming back to normal,” said Dorothy Collins, vice president for enrollment services at CCAC. “I think we’re trending upward. I’m happy.” 

While a silver lining, this small bump in enrollment still reflects a 34% drop from fall 2019 – and roughly a 50% drop from fall 2010, around the time community college enrollments peaked nationwide. 

Renewed declines could have significant implications. The college relies on tuition for a sizable share of revenue, and regional employers count on CCAC graduates to fill vital jobs in industries such as health care. On top of that, people without degrees often earn less over their lifetimes than those with them. 

Bringing students back is a priority for CCAC. The college has created a Strategic Enrollment and Retention Management Plan, and the cross-departmental team overseeing the plan will soon set goals around enrollment, retention and affordability, said Collins, who took over this summer. 

The college has not yet set specific numerical goals for boosting enrollment.  

What’s driving the growth?

Tom Brock, director of the Community College Research Center at Teachers College, Columbia University, said the nationwide upswing in community college enrollments is encouraging. He said the boost, though, is largely because they “fell so far during the pandemic that you could say, ‘They could only go back up.’”

Collins attributed CCAC’s recent uptick to the region’s post-pandemic recovery, which may also be reflected in the diversity of the student body. Community colleges often serve communities of color that were disproportionately impacted by the crisis, and this fall, the share of students of color at CCAC exceeded pre-pandemic levels in some areas.

Black students made up about 17% of the student body, up from about 14% in fall 2021. The share of Hispanic and Latino students steadily increased throughout the pandemic, growing from roughly 3% in fall 2019 to 4% in fall 2023. The share of white students declined slightly during that time, from about 61% to 60%, with roughly 1 in 5 students falling into other categories.

But there are other factors driving the boost nationally, experts told PublicSource, and some could bode well for CCAC. Community colleges that focus on hands-on learning and short-term credentials have benefited from the public’s growing concern about student debt and declining confidence in the value of a four-year degree. 

“Families are seeing it as a better value,” Brock said. The tuition rate at CCAC for county residents taking classes full-time is $1,890 a semester, while the figure is at least $10,077 for in-state students at the University of Pittsburgh’s main campus.

Collins has observed that more students are coming to the college looking for credentials that will quickly lead to well-paying jobs. The college has invested in this area, recently opening its $43 million Center for Education, Innovation and Training to house programs in the skilled trades and other high-demand fields. 

And since the pandemic, high schoolers have become a substantial boost to enrollment at community colleges nationwide, experts said. High schoolers can pay to take community college courses; the practice, known as dual enrollment, aims to reduce the time and cost associated with a four-year degree. 

CCAC wants to enroll “every type of student that wants to come here,” Collins said — and recruiting high schoolers is part of its strategy. So far, though, the college has not seen a substantial return from dual enrollment. High schoolers made up 16% of the country’s community college students in 2019 but just below 8% at CCAC that fall, according to data from the college. Since then, their share of CCAC’s student body has fallen to about 5%. 

“I think that you’ll see that our dual enrollment is going to increase after this semester,” Collins said. “We’re meeting, we’re going out, we send email blasts. We’ve sent a lot of information to let the high schools know that we’re here.” 

There are plenty of benefits for the high schoolers taking these classes, but their enrollment in a few courses may not bring CCAC the same revenue as a full-time student. 

“By and large, community colleges do worse financially by enrolling a dual-enrolled student,” said Joshua Wyner, founder and executive director of the College Excellence Program at the Aspen Institute, noting lower tuition and subsidies for the high school students. 

But these students can come back after graduation, Wyner said, especially if the colleges provided them with meaningful advising and helped them take courses that match their career interests. At Florida’s Valencia College, for example, about half its dual-enrollment students return. Most community colleges see about 20%, Wyner said.

Collins said CCAC is looking at ways to reduce or cover the cost of dual enrollment, from securing grant funding for some students to “trying to entice the state” to pay for these programs. Ohio, for example, covers the tuition and textbook fees of public high school students through its College Credit Plus program. 

Beyond these areas, she said CCAC is working to bring students back by hosting walk-ins to help students complete federal financial aid applications; marketing open houses months in advance; and informing prospective students of the college’s support services. 

Enrolling students is half the battle

A shrinking student population isn’t the only challenge CCAC faces; many students struggle to reach graduation after they sign up for classes. 

Community college students often face more challenges than students at four-year universities, as they are more likely to be low-income. At CCAC, almost 40% struggle to consistently access basic needs like food, shelter or child care, according to minutes of meetings of the college’s Board of Trustees. 

Still, the college’s graduation rate falls short of accreditation standards. Only 20% of full-time freshmen who enroll for the first time graduate three years later — one year beyond what an associate’s degree typically requires — according to a college spokesperson. The Middle States Commission on Higher Education says the rate should be at least 23% and has required the college to detail its plan for improvement. The commission will decide whether to renew CCAC’s accreditation in 2026. 

CCAC is working to meet the commissions’ standard, Collins said. The college has purchased software that alerts the institution when students are missing or failing classes, she said, and the enrollment planning committee will prioritize reaching the requirement.

“We’re going to be intrusive. We’re going to be deliberate. We’re reaching out, ‘Hey, you’re not doing what you said you were going to do when you decided to come to this institution. Now, we want to get you back on track. We want to help you succeed,’” she said.

Experts pointed to a variety of reforms that could help students enroll and graduate. Colleges should be more flexible with when, and how, courses are offered, and potentially expand online and weekend options. They should improve partnerships with four-year universities to help students transfer seamlessly. And they need greater financial support from state or local governments to help low-income students finance college. 

Take Virginia’s “Get a Skill. Get a Job. Get Ahead,” or “G3,” program, which the state officially launched in 2021. Initially funded at $69 million over two years, the program provides tuition assistance to students with annual household incomes below a certain level pursuing degrees in “high-demand” fields. Enrollment in eligible academic programs grew by 9% from fall 2020 to fall 2021, according to reporting by Virginia’s public media outlet.

A few community colleges nationwide have staved off enrollment declines by sharpening their focus on student success, according to the Aspen Institute. The Alamo Colleges District, a system of five in Texas, improved their graduation and transfer rates after hiring more advisers and ensuring all students received guidance earlier, among other improvements. Over the last decade, enrollment grew by 24%.

Lake Area Technical College, a small community college in South Dakota, saw enrollment grow by 61% in the last decade, partly because it tailored its academic offerings to the workforce needs of the region. More than three-quarters of students graduate in three years, and nearly all are employed one year after graduation. 

Above all, community colleges need to ensure their students get bachelor’s degrees or well-paying jobs, Wyner said. “Colleges that deliver value — meaning strong graduation rates and degrees that have value to students after they graduate, either in transfer or in the workforce — have gained enrollment. … 

“I think that too many colleges believe that they can market their way out of the current challenge or recruit their way out,” Wyner added. “I just don’t think we’re at a moment where that’s likely to work.”

Emma Folts covers higher education at PublicSource, in partnership with Open Campus. She can be reached at emma@publicsource.org.

This story was fact-checked by Pamela Smith.

The post After pandemic disruption, enrollment at CCAC stabilizes appeared first on PublicSource. PublicSource is a nonprofit news organization serving the Pittsburgh region. Visit www.publicsource.org to read more.

At Carlow University, administrators, faculty and staff no longer get raises at the start of the fiscal year. The university waits until enrollment numbers are finalized for the academic year, and if enough students showed up, doles them out. 

“Our raises come because the students are successful,” President Kathy Humphrey said in an interview. “Everybody waits with bated breath – ‘Did we make our number?’ When you’ve got everybody pulling in that direction, it makes a dramatic difference.” 

The university added this incentive after Humphrey took over more than two years ago. Since then, Carlow appears to have stemmed its declining enrollment. The university saw a meaningful increase from fall 2021 to fall 2023, according to officials. But for years, employees at Carlow likely wouldn’t have earned raises under this model – and if other small, private universities in Allegheny County took the same approach, theirs wouldn’t have, either.

The majority of these institutions have seen significant enrollment declines in roughly the last decade, and they depend on tuition revenue to balance their budget. 

Between fall 2011 and fall 2021, enrollment fell by about 17% at Carlow, 16% at Duquesne University and 9% at Point Park University, according to the most recent data available from the U.S. Department of Education. But Carlow and Point Park, using internal numbers, calculate declines of about 15% and 11%, respectively.

Robert Morris University, in Moon Township, saw about a 24% drop during this time. La Roche University, in McCandless, saw about a 12% decline. 

Chatham University bucked the trend over that decade, increasing enrollment by about 7% — driven in part by admitting undergraduate men for the first time. But the university faces a multimillion-dollar budget deficit that one official told faculty was partly attributable to a yearslong drop in graduate student enrollment. 

PublicSource included only students seeking degrees or certificates in its analysis. The federal government has not yet made this data available for fall 2022 and 2023. La Roche and Point Park provided data that shows a continued decline during those semesters, while data from Carlow shows that enrollment this fall almost matched that of fall 2011. Chatham, Duquesne and Robert Morris did not provide this data for recent semesters.

While enrollment at smaller universities like these across the U.S. largely held steady over the last decade, the Pittsburgh universities aren’t the only private institutions grappling with shrinking student bodies.

Persistent declines could bring cuts to academic programs, layoffs or, in rare cases, closures, as the fates of other universities in the country show. The local declines could soon worsen as a reduction in births during and after the Great Recession of 2008 is projected to play out more acutely in Pennsylvania, setting up a steep drop in the traditional college-going population by the end of the decade. 

On top of that, the universities must contend with an American public that’s losing confidence in the value of a degree. And they must also face a disproportionate number of competitors – Pennsylvania has one of the highest ratios of higher education institutions to students in the country, according to Inside Higher Ed. 

Against this backdrop, small, private universities in Pittsburgh are facing “an uphill battle” in attracting students, said Robert Kelchen, head of the Department of Educational Leadership and Policy Studies at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville.

“They have to really get a niche and protect it,” Kelchen said. “They have to look carefully at who they are, who they want to be, and look at every dollar that they’re spending. Because the competition is fierce, and it’s likely not getting any easier.”

What’s causing the declines?

From 2012 to 2029, the population of 18-year-olds in the U.S. is projected to decline by about 10%, according to an analysis from economics professor Nathan Grawe. The drop is far more severe in Pennsylvania and Pittsburgh, where the population in both cases is projected to fall by nearly 20%. 

The demographic decline in Pennsylvania is likely one factor driving the enrollment woes at small, private universities, but their limited national or global reputation could be another, said Barrett Taylor, a professor at the University of North Texas who specializes in higher education policy, governance and finance.  

For example, while out-of-state and international students made up about 90% of degree-seeking students at high-profile Carnegie Mellon University in fall 2022, they accounted for just 30% at Chatham.

Some local schools are shifting their recruitment focus accordingly.

Marlin Collingwood, vice president of enrollment at Point Park, arrived at the university in April. At the time, he found that the university had focused on recruiting high school graduates who lived, at most, about three hours from Pittsburgh. Now, the university’s marketing efforts extend to Columbus, Ohio; Buffalo, New York; Philadelphia and Maryland. 

Collingwood believes that students are more likely to enroll if they’ve toured campus. To that end, the university is providing eligible high school juniors and seniors with $4,000 scholarships if they visit campus by mid-February and enroll.

“There are 18-year-olds living in small towns in Pennsylvania, and Ohio, and West Virginia, New York, whose only goal in life when they graduate is to go to a city,” Collingwood said. “We are an urban experience that Mom and Dad will probably say, ‘OK, I can live with that. I can’t live with you going to New York, or Chicago, or Philly. But Pittsburgh is doable.'”

Growing skepticism in the value of higher education may also be playing a part in lower enrollment trends, according to researchers, who also point to weaknesses in enrolling older undergraduates and universities’ potentially limited resources for serving diverse students, such as veterans. 

Enrolling more “nontraditional” students – including older adults – could reduce or offset declines. In Allegheny County alone, around half of residents ages 25 and older lack a college degree.

Nontraditional students are important to Carlow, which has prepared for the “enrollment cliff” by serving students who may otherwise find college inaccessible, said President Humphrey. The university recently launched a certificate program for practical nurses; the current cohort includes older adults and single mothers, she said. 

Left: Carlow University’s campus in Oakland. (Photo by Lilly Kubit/PublicSource). Right: Kathy Humphrey, president of Carlow, speaks to PublicSource during an interview in October 2022. (Photo by Stephanie Strasburg/PublicSource)

“We have always sought to provide opportunities to students who ordinarily wouldn’t get the opportunity,” Humphrey said. “When you do that work, what happens is the cliff doesn’t scare you. Because, in actuality, we’re grabbing those individuals that others are not looking at.”

“I’m a little concerned about you telling my story because they might start taking my people, right,” Humphrey said, laughing.

Point Park wants to boost its enrollment of nontraditional students, but Collingwood said the university’s main competitor is not other local institutions – it’s the option of entering the workforce and foregoing college. Point Park is tackling this, officials said, by promoting its focus on career readiness to prospective students.

“I don’t think that the university really did its best to promote itself and promote its value to the community. We’ve kind of been our own best-kept secret,” said President Chris Brussalis, who officially took over in July following the abrupt departure of his predecessor in January.

“Our differentiator here is really all about experiential learning,” Brussalis said. “We really want and desire for all of our freshmen to have job-shadowing experiences and internships right out of the gate.”

The pitfalls of tuition dependence

The price of attendance, coupled with the competition for students in Pennsylvania, could be contributing to the loss of students at local institutions. 

The state’s many public universities largely offer local families a lower price. After receiving financial aid, the average in-state family paid roughly $16,000 more to attend Duquesne than the public Slippery Rock University during the 2021-22 academic year; about $10,450 more to attend Chatham and nearly $7,000 more to attend Point Park.

Carlow was an outlier that academic year, as the average student paid the lowest price of the local small, private universities and most state publics. The university provided financial aid to the vast majority of traditional students last academic year, according to institutional data. 

Tuition and fees, however, are crucial to the bottom lines of most private universities. They accounted for about 80% of revenue at Chatham in the fiscal year ending June 2022 and about 60% at Carlow, according to their Form 990s filed with the IRS. The most selective private colleges, with much larger endowments, work differently. At Carnegie Mellon, for instance, tuition was about 45% of total revenue.

The financial situations at the local privates are varied. Carlow, Point Park and Chatham reported deficits at the end of their fiscal years ending in 2022, while Duquesne, La Roche and Robert Morris reported surpluses. 

Persistent enrollment declines, though, likely will not bode well. While schools with strong endowments may be able to fill some gaps in revenue, it’s not a permanent solution to fewer students showing up, said Walter Brown, a professor at Jackson State University who specializes in higher education finance. 

He said that institutions with shrinking enrollments may need to streamline their operating costs – which could include reducing their number of adjunct faculty or delaying the rollout of planned academic programs – or consider merging with other universities. 

Chatham has already cut faculty compensation, among other austerity measures, to reduce its budget deficit. And this fall, WESA reported that Point Park, Chatham, Carlow and Robert Morris, as well as Washington & Jefferson College, were considering combining and outsourcing their back office work. Some said after the story ran that they were backing away from the proposed agreement.

“You have to look at it as if it is a small business, and you have to be competitive in what you do. … You have to think strategically,” Brown said. “That’s not something that you do when you’re having serious problems, or when you’re almost closing. That has to be thought of when times are good.”

Brussalis, the Point Park president, said that the university’s finances are well-managed, despite the deficit. He expects that the institution’s new strategic plan, which charts Point Park’s future through 2030, will increase revenue. The university wants to grow enrollment by 30% and launch a capital campaign, among the plan’s plethora of goals.

The plan also states that, upon annual review, Point Park will phase out programs “that are no longer relevant.” Brussalis has denied that this will imminently lead to faculty layoffs. “I’ve always been a believer, throughout my entire career, that it is difficult to impossible to cut your way to prosperity,” he said.

What might the future hold?

Some researchers are unsure whether small, private universities will weather the storm they face. These universities can be, “depending on who you talk to, either really stubborn or really resilient,” said Kelchen, at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville.

“Even among those that all the numbers say they should close, most of them, somehow, some way, make it through,” he said. “But it’s a challenging environment. And then it’s a question of, ‘What type of education can they offer students when their main goal is just surviving financially?’”

Since 2016, 91 private universities in the U.S. have announced closures, mergers or plans to do either, according to CNBC. That’s a small number, given that there were nearly 4,000 degree-granting institutions in the country during the 2020-21 academic year. 

Still, Ozan Jaquette, an associate professor at the University of California, Los Angeles, is pessimistic. While some small, private institutions may survive by finding a niche in the market, he expects most to close within the next decade. “The economics are just very much against these institutions,” said Jaquette, whose research has focused on higher education enrollment management.

Local universities point to some bright spots, however. Gabriel Welsch, a spokesperson for Duquesne, said in a statement that this fall’s incoming freshman class was 24% larger than that of fall 2020. He attributed the growth partly to the creation of new academic programs and the planned 2024 opening of the College of Osteopathic Medicine. 

Even with that growth, though, institutional data from Duquesne shows that total enrollment decreased by about 8% between fall 2020 and fall 2023. 

Humphrey, at Carlow, is confident her university will survive. She partly attributed Carlow’s recent growth to the university aligning its academic offerings with community needs and partnering with local institutions, such as UPMC, to inform that work.

“We’re trying to meet the next great need. That’s what’s driving our enrollment in the right direction. And that’s why I can say to you, ‘We’re not concerned about the cliff.’ We’re going to make it over the cliff with no problem because we’re going to be intensely who we are.”

Emma Folts covers higher education at PublicSource, in partnership with Open Campus. She can be reached at emma@publicsource.org.

This story was fact-checked by Sophia Levin.

The post Pittsburgh’s smaller colleges teeter on edge of ‘enrollment cliff’ and tuition drought appeared first on PublicSource. PublicSource is a nonprofit news organization serving the Pittsburgh region. Visit www.publicsource.org to read more.

As a teenager, Fernanda wanted her time in college to be like what she saw in movies. She wanted to attend a big university – one with name recognition – and live in a dormitory. She achieved that dream in 2015, but because she is undocumented, the experience came with a hefty price tag. 

Beechview Points of Pride
PublicSource maps and chronicles the strengths of diverse communities

At least 18 states have passed legislation allowing some undocumented immigrants to access state financial aid, which many citizens rely on to pay for college. Pennsylvania, however, is not one of them. The state legislature also has not advanced bills that would provide eligible undocumented residents with in-state tuition at public institutions, which can reduce the cost of attendance by thousands. 

No matter where they live in the U.S., undocumented students can’t access federal financial aid. These barriers are significant and can make higher education inaccessible to others like Fernanda, advocates say.

Fernanda, 26, who asked to withhold her last name due to her immigration status, graduated from the Pennsylvania State University in 2018. But she finished with $84,602 in debt from private loans, which often have higher interest rates and fewer borrower protections than federal options. The South Hills resident said she pays off about $700 a month but has hardly made a dent in her debt, which totaled $78,181 in December.

Still, she deeply values her college education. 

“Everyone has unlimited amounts of potential, but it’s resources that actually keep us from achieving that potential,” she said. “If you’re undocumented, and you’re 19, just graduated high school, what are your real options? Do you go into school, get in debt? That is, of course, if the school that you’re applying to even accepts you.”

In recent years, some Democratic state lawmakers have sponsored legislation that would definitively allow eligible undocumented immigrants to access in-state tuition or aid through the Pennsylvania Higher Education Assistance Agency. The bills have languished, without votes, in the House of Representatives or Senate. 

The changes would impact a tiny share of Pennsylvanians – an estimated 3% of the population were not citizens as of 2022 – but some lawmakers and advocates believe the state also stands to benefit from them.

They assert that expanding access to undocumented immigrants would support the economy, particularly as the state is projected to lose about 5% of its traditional working-age population between 2020 and 2030. They argue that it will also boost college enrollment, given that the state’s college-going population is projected to shrink. 

Beyond the potential economic benefits, “The whole idea that we should not let kids go to college or make it harder for students to go to college is patently absurd,” said Rep. Peter Schweyer, D-Lehigh County, chair of the House Education Committee. 

Tuition equity is important to Casa San José, a local nonprofit that serves and advocates for the Latino community. Between 2021 and early November of this year, the Beechview-based organization had nine meetings with state legislators to advocate for undocumented residents to receive in-state tuition and state financial aid. As of 2022, about 34% of the state’s foreign-born population was from Latin America. 

“We’ve really played the argument of, you know, enrollment is going down,” said William Reeves, the former community policy organizer with the nonprofit. “Being able to have a more inclusive process for all residents within the state, regardless of immigration status, could ensure that even more adults could return back to school.”

“I think we’ve created good connections solely through this issue, to raise awareness around this issue. And a lot of legislators did not even know this was an issue, to be honest,” he said.

Beechview, a neighborhood in the city’s southern reaches, saw its Hispanic or Latino population increase by around 75% from 2010 to 2020, according to census data compiled in 2021 by The University of Pittsburgh’s Center for Social and Urban Research. That was one of the largest increases among Pittsburgh neighborhoods. 

The landscape in Pennsylvania

At least 24 states allow eligible undocumented students to receive in-state tuition, according to Presidents’ Alliance on Higher Education and Immigration. Pennsylvania lacks a statewide policy on the matter, but at least one public institution says it offers the discount in some cases. 

In 2021, undocumented immigrants made up about 1% of all Pennsylvania college students.

At Pennsylvania’s state-related universities, policies determining in-state tuition qualifications are generally prohibitive. Pitt states that refugees, asylees, green card holders and those with an approved I-140 or I-130 may be eligible. Temple University considers non-citizens generally ineligible. Lincoln University assumes non-citizens without immigrant visas are ineligible but allows them to refute that classification “with clear and convincing evidence.”

Penn State’s website states the university will consider undocumented immigrants eligible if they meet certain residency requirements, which include attending a Pennsylvania high school for four years. But spokesperson Lisa Powers indicated in a statement such cases are a rarity.

“Non-citizens are classified as international students,” Powers wrote. “The University’s policy is to offer in-state tuition solely to Pennsylvania residents who meet the extensive Pennsylvania residency requirements. While there are a limited number of instances where students without visas might be eligible for Pennsylvania resident tuition, these cases are exceptions rather than the rule.”

The university charged out-of-state students $38,651 in the 2022-23 academic year, without financial aid, while in-state students were charged $19,835.

Fernanda applied to Penn State after first being granted Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals [DACA], a federal program offering protections to qualifying undocumented residents. The university intended to charge her out-of-state tuition, but she was able to receive the in-state discount after she and her father provided an admissions official with documents proving her residency.

The sticker price for in-state students at Penn State’s main campus was $18,828 during the 2017-18 academic year, Fernanda’s senior year. She received a few small scholarships from the university and graduated a semester early, she said, but needed to borrow for the vast majority of the cost. 

“I was just so young and naive, and my parents didn’t know anything, either, that we were just like, ‘OK, well, we’ll just get a loan,’” Fernanda said. “So, I signed with Sallie Mae and got huge interest, a huge loan for that first year of college, and had to do that every year.”

Despite the cost, Fernanda said her years in college were some of her best. She majored in international relations and Spanish, with a minor in Latin American history. Learning about those subjects was a “gift,” she said, as her high school hadn’t exposed her to them. She also enjoyed her classes in anthropology, philosophy and psychology. 

She got involved in student organizations, too, serving as president of the university’s UNICEF chapter and secretary of a club focused on women in politics. Her roles showed her “what it means to be an active citizen and participant and what it means to be an advocate for those who are marginalized,” she said. 

Progress stalls in Harrisburg

In April, a bill that would definitively allow eligible undocumented immigrants to receive in-state tuition at public institutions was referred to the House Education Committee, which Schweyer, a Democrat, now chairs. The bill — like a similar proposal introduced during the prior legislative session — has not received a vote. 

And in February, state Sen. Judith Schwank, D-Berks County, and other elected officials introduced a similar bill. The legislation was co-sponsored by Democratic senators Jay Costa, Wayne Fontana and Lindsey Williams, who represent Allegheny County. The bill was referred to the Republican-led Senate Education Committee, where it has sat without a vote. 

Republican control of the legislature and a lack of bipartisan support – influenced by the anti-immigrant rhetoric that has pervaded national politics in recent years – have prevented progress, Schweyer and Schwank told PublicSource. Republicans, who tend to support more aggressive responses to illegal immigration, controlled the House from 2010 to 2022 and currently control the Senate. 

“This incredibly dehumanizing rhetoric and policy that’s all over the United States – Pennsylvania’s not immune to that. But it’s really only coming from one side of the aisle, and it ain’t coming from my side,” Schweyer said. 

But Rep. Jesse Topper, the Republican chair of the House Education Committee, said he would be “perfectly fine” with a university choosing to offer in-state tuition to undocumented immigrants – he doesn’t believe the state should mandate it. “I believe that they’re in the best position to make that decision,” he said.

“We are required, as a state and as a constitution, to ensure that each child has access to high-quality K-12 education. That requirement does not exist for higher education,” Topper said. “We definitely need to support our institutions to make sure we’re supporting our workforce, we’re supporting families where that is a choice on their part. But it is a choice.”

Topper added that he is not anti-immigrant and does not espouse such rhetoric. He believes that immigration reform is needed to make achieving citizenship easier, but he said that issue is separate from tuition equity. “The other side of the aisle thinks that government intervention is the solution for everything, except, apparently, enforcing [immigration laws].”

With progress stalled for now, Schweyer said that he and advocates have instead prioritized issues that they believe are most likely to pass in the Senate – and that reflect the immigrant community’s greatest needs. 

Casa San José in Pittsburgh, for example, met with legislators 74 times between 2021 and early November to push the state to allow undocumented residents to obtain driver’s licenses. While tuition equity would profoundly impact the community, Casa San José has not prioritized the issue recently because of the organization’s limited resources for advocacy, Reeves said.

Julio Rodriguez, political director of the Pennsylvania Immigration and Citizenship Coalition, said that the battle in the legislature over funding the state-related universities has further complicated matters. It’s difficult to advocate for expanded access to in-state tuition when the universities are unsure they’ll receive enough funding to offer the discount at all, he said. 

And the allocations have been politicized in the past, with House Republicans initially attempting to block Pitt from receiving its funding in 2022 unless the university halted its fetal tissue research. Support for undocumented immigrants may be another lightning rod. “The universities are very cautious about risking their funding overall,” Rodriguez said.

Rodriguez is encouraged by Schweyer’s leadership of the House Education Committee and believes that legislation on this issue will pass if the Senate flips Democratic in 2024 or 2026. Schweyer is also optimistic about the future, but he said that he and other supporters must reach across the aisle.

“I haven’t run many bills at all – I don’t know that I’ve run any – that have been straight-up 100% passed just by Democrats,” Schweyer said. “It’s going to be a lot of education. It’s going to be a lot of work.”

Reeves said the organization has garnered bipartisan support for tuition equity, noting that legislators on both sides can be skeptical about supporting undocumented immigrants. He said that providing testimonials to legislators has been helpful, but he added that more data on the impact of these policies is needed to convince lawmakers.

“We want to ensure that, instead of it being conveyed as a partisan issue, that this is a necessity that could benefit all residents of Pennsylvania,” Reeves said.

Life after college

Ultimately, Fernanda graduated from Penn State and now has a full-time job as a recruitment manager. Though her debt forces her to be hyper-aware of her spending and budgeting, she’s been able to pay for her car and housing and “have a full life,” she said. 

But she’s frustrated that Pennsylvania hasn’t made tangible progress on tuition equity, thus failing to build a bridge for others in her situation who might want to broaden their opportunities and perspectives. 

“My perspective on everything shifted in college,” she said. 

“My mind was really formed and shaped, not only intellectually and academically, but also in the people that I met – people who were international students, people who grew up in different parts of the country, and people whose stories were similar to mine, or different to mine.” 

Emma Folts covers higher education at PublicSource, in partnership with Open Campus. She can be reached at emma@publicsource.org.

This story has been fact-checked by Ladimir Garcia.

Translation by Zulma Michaca, a bilingual professional living in Riverside County, Calif., with family ties in Pittsburgh. She can be reached at z.michaca123@gmail.com.

The post Undocumented but undaunted, young immigrants aim for degrees but get few breaks on costs appeared first on PublicSource. PublicSource is a nonprofit news organization serving the Pittsburgh region. Visit www.publicsource.org to read more.

De adolescente, Fernanda quería que su tiempo en la universidad fuera como lo veía en el cine. Ella quería atender una universidad grande – una con nombre reconocido – y vivir en un dormitorio. Ella alcanzó ese sueño en el 2015, pero debido a que es indocumentada, la experiencia llegó con un precio muy alto. 

Beechview Puntos de Orgullo
FuentePública (PublicSource) mapea y relata las fortalezas de comunidades diversas.

Al menos 18 estados han aprobado legislación permitiendo acceso a algunos inmigrantes indocumentados a ayuda financiera del estado, en la cual dependen muchos ciudadanos para ayudar a pagar por la universidad. Pero Pennsylvania no es uno de ellos. La legislatura estatal no ha avanzado propuestas para proveer matriculación estatal a residentes indocumentados elegibles, que podría reducir el costo de atender por miles. 

Sin importar en qué parte de Estados Unidos vivan, los estudiantes indocumentados no tienen acceso a ayuda financiera federal. Estas barreras son significativas y pueden hacer inaccesible la educación superior para otros como Fernanda, dicen los defensores.

Fernanda, de 26 años, quien pidió retener su apellido debido a su estatus migratorio, se graduó de la Universidad del Estado de Pennsylvania (Pennsylvania State University) en el 2018. Pero terminó con una deuda de $84,602 en préstamos privados, que a menudo tienen intereses más altos y pocas protecciones que las opciones federales para los prestamistas. La residente de South Hills dice que paga como $700 al mes, pero casi no ha bajado su deuda, con un total de $78,181 en diciembre. 

Aun así, ella valora mucho su educación universitaria.  

“Todos tienen una cantidad ilimitada de potencial, pero son los recursos los que nos alejan de alcanzar ese potencial,” ella dijo. “Si eres indocumentado, y tienes 19 años, apenas graduado de la preparatoria (high school), ¿cuales son tus opciones reales? ¿Vas a la escuela, te endeudas? Eso es, por supuesto, si la escuela a la que aplicas si quiera te acepta.” 

En años recientes, algunos legisladores estatales Democráticos han patrocinado legislación que definitivamente permitiría a inmigrantes indocumentados elegibles el acceso a la matriculación estatal o asistencia de la Agencia de Pennsylvania de Asistencia para Educación Superior (Pennsylvania Higher Education Assistance Agency). Estas propuestas han languidecido, sin votos, en la Cámara de Representantes o en el Senado.

Los cambios impactarían a una pequeña porción de Pensilvanos – un estimado 3% de la población no eran ciudadanos a partir del 2022 – pero algunos legisladores y defensores creen que el estado puede beneficiarse de ellos. 

Ellos afirman que expandir el acceso a inmigrantes documentados apoyaría la economía, particularmente cuando el estado proyecta perder alrededor de 5% de su población de edad laboral entre 2020 y 2030. Ellos argumentan que eso incrementará la inscripción universitaria, en vista de que la población de edad universitaria se proyecta reducir.

Más allá de los posibles beneficios económicos, “La idea de que no deberíamos permitir que los niños vayan a la universidad o hacer más difícil que los estudiantes vayan a la universidad es totalmente absurda,” dijo el Rep. Peter Schweyer, D-Lehih County, presidente del Comité de Educación de la Cámara.  

La equidad de la matriculación es importante para Casa San José, una organización local sin fines de lucro que atiende y aboga por la comunidad Latina. Entre 2021 y principios de noviembre de este año, la organización basada en Beechview tuvo nueve reuniones con legisladores estatales para abogar para que los residentes indocumentados reciban matrícula estatal y ayuda financiera del estado. Desde el 2023, aproximadamente alrededor de 34% de la población del estado nacida en el extranjero es de América Latina.  

“Hemos dado el argumento de que, pues sabes, la inscripción está bajando,” dijo William Reeves, el ex organizador de pólizas comunitarias para la organización. “Tener un proceso más inclusivo para todos los residentes dentro del estado, independientemente de su estatus migratorio, puede asegurar que aún más adultos puedan regresar a la escuela.” 

“Yo pienso que hemos creado buenas conexiones solamente a través de este tema, para crear conciencia del tema. Y, para ser honesto, muchos legisladores ni sabían que esto era un problema,” él dijo.

Beechview, un vecindario en la parte del sur de la ciudad vio a su población Hispana o Latina incrementar por alrededor de 75% de 2010 a 2020, de acuerdo con data del censo compilado en 2021 por el Centro para Investigación Social y Urbana de la Universidad de Pittsburgh (The University of Pittsburgh’s Center for Social and Urban Research). Fue uno de los incrementos más grandes entre los vecindarios de Pittsburgh.

El paisaje en Pennsylvania 

Al menos 24 estados permiten que estudiantes indocumentados elegibles reciban matriculación estatal, de acuerdo con La Alianza de Presidentes sobre Educación Superior e Inmigración (Presidents’ Alliance on Higher Education and Immigration). Pennsylvania carece de una póliza estatal en el tema, pero al menos un instituto público dice que en algunos casos ofrece descuentos.

En 2021, los inmigrantes indocumentados formaron alrededor de 1% de todos los estudiantes universitarios en Pennsylvania. 

En las universidades relacionadas con el estado de Pennsylvania, las pólizas para determinar las calificaciones para la matriculación estatal generalmente son prohibitivas. Pitt dice que los refugiados, asilados, titulares de tarjeta verde, y aquellos con una I-140 o I-130 aún pueden ser elegibles. La Universidad Temple (Temple University) considera a los no-ciudadanos generalmente inelegible. La Universidad Lincoln (Lincoln University) asume que los no-ciudadanos sin visas inmigrantes son inelegibles, pero les permite refutar esa clasificación “con evidencia clara y convincente.” 

El sitio web de Penn State dice que la universidad va a considerar inmigrantes indocumentados elegibles si cumplen ciertos requisitos de residencia, que incluye atender una preparatoria de Pennsylvania por cuatro años. Pero la portavoz Lisa Powers indicó en una declaración que tales casos son raros. 

“Los no-ciudadanos son clasificados como estudiantes internacionales,” escribió Powers. “La póliza de la Universidad es de solo ofrecer matriculación estatal a residentes de Pennsylvania que cumplan con los requisitos extensivos de residencia en Pennsylvania. Mientras que hay unas instancias limitadas cuando los estudiantes sin visas quizás pueden ser elegibles para la matriculación estatal, estos casos son la excepción en vez de la regla.” 

La Universidad le cobró a los estudiantes de fuera-del-estado $38,651 en el año académico 2022-23, sin asistencia financiera, mientras que les cobraron $19,835 a estudiantes del-estado. 

Fernanda aplicó a Penn State cuando recién se le otorgó Consideración de Acción Diferida para los Llegados en la Infancia (Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals o DACA), un programa federal ofreciendo protecciones a residentes indocumentados que califiquen. La universidad tenía la intención de cobrarle la matriculación fuera-del-estado, pero ella pudo recibir el descuento dentro-del-estado después de que ella y su padre proveyeron documentos que comprobaban su residencia a oficiales de admisión.

El precio de etiqueta para estudiantes del estado en el campus principal de Penn State fue $18,828 durante el año académico 2017-18, el último año escolar de Fernanda. Ella recibió unas cuantas becas pequeñas de la universidad y se graduó un semestre más temprano, ella dijo, pero necesitaba pedir prestado para la gran mayoría del costo.  

“Es que yo era tan joven e ingenua, y mis padres tampoco sabían nada, que solo dijimos, ‘Bueno, entonces, conseguiremos un préstamo,” dijo Fernanda. “Así que, yo firmé con Sallie Mae y conseguí un interés enorme, un préstamo enorme para ese primer año de la universidad, y tuve que hacer eso cada año.”

A pesar del costo, Fernanda dice que sus años en la universidad fueron unos de los mejores. Ella estudió relaciones internacionales y español, con un menor en historia Latino Americana. Aprender de esos temas fue un “regalo,” ella dijo, ya que su escuela preparatoria no la había expuesto a eso. Ella también disfrutó sus clases de antropología, filosofía y psicología. 

Ella también se involucró en organizaciones estudiantiles, desempeñándose como presidente de la asociación UNICEF de la universidad y cómo secretaria de un club enfocado en las mujeres en la política. Sus funciones le enseñaron “lo que significa ser un ciudadano y partícipe activo y lo que significa ser una defensora para los que son marginalizados,” ella dijo. 

El progreso se detiene en Harrisburg 

En abril, una propuesta que definitivamente permitiría a los inmigrantes indocumentados elegibles recibir la matriculación estatal en los institutos públicos fue referida al Comité de Educación de la Cámara, el cual preside Schweyer, un demócrata. La propuesta – como una propuesta similar introducida durante la previa sesión legislativa – no ha recibido un voto. 

Y en febrero, la Senadora estatal Judith Schwank, D-Condado Berks, y otros oficiales electos introdujeron una propuesta similar. La legislación fue co-patrocinada por los senadores demócratas Jay Costa, Wayne Fontana y Lindsey Williams, quienes representan el Condado Allegheny. La propuesta fue referida al Comité de Educación del Senado guiado por Republicanos, donde se ha quedado sin voto. 

El control Republicano de la legislatura y la falta de apoyo bipartita – con la influencia de la retórica antiinmigrante que se ha difundido en años recientes – han prevenido el progreso. Schweyer y Schwank le dijeron a FuentePública (PublicSource). Los Republicanos, que tienden apoyar respuestas más agresivas a la inmigración ilegal, controlaban la Cámara de 2010 al 2022 y actualmente controlan el Senado. 

“Esa retórica y póliza increíblemente deshumanizadora está en todas partes de Estados Unidos – Pennsylvania no está inmune a eso. Pero en realidad solo viene de un lado del pasillo, y no viene de mi lado,” dijo Schweyer. 

Pero el Rep. Jesse Topper, el Republicano que preside el Comité de Educación de la Cámara, dijo que él estaría “perfectamente bien” con que una universidad elija ofrecer matriculación estatal a inmigrantes indocumentados – él no cree que debe ser un mandato del estado. “Yo creo que ellos están en la mejor posición para tomar esa decisión,” él dijo.  

“Estamos requeridos, como un estado y como una constitución, de asegurar que cada niño tenga acceso a educación de calidad K-12. El requisito no existe en la educación superior,” dijo Topper. “Definitivamente necesitamos apoyar a nuestros institutos para asegurar que estamos apoyando nuestra fuerza laboral, estamos apoyando a las familias donde esa es una decisión por su parte. Pero es una decisión.”  

Topper agregó que él no es antiinmigrante y no apoya tal retórica. El cree que la reforma migratoria se necesita para que sea más fácil conseguir la ciudadanía, pero el dijo que ese tema es aparte de la matriculación equitativa. “El otro lado del pasillo piensa que la intervención gubernamental es la solución para todo, excepto, aparentemente, cumplir [las leyes migratorias].”  

Con el progreso detenido por ahora, Schweter dijo que él y los defensores en vez le han dado prioridad a temas que creen que son más probable que pasen en el Senado – y que reflejan las necesidades más grandes de la comunidad inmigrante. 

Casa San José en Pittsburgh, por ejemplo, se ha reunido con legisladores 74 veces entre 2021 y principios de noviembre para reclamar que el estado permita que residentes indocumentados obtengan licencias de conducir. Mientras que la matriculación equitativa impactaría a la comunidad profundamente, Casa San José no le ha dado prioridad al tema recientemente por los recursos limitados de la organización para abogacía, dijo Reeves. 

Julio Rodriguez, director político de la Coalición de Inmigración y Ciudadanía de Pensilvania (Pennsylvania Immigration and Citizenship Coalition), dijo que la batalla en la legislatura de fundar las universidades relacionadas al estado ha complicado más las cosas. Es difícil abogar por un mayor acceso a la matriculación estatal cuando las universidades no están seguras de que recibirán suficientes fondos para ofrecer el descuento, dijo.

Y las asignaciones se han politizado en el pasado, con Republicanos de la Cámara inicialmente intentando impedir que Pitt recibiera financiamiento en el 2022, a menos de que la universidad le pusiera un alto a su investigación de tejido fetal. El apoyo para inmigrantes indocumentados puede ser otro pararrayos. “Las universidades son muy cuidadosas de no arriesgar su financiación generalmente,” dijo Rodriguez.     

Rodriguez está motivado por el liderazgo de Schweyer en el Comité de Educación de la Cámara y cree que la legislación del tema se aprobará si el Senado se vuelve Democrático en 2024 o 2026. Schweyer también es optimista del futuro, pero dijo que él y otros promotores deben alcanzar el otro lado del pasillo. 

“No he ejecutado muchas propuestas – no se si he ejecutado alguna – que ha sido 100% directamente pasada solo por Demócratas,” dijo Schweyer. “Se va a tratar de mucha educación. Va a ser mucho trabajo.”

Reeves dijo que la organización ha ganado apoyo bipartito para apoyar la equidad de matriculación, notando que los legisladores de ambos lados pueden ser escépticos de apoyar a inmigrantes indocumentados.  Él dijo que proveer testimonios a los legisladores ha sido útil, pero agregó que se necesitan más datos acerca del impacto de estas pólizas para convencer a los legisladores.

“Queremos asegurar que, en vez de que sea transmitido como un tema partidista, que sea una necesidad que puede beneficiar a todos los residentes de Pennsylvania,” dijo Reeves.  

La vida después de la universidad 

Finalmente, Fernanda se graduó en Penn State y ahora tiene un trabajo de tiempo completo como gerente de reclutamiento. Aunque su deuda la obliga a ser muy consciente de sus gastos y presupuestos, ella ha podido pagar por su carro y vivienda y “tener una vida completa,” ella dijo. 

Pero ella está frustrada de que Pennsylvania no ha hecho progreso tangible en la equidad de matriculación, así fallando al construir puentes para otros en su situación que quizás quieren ampliar sus oportunidades y perspectivas.

“Mi perspectiva de todo cambio en la universidad,” ella dijo. 

“Mi mente realmente se formó y moldeó, no solo intelectual y académicamente, sino también por las personas que conocí – personas que eran estudiantes internacionales, personas que crecieron en diferentes partes del país, y personas que tenían historias similares a la mía, o diferentes a la mía.”   

Emma Folts cubre educación superior en FuentePública (PublicSource), en colaboración con Open Campus. Ella puede ser contactada en emma@publicsource.org.

Los hechos de esta historia fueron revisados por Ladimir Garcia. 

Traducción de Zulma Michaca, profesional bilingüe experta viviendo en el Condado de Riverside, Calif., con familia en Pittsburgh. Para contactarla: z.michaca123@gmail.com.

The post Indocumentados pero impertérritos, jóvenes inmigrantes aspiran a obtener títulos pero reciben poco alivio en los costos appeared first on PublicSource. PublicSource is a nonprofit news organization serving the Pittsburgh region. Visit www.publicsource.org to read more.

Some faculty members at Chatham University are exploring the option of unionizing, seeking “a seat at the table,” as one professor put it, with an administration that’s deciding how to patch a multimillion-dollar budget deficit. 

Ten faculty members, with and without tenure, have formed an organizing committee for the early-stage effort for full-time faculty. Through casual conversations and a few virtual information sessions, they’ve been trying to educate their colleagues on the process of unionizing and the benefits they believe representation could bring.  

The committee has spoken to unions about potentially forming an affiliate and plans to share their preferred choice with faculty in mid-December. They could face an uphill battle: A decades-old decision from the U.S. Supreme Court has made unionization very difficult for tenured and tenure-track faculty at private universities. But the group is hopeful that a 2014 National Labor Relations Board ruling will work in their favor. 

The effort comes after Chatham, primarily located in Squirrel Hill North, reduced faculty benefits and cut some salaries this summer to trim its deficit, which the university says stands at $6 million. The university’s response to the budget hole renewed interest in unionizing that had simmered among some faculty for years, according to one professor. 

“The budget crisis really underscored how powerless we are, how little transparency there is in decision-making that affects our future, and how much we really desire to have some stability and a voice in the process,” said Lou Martin, an associate professor, labor historian and organizer with the union effort. 

Bill Campbell, a spokesperson for Chatham, said in a statement that the university has had positive working relationships with existing unions that represent some campus employees, including police, security and housekeeping.

“As an educational community, we encourage anyone to learn more about unions and collective bargaining and believe a comprehensive understanding of these aspects is essential to making well-informed decisions,” Campbell said.

‘There is no shared power’

Campbell said Chatham’s deficit stood at $12 million in late June. That’s a sizable gap for a university that collected about $52 million in revenue in the 2022 fiscal year, according to audited financial statements. President Rhonda Phillips inherited the financial burden when she took the helm in July. 

In the months that followed, Chatham implemented significant cuts. The university reduced its maximum retirement match for faculty and staff from 8% to 3% and implemented a 5% pay cut for faculty earning more than $100,000 a year. Beginning in January, spouses of employees will be ineligible for the university’s self-insured health plan if they have certain employer-provided coverage. 

The university’s leadership team also saw their salaries cut by 10%. 

“There’s a lot of really positive ‘Rah, rah, we’re getting out of this hole.’ And many of us feel like we’re getting out of this hole on the backs of faculty and staff,” said Jennie Sweet-Cushman, an associate professor and organizer of the union effort.

Supporters of the union effort want faculty to have a greater say in administrative decisions, with the teeth of a contract, Sweet-Cushman said. One way some faculty engage with administrators now is through appointment or election to a standing committee – but the committee doesn’t vote and can’t compel the administrators to act on matters that are discussed, according to one member.

“There is no shared power. There is no agreeing to things. Whatever the administration says, that’s how it works. A lot of it just is theater,” said John Stakeley, a visiting assistant professor of business management who is involved in the union effort. 

Campbell said that there are several other faculty committees at Chatham, and that the faculty has expressed interest in the creation of a senate. “President Phillips asked the faculty to provide a more formal proposal earlier this semester. To my knowledge, this has yet to be presented,” Campbell said.

Some supporters said they would also like the administration to be more transparent with faculty about its austerity measures and other decisions. And though Sweet-Cushman said many faculty want to protect their salaries and benefits, she added that the union supporters are looking to reach a realistic agreement with Chatham and negotiate in good faith. 

“It’s more like, OK, let’s make the decisions that the university has made [into] a floor for where we’re at,” she said. “Can we be part of the plan to – and if it’s slowly, it’s slowly; we can be understanding about that – reinstate some of those things? How do we make sure that our retirement is prioritized as the university recovers?”

She added: “There doesn’t need to be anything at all contentious about this. I think that’s very much a myth about unions.”

Campbell said that no tenured or tenure-track faculty will be eliminated this academic year, and that faculty promotions are proceeding as usual.

An extremely difficult – but changing – legal landscape

Private universities can acquiesce to unionization, but that hasn’t been the history at Chatham.

In June 2016, the United Steelworkers canceled a planned election for part-time faculty only – after more than a year of organizing – and blamed the Chatham administration for disseminating “confusing, misleading and inaccurate information” to faculty. 

The number of faculty collective bargaining units at private universities in the U.S. has grown in recent years, but very few have included tenured and tenure-track faculty, as the Chatham effort would. Chatham employed 139 full-time instructional faculty as of fall 2022, according to the U.S. Department of Education.

There were 65 new bargaining units certified or recognized at private nonprofit universities between 2013 and 2019, but only three represented tenured and tenure-track faculty, according to a 2020 report from the National Center for the Study of Collective Bargaining in Higher Education and the Professions. One such unit is at Point Park University, in downtown Pittsburgh. 

A 1980 ruling from the U.S. Supreme Court has played a major role in limiting successful faculty organizing at private universities. 

In the case, the court determined that full-time faculty members at the private Yeshiva University were managerial employees because they effectively determined its course offerings and made recommendations about faculty hiring, among other roles. As such, the university was not required to collectively bargain with the faculty under the National Labor Relations Act, which protects most private-sector employees. 

“If a petition is filed at Chatham University, it will be up to the university to decide whether they want to raise a Yeshiva defense to the petition, or whether they just want to allow for the faculty to decide for themselves whether they want a union,” said William A. Herbert, executive director of the national center.

The ruling has been used to deny tenured and tenure-track faculty at private universities the right to unionize “in most cases,” said Timothy Cain, a professor at the University of Georgia who has researched unionization in higher education.

During the last effort at Chatham, the administration argued that full-time faculty were managerial employees, and the United Steelworkers pursued — but then canceled — an election only for part-time faculty.

The legal ground on this issue shifted slightly in 2014, when a ruling from the National Labor Relations Board offered standards for determining whether faculty are managerial employees. The board ruled that faculty’s control over academic programs and finances should be considered, among other areas. Still, most of the subsequent petitions involving tenured and tenure-track faculty – of which there have been few – have been dismissed, Herbert wrote in an email.  

This year’s group is optimistic, though. Sweet-Cushman wrote in an email that “While it is possible that some of the faculty might meet a [management] threshold, and thus be removed from the bargaining unit, we don’t believe we are all engaged anywhere near enough in the operation of the university to fit this definition.”

“If anything, we are being less and less involved in managerial decision making,” she added.

They’re also encouraged by the union victory at Point Park. Full-time faculty at the private university reached their first tentative agreement on a union contract in 2017. The win came more than a decade after faculty voted to unionize and about two years after Point Park dropped a longstanding legal challenge to the effort.

At the time it dropped the challenge, Point Park told the university community that “The current administration at Point Park does not wish to spend any resources on a potentially costly legal battle with its full-time faculty.” 

How are faculty responding?

Several organizers said they believe the union effort has garnered support from a lot of faculty. But the organizing committee has also sought to correct misunderstandings and try to dispel concerns that some faculty have had. 

Some faculty have believed that unions are only for the trades. Some have thought that unions are third parties and would not be made up of the faculty. And some have expressed concern over striking – which Sweet-Cushman agreed would be undesirable and said would likely occur only in a last-ditch effort that the union votes to authorize. 

Sweet-Cushman said she knows of only a handful who are concretely opposed. Others, she said, haven’t engaged with the effort yet.

“We really would like to hear what their concerns are, because this is us making this,” she said. “We also have the power to make it so it is something that best suits the needs of the faculty, and we’re very interested in doing that.”

Emma Folts covers higher education at PublicSource, in partnership with Open Campus. She can be reached at emma@publicsource.org. 

This story was fact-checked by Erin Yudt.

The post Chatham cut faculty compensation to trim its deficit. Now, some faculty want to unionize. appeared first on PublicSource. PublicSource is a nonprofit news organization serving the Pittsburgh region. Visit www.publicsource.org to read more.

Each year, Pennsylvania high schools ask their graduates if they’re going to college. Back in 2005, they overwhelmingly said yes — about 72% planned to. But in the years since, that percentage has taken a sharp fall, to just 60% among the class of 2022. 

The drop comes as the American public increasingly sours on higher education, according to some surveys. The national shift is likely driven by concerns over the cost of college and doubts about the value of a degree, both real and perceived. As the class of 2024 prepares to make big decisions about their futures, with deadlines for college applications beginning this month, these factors could shape their choices. 

Allegheny County has seen a similar downward trend in college-bound graduates since 2005, though there was a slight increase in 2022. The rate varies across districts, and disparities sometimes fall along racial and socioeconomic lines. While nearly all 2022 graduates in the predominantly white, wealthier Upper St. Clair School District said they plan to enroll, less than half did in the Sto-Rox School District, where a majority of students at the high school are Black and about 90% are low-income, according to state data.

Over the last four decades, the average amount undergraduates paid in tuition, fees, room and board grew by 169% when accounting for inflation, while the average earnings of workers ages 22 to 27 grew by only 19%. Student loan debt has nearly tripled since 2007. And in Pennsylvania, declining state investment in higher education has made its public universities some of the priciest in the U.S. for local families.

“When I first started here, usually with the state aid that they would get, the state schools were affordable,” said Joe Herzing, a longtime counselor at Sto-Rox Junior-Senior High School. Now, after students receive financial aid, “they’re still several thousands of dollars short, and that they don’t have.”

The price tag of a degree has likely dampened the public’s view of the necessity of higher education. While nearly three-quarters of young adults viewed college as “very important” in 2013, only 41% did in 2019, according to Gallup. In the Pittsburgh area, about half of surveyed adults would recommend vocational or technical training over college, WESA reported in late September. 

Some colleges and universities in Pennsylvania are already facing enrollment headwinds, and the state is projected to see its traditional college-age population shrink by 12% from 2013 to 2029. Fewer students choosing to attend college could exacerbate this trend, potentially to the detriment of these institutions. 

Sometimes, perception is everything

Akil Bello, senior director of advocacy and advancement at FairTest, said he wasn’t surprised by the county’s general decline in college-bound high schoolers. The public messaging around college has become increasingly grim, he said, with hyperbolic narratives taking hold about student debt and the opportunities that are available without a degree. 

There are the articles about “The Richest Americans Who Never Went To College” and the woman who donated her eggs seven times and still has $50,000 in student loan debt. There’s billionaire Peter Thiel’s 2011 creation of the Thiel Fellowship, which provides young adults with $100,000 over two years to start a company – if they “skip or stop out of college.” 

The steady arguments for higher education don’t generate the same excitement, Bello said. “There are no big, splashy narratives that say, ‘Going to college is good.’ So it’s still really just the same narrative that’s been said forever, which is essentially, ‘College eventually pays more,’” he said. 

While the return has shrunk, the case can still be made. A wage premium still exists for people with college degrees. But even that story is getting complicated, as new research from the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis finds that the lifetime wealth benefits are falling.

Some counselors across the county are seeing the reality and perception of college affordability impact students’ attitudes and choices. 

Left: Joe Herzing, a longtime counselor at Sto-Rox Junior-Senior High School, talks to PublicSource in the school’s cafeteria on Monday, Oct. 16, 2023, in McKees Rocks. Right: Student Jaymes-Cameil Bulls zips up her backpack after a recruiting session for The Pennsylvania State University in the school’s cafeteria that day. (Photos by Stephanie Strasburg/PublicSource).

Herzing has been a counselor at Sto-Rox since 2005. He encourages students to apply to colleges regardless of the cost of attendance  – “You can’t predict what scholarship might pop up,” he said – but he’s frequently seen prices determine where students end up.

The share of Sto-Rox students who say they plan to enroll in college after graduation has varied over the years, according to the school district’s self-reported data. Students like senior Jaymes-Cameil Bulls want to go to college, but in her case, she’s unsure how she’ll navigate the cost of attendance. 

“I went on a little scholarship spree,” said Bulls, adding that she applied to about 15 that she found through an Internet search. 

Herzing doesn’t pressure his students to pursue college, and in recent years, he’s seen more become comfortable expressing a desire to enter the trades instead. The number of students taking classes at Parkway West Career & Technology Center grew from 40 to 70 in the last year, and 16% of 2023 graduates said they plan to directly enter the workforce. 

“If you’re going to go to college for a degree that’s only going to earn you $60,000, $70,000, but that’s what you’re really passionate about doing – such as social work or becoming a teacher – that’s great. But there are a lot of jobs that you can get right out of high school,” Herzing said. 

In the East Allegheny School District, where almost a third of families are low-income, half of graduates in the class of 2022 said they plan to attend college. That was the lowest share the district reported since the 2004-05 academic year. Emilia Mattucci Peiffer, who has counseled students there in grades 10-12 for nearly 30 years, said some of her students choose not to attend because they assume they can’t afford the cost. 

More of her students – the majority of whom would be the first in their families to attend college – have shared in recent years that they don’t want to take out loans for college. She attributes that to the prevalence of media coverage around student debt and some borrowers’ struggles to repay. She tries not to be so fatalistic. 

“I tell them, ‘Hey, it took me 10 years to pay mine back, but I did it,’” Mattucci Peiffer said. “With your education, you will have that. That’s yours to keep for the rest of your life. And it will help you to get to whatever job that you want to get to.” 

Disparities exist across some districts

Meanwhile, almost all graduates in the Mount Lebanon School District – where the median household income is $152,708 and only 4% of households are low-income – have said they plan to attend college. The percentage has hovered in the 90s since the early 2000s. High School Principal Joel Thompson said that, while families could be having more conversations about college costs now, “it hasn’t changed the ultimate goal for many, many of our families and students.”

He said he believes that many parents in the district value education and instill that view in their children, which contributes to the district’s high percentage of college-bound students. About 80% of parents in the district have a bachelor’s degree or higher. “When kids come in here, we don’t need to convince them that education matters,” Thompson said. 

Values don’t make college affordable or accessible, but Bello said that environment and parental opportunity are significant factors behind the county’s disparities in high schoolers’ post-graduation plans. 

“In wealthy communities, going to college is accepted and a normal reality,” he said. “In lower-income communities, in communities where there’s less educational attainment as the standard, then college is a reach. And a pandemic, a recession, the perception of college debt, makes it really easy to say, ‘I’m not reaching.’” 

Mandy Savitz–Romer, a senior lecturer at the Harvard Graduate School of Education who has worked in school counseling, said counselors in under-resourced school districts may be stretched thin and unable to provide the same guidance around college as those in wealthier communities. Colleges and universities have historically visited wealthier districts more frequently than poorer ones, too.

And though she has seen school districts nationwide ramp up their career-oriented programming, she worries that young people pick up on society’s elevation of higher education.

“In an ideal world, we would see people questioning higher education and simultaneously getting a lot of support for career pathways and other career and trade opportunities in K-12,” Savitz-Romer said. “I’m not sure, for the lowered interest in higher education, we are simultaneously seeing that kind of investment, culturally as well as practically.”

Students pursue career and technical education

Mahalia Cook, 17, is a senior in high school and a certified nursing assistant. While juggling her schoolwork at Westinghouse Academy 6-12, she works four days a week, for four hours a day, at a senior living facility. “It’s taught me a lot,” she said.

She’s doing this through Pittsburgh Public Schools’ career and technical education programming. The district offers 16 programs, first available in 10th grade, to prepare students “for careers in high demand fields that are crucial to our infrastructure as a society.” They can receive career certifications, earn college credit and connect with employers.

Mahalia wants to become a nurse practitioner, which would require an advanced degree. For her undergraduate studies, she’s applied to the University of Pittsburgh – her top choice – as well as Penn State, Chatham and Carlow universities. She said that, if she doesn’t receive enough financial aid, she may go to community college first. 

Dave Cook, 41, would be happy if his six children all saw college in their future, but he wants them to know that the trades are a valuable option. Vocational training was stigmatized when he was in high school – it was “for the dumb kids,” he said. He’s worked in retail since he left college, now as a store manager at an Advanced Auto Parts, and wishes he had the more consistent hours that a trade can provide. 

He thought that Mahalia’s choice to enroll in the district’s career and technical education programming was wise. Even if she doesn’t pursue college, she could use her existing certification to potentially earn around $40,000 a year. 

No matter what his children decide, he said: “I don’t want them to have to settle.”

Correction: An earlier version of this story mischaracterized the demographics of the Sto-Rox School District student body.

Emma Folts covers higher education at PublicSource, in partnership with Open Campus. She can be reached at emma@publicsource.org. 

This story was fact-checked by Tanya Babbar.

The post With the value of a degree in doubt, high schoolers are exploring other routes appeared first on PublicSource. PublicSource is a nonprofit news organization serving the Pittsburgh region. Visit www.publicsource.org to read more.

Stephen J. Zappala Jr. will continue his quarter-century tenure as Allegheny County’s top prosecutor after surviving a well-financed challenge in a race that forced the lifelong Democrat to run as a Republican.

Zappala reversed the results of the Democratic primary, won by Matt Dugan, a former public defender. The incumbent stayed politically alive by receiving the Republican nomination, then won slightly more than 51% of General Election votes despite the county’s 2-to-1 Democratic registration edge.

“First and foremost, I want to thank the voters of Allegheny County,” Zappala told supporters at his campaign’s watch party. “I think it was more a referendum of us as a community.”

“We were up against a billionaire,” he continued, in reference to George Soros, the liberal philanthropist who largely funded his campaign rival. “We had to be competitive, not just financially

Zappala said voters are “aware of some of the problems we have and some of the things that need to be done,” calling the vote “a referendum on us as a community.”

In his seventh term as district attorney, he said he’d like to explore the development of a municipal authority for the South Side and the South Side Flats. He described the area as a regional asset and said that, “rather than argue about undermanning the Pittsburgh police and not helping them do their job, we’re going to look at it a little bit differently, in a little bit more broader manner.”

In regards to the Shuman Juvenile Detention Center, Zappala said the facility’s name and “the concept of a penitentiary in and of itself — that should disappear.” He has said that greater emphasis should be placed on providing juvenile offenders with education and support, and he referenced that in his speech. 

“We bring health care, education, and as a last resort, then we talk about detaining younger people, even though serious consideration has to be given because they are serious crimes that people are being accused of,” Zappala said. 

He also discussed the issue of homelessness, saying that under Pittsburgh mayors Bob O’Connor and Luke Ravenstahl, there were about 250 people characterized as being homeless, and most city police officers knew them. Zappala said that Pittsburgh was unprepared for its designation as a sanctuary city under Mayor Bill Peduto, which he said caused the population of unhoused people to grow to more than 1,000. 

Unhoused people, he said, are “being exploited by the nickel and dime drug dealer. So there’s a new market Downtown,” he said. “So there’s a lot we have to do tonight. We’re not going to fix everything, but we’re going to start tomorrow morning.”

Zappala thanked his finance team early in his speech. He said his campaign was “up against a billionaire,” referencing Soros’ roughly $1.8 million in support for Dugan’s campaign. “We had to be competitive, not just financially,” Zappala said. 

He said he faced “the national type of organization, the national type of commercials, the national media people that they bring to bear,” faulting Soros for “doing this all over the country,” and blaming such campaigns for liberal public safety policies and decline in cities like San Francisco. “I don’t know what the economic status of our county would be a year and a half from now if we continue to move in the same direction, but, which, by the way, we will not.

Not all welcome the news of Zappala’s political survival.

Corinn Lyon, 77, of Sheraden, said crime in the county also motivated her to vote — but it prompted her to vote against the DA candidate who positioned himself as tough on crime. 

The retired US Airways worker and registered independent voted for Dugan because we need “new blood” in the district attorney’s office. 

“[Zappala’s] been in there too long and I just don’t think he’s done enough,” she said.

That thinking, though, did not prevail at the polls.

Zappala became DA in 1998 after the judges of the county’s Common Pleas court elected him to fill a vacancy, and voters granted him a full term in the 1999 election. Then it was smooth political sailing for Zappala, who didn’t face a serious challenge until 2019, when he turned aside independent challenger Lisa Middleman with 57% of the vote.

Dugan — defeated tonight after besting Zappala in the Democratic Primary — earned the backing of local progressives who wanted to see Zappala’s career over, and perhaps more importantly, he earned the backing of Soros, who has funded numerous DA candidates throughout the country. The philanthropist bolstered Dugan with $700,000 worth of TV ads during the primary season and more than $1 million ahead of the General Election. Zappala raised considerable sums himself, including more than $600,000 ahead of his November rematch with Dugan, but it didn’t stack up with Soros’ support for Dugan.

“I would absolutely do it again,” Dugan told supporters at his campaign’s election watch party in Carnegie. 

He said his campaign fought for people in the criminal justice system “who are underserved, whose needs are under-met.”

“I stand here, proud of the campaign that we ran, proud of the message that we brought unapologetically across the county demanding reform in our system,” he said during his concession speech.

Zappala accepted the Republican nomination after Dugan defeated him in the Democratic primary, thanks to several thousand Republican write-in votes. He also accepted the endorsement of the Forward Party, the centrist-focused national political group fronted by former presidential candidate Andrew Yang.

The two candidates clashed in a heated campaign season this fall. Dugan assailed Zappala for being too tough on nonviolent offenders and Black defendants. Zappala said Dugan would likely be too lenient toward criminals as DA, and said he would be too beholden to Soros. 

Zappala is new to the GOP side of the ballot, and referred to himself in a debate as a “law and order Democrat,” but he has pulled support from traditional Republican donors and politicians. And while the ink is still drying on his party switch, he is the first Republican elected to countywide office (other than a county council at-large seat which is virtually guaranteed to the party) since 1999, when Jim Roddey was elected county executive.

Zappala campaign spokesperson Ben Wren said that voters in the county are deciding how far they’re willing to be pushed to the left. He said that Democrats are getting increasingly liberal and added that there is division in the county between what he referred to as city Democrats and Mon Valley Democrats.

Dugan, a Moon Township resident, worked in the public defender’s office from 2007 until this year, and served as chief public defender since 2020. 

Venuri Siriwardane is PublicSource’s health and mental health reporter. She can be reached at venuri@publicsource.org. 

Emma Folts covers higher education at PublicSource, in partnership with Open Campus. She can be reached at emma@publicsource.org. 

Charlie Wolfson is PublicSource’s local government reporter and a Report for America corps member. He can be reached at charlie@publicsource.org.

The post Stephen Zappala wins DA race, pledges action on Downtown, South Side appeared first on PublicSource. PublicSource is a nonprofit news organization serving the Pittsburgh region. Visit www.publicsource.org to read more.

The University of Pittsburgh has pressed summary charges against at least three pro-LGBTQ protesters and held conduct hearings for eight students who disrupted a public Board of Trustees meeting in September.

Most of the protesters, some unaffiliated with the university, were members and supporters of the on-campus group Trans Action Building. The group formally emerged in May, following a tumultuous semester that saw “anti-trans” speaker events on campus spark outrage and concern among LGBTQ students. 

About 12 students, staff and unaffiliated supporters participated in Trans Action Building’s protest on Sept. 29, said Iris Olson, a Pitt staff member and organizer with the group. They separated into three groups and protested in succession, with one person in each designated to speak, and campus police escorted them out, Olson said. A video posted to Instagram shows some protesters walking out of the meeting with police, shouting their demands as they leave. 

At least three supporters of Trans Action Building who are unaffiliated with Pitt were charged with “Disorderly Conduct Engage In Fighting,” court records show. Pitt initiated internal hearings against several students for allegedly violating university policy. Olson was asked to meet with a member of the Office of Human Resources to receive a verbal warning about the procedure for speaking at the meetings.

Pitt’s Office of Student Conduct threw out the cases against several students due to a “lack of evidence,” according to the University Times, a publication serving faculty and staff. Olson also said they did not face repercussions as a staff member. But at least three supporters unaffiliated with the university face ongoing summary charges for the same incident that could result in fines of up to $300 and imprisonment of up to 90 days. Three have pleaded not guilty as of Monday, including 31-year-old Joshua Kovel. 

“You take the queer people that were talking about queer rights and trans people talking about trans rights, and you give them court summons. It’s not good optics for the university,” Kovel said. “It’s a waste of time for us, because it is a ridiculous case, and we didn’t do anything. And what are they going to do? Throw us in jail for protesting for trans rights?”

The chair of the Board of Trustees can direct campus police to escort out and, “as a last resort,” arrest people who disrupt meetings and refuse to leave, according to board rules. The September protesters “did not follow repeated requests to cease their disruption of the meeting,” Pitt spokesperson Jared Stonesifer said in a statement.

“When appropriate, the University uses internal conduct processes to address on-campus misconduct by its affiliates,” Stonesifer said. “However, the only recourse the University has to address misconduct on campus by non-affiliates is what is available via the Pennsylvania criminal code.”

Melissa Melewsky, media law counsel for the Pennsylvania NewsMedia Association, said Pitt can impose reasonable rules to control conduct during public meetings. She said it’s not unusual for institutions to remove members of the public who are out of line, but pressing charges against them is “extremely rare.” 

“To have that conduct result in a criminal charge is something that I haven’t seen very often at all, and I’ve been doing this for almost 20 years,” Melewsky said. 

“Even if the charges are dismissed eventually, they’ve already set the precedent that ‘Hey, if you speak out of turn, you might be arrested and charged with a crime.’ That’s a significant deterrent to public speech.”

Zach Greenberg, senior program officer on the campus rights team at the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression [FIRE], said that Pitt acted within bounds, including in pursuing charges. “Talking over people, interrupting meetings, shutting down speech of others, that’s not free speech. And that’s something that can be punished by universities,” he said. 

Students can protest, Greenberg said, by using signs or scheduling time to speak during the meeting. 

Members of the public can request to speak at Pitt’s Board of Trustees meetings by writing the Office of the Secretary 15 days in advance, but the chair can deny those requests at will. An email from one Trans Action Building member shows that they requested to speak by emailing the office 20 days in advance. They followed up on Sept. 22. 

The response from the office, dated Sept. 22, reads: “I am sorry we missed your email sent on Saturday, Sept. 9. Unfortunately, the agenda is posted. To give this the time it deserves, will you consider the next public meeting?” 

“My colleagues today sent multiple requests to speak at the Board of Trustees meeting and were … told to try again for December, even though we followed your processes and we followed your deadlines,” Olson said during the meeting. “Today, queer and trans voices are being silenced.” 

Chancellor Joan Gabel told the University Times after the meeting that “I absolutely respect their right to protest and we’re in a public meeting and they have the opportunity to protest, and then we restored the process of the board meeting in due course so that the business can continue.”

Students with the Fossil Free Pitt Coalition, a campus organization advocating for the university to divest from the fossil fuel industry, spoke out in a similar fashion during the September meeting. Pitt held conduct hearings for four students, the group says. Meredith Felde, a student involved with Fossil Free Pitt, said her hearing officer indicated that similar protests in the future may be punished.

Stonesifer said the university does not comment on the outcomes of conduct cases, citing federal privacy law, but Olson said that students from both groups haven’t faced repercussions. If Pitt had found the students responsible for the alleged violations, they could temporarily lose their ability to live in Pitt-owned housing and their status at the university could be “conditioned upon future behavior,” according to the Student Code of Conduct.

Pitt isn’t the only university that has taken a more aggressive stance on student protests, though the severity of the response varies. This summer, two graduate students and an alumnus of the University of California, San Diego, were accused of felony vandalism of a campus building. The union representing the protesters said they used chalk and washable window markers. The university recently said it will not move forward with criminal charges.

Stonesifer said Pitt does not plan to drop the summary charges.

The university’s response

Trans Action Building is demanding that the university create three on-campus resource centers for LGBTQ students, as well as students of color and those with disabilities. The group also wants the university to provide expanded trans-inclusive housing, among other demands.

In June, a smaller group of protesters with Trans Action Building disrupted that month’s Board of Trustees meeting to advocate for these demands. Campus police escorted them out without further repercussions, Olson said. 

The protesters disrupted a portion of the September board meeting during which the trustees were voting on whether to elect Louis Cestello as chair of the board. A livestream of the meeting shows Cestello interrupting trustee David Chavern, who was participating in the meeting via Zoom, over an apparent, but unseen, disruption. 

“Hold on,” Cestello said, reading from a piece of paper. “There’s established procedures for bringing issues and concerns to the board. You have not been following these.” He said it was announced at the start of the meeting that participation was limited to trustees and invited guests, and that further disruptions would “be dealt with as appropriate.”

“Officers, can you please remove this and let us go on with our board deliberations, ” Cestello said. 

Once outside, Olson said the campus police asked the protesters for identifying information — something that did not happen in June. The officers told the group that “they just wanted to verify who we were, so that we wouldn’t come back to this public meeting again, and that we were not allowed to return,” Olson said. 

Iwan Martin, 32, was one of the unaffiliated supporters charged with disorderly conduct. He lives in the U.S. as a permanent resident, and he’s concerned that he could be deported if he’s convicted of a crime. His residency status has historically made him hesitant to participate in activism, but he said he was told that September’s protest wasn’t expected to get out of hand.  

“From the beginning, I was intending to just be very polite, to be very unobtrusive, comply with anything that anybody told me to do,” Martin said.   

Martin and Kovel said their role in the protest was to wear shirts with the group’s demands written on them. Kovel said he did not speak out during the meeting, and Martin recounted that he was silent throughout. Yet, both were charged with “Disorderly Conduct Engage In Fighting,” and their citations read that they “engaged in unreasonable noise during a public meeting” after being asked to stop.  

Kovel initially was unsure what the charge was for.

“I was like, ‘When did I engage in fighting with anybody?,’” he said. He doesn’t have a lawyer at this time, but he said he feels “fairly certain” that his case will be dismissed.

Martin described the charge against him as “blatantly untrue” but said he’s worried about the case’s potential implications for his residency status. He said he’s determining whether he can borrow money from people he knows to hire a lawyer. 

“The feeling that I get is that the university is just annoyed by the protest and wants it to go away,” Martin said. “They talk a big talk about caring a lot about people and wanting to listen to their concerns and make sure that everybody’s heard, but I think in terms of their actions, they are completely disinterested in actually doing so.”

A letter received by one student, redacted and posted on social media, calls them to attend an internal hearing because they had allegedly violated the university’s demonstration guidelines.

Pitt’s guidelines prohibit the disruption of “activity related to the University’s educational process, including, but not limited to, activity occurring in classrooms, offices, laboratories or other University facilities.”

Olson said that Trans Action Building had reviewed the policy, along with available information about public participation during the board’s meetings, and assumed that their protest would adhere to them. 

The board has published rules regarding public participation, which state: “Except by invitation of the Board, no one who is not a member of the Board shall address the Board, participate in the proceedings, interfere with the movement of participants or observers, or disturb the meeting in any way.”

Greenberg, with FIRE, said that Pitt could do a better job of informing students of the difference between disruptive protest and protected speech. 

How are the protesters moving forward?

Both groups, Trans Action Building and Fossil Free Pitt, took to Instagram to state that they “will not be silenced” by Pitt’s response to their protests. Trans Action Building is hosting a public meeting on Saturday where attendees can collect “posters for upcoming events, offer ideas about how we could be preparing for them, and build community,” according to an Instagram post. 

Felde said she believes that “there is legitimacy to breaking rules, if that’s part of your demonstration tactic.” However, she said that Fossil Free Pitt, which formed in 2014, has continually sought to adhere to the university’s demonstration guidelines for the protests it has hosted over the years. 

Stonesifer, the spokesperson, said that the university’s Office for Equity, Diversity and Inclusion has been working since September to schedule a meeting with the leaders of Trans Action Building. He added that, in regards to Fossil Free Pitt, “The University is committed to transparency regarding its approach to fossil fuels. Pitt is handling the issue in accordance with recommendations from its Board of Trustees.”

Martin said he cares a lot about Trans Action Building and will try to support the group from the sidelines, but he probably will not attend future board meetings because of the personal risk. Kovel said that he’d like to help Trans Action Building in the future, if he has the time. 

Pitt should’ve responded to the protest, Kovel said, by accommodating their requests to speak at that time. 

“Trans rights are incredibly important, and the actual proper treatment of trans people needs to be a concern,” he said.

Emma Folts covers higher education at PublicSource, in partnership with Open Campus. She can be reached at emma@publicsource.org. 

This story was fact-checked by Rich Lord.

The post Pitt presses charges against protesters calling for greater LGBTQ support appeared first on PublicSource. PublicSource is a nonprofit news organization serving the Pittsburgh region. Visit www.publicsource.org to read more.

During his junior year of high school, Wade Lipscomb enlisted in the military because he didn’t know how he would pay for college. That would soon change.

He learned of a new program called The Pittsburgh Promise, which would provide $5,000 a year, over four years, to him and other eligible students in Pittsburgh Public Schools [PPS] to attend college in Pennsylvania. Lipscomb applied to colleges with the encouragement of a school counselor, got out of his military contract and enrolled in Pennsylvania State University’s petroleum and natural gas engineering program in 2010.

“It was a big part in really getting me to think about college being an option, and then also helping me pay for it,” Lipscomb said of the Promise. He took out an estimated $15,000 in loans, which he paid off two years after graduating in 2014, and started his own construction company in 2021. 

The Promise, which launched in 2008, made college more accessible for Lipscomb, but future PPS graduates are losing one extra way to pay for their education as costs rise nationally. 

The Promise’s executive director, Saleem Ghubril, told district parents in a mid-September letter that the class of 2028 – eighth graders today – would be the last to receive the privately funded scholarship, WESA reported. The organization had said for years that it could not make commitments to future graduates as the uncertainty of available funding grew. 

The Promise has provided $171.5 million in scholarships to nearly 11,600 students. The scholarship has made a tangible difference in the lives of students who spoke with PublicSource, and PPS considers it to be one factor behind its improving graduation rates and one strategy for keeping students in the district as enrollment drops.

But the value of the scholarship has fallen over time, with the maximum annual award increasing to $10,000 in 2012 but dropping back to $5,000 in 2018. And while more students have become eligible for the scholarship, as of 2019, 40% of students in PPS still didn’t meet its GPA and attendance requirements. Students must maintain at least a 2.5 GPA to qualify.

In an interview, Ghubril said that a high school diploma is no longer enough for many residents to compete for jobs and noted that the state is home to some of the most expensive public universities in the nation for local families. 

“There’s a lot at stake, and answering it through a privately funded Promise initiative in one city, in one public school system in the commonwealth of 500, is short-sighted,” Ghubril said.

Without the scholarship, the Promise wants to advocate for a public policy solution to funding post-secondary education in Pennsylvania. College affordability has been a long-standing issue in the state, though, with no clear resolution in sight. 

What was the impact of the scholarship – and who got it?

Promise programs provide college scholarships to local students but vary in their awards, funding models and eligibility criteria. There were more than 200 promise programs in the country as of September, according to a database from the W.E. Upjohn Institute for Employment Research. About 31% exclusively rely on private funding, as The Pittsburgh Promise has.

The Pittsburgh Promise is a last-dollar scholarship, meaning it covers students’ eligible expenses after they receive all other scholarships and grants. The scholarship has been one of the more financially generous offerings in the country, said Michelle Miller-Adams, a senior researcher at the institute. 

Promise programs have been shown to boost college enrollment, but there have been few rigorous studies analyzing whether they improve college completion, Miller-Adams said. A 2017 study from researchers at the University of Pittsburgh found that PPS graduates were more likely to enroll in college, select an in-state institution and persist for a second year because of their Promise eligibility. 

In all, more than 60% of Pittsburgh Promise recipients have graduated from college or are currently enrolled, Ghubril told PublicSource in a mid-October interview. While Ghubril “will never be satisfied” with that statistic, he said it aligns with national norms for educational attainment. The Promise measures its results against data from the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center, analyzed by Pitt researchers.

“I think it’s noteworthy that this one urban demographic is holding its own when compared to every demographic,” Ghubril said.

About 49% of all Promise awardees are white, and 46% are Black or multiracial, according to data from the organization reflecting the scholarship’s launch through Oct. 10. During the 2022-23 academic year, about 31% of PPS students were white, while 51% were Black. That excludes the charter schools that are eligible for the Promise, the majority of which are predominantly Black.

Black women make up the largest share of Promise awardees, at nearly 30%, though they’re underrepresented in proportion to their presence in the district. White women and men follow, then Black men, at 17%. That percentage grew from about 7% in the Promise’s early years, when the organization ran a mentoring initiative, but then stagnated, Ghubril said. 

“The tragic reality is that low-income students, and Black males in particular, face challenges that the rest of Pittsburgh’s demographics don’t,” Ghubril said.  

Promise eligibility has also varied by high school, according to data from 2019, the most recent year available. Only 22% of students at Perry High School qualified for the scholarship that year, compared to 89% at CAPA 6-12. The vast majority of students at Perry are economically disadvantaged, while about 29% are at CAPA.

The Promise offers post-secondary coaching to students at Carrick High School, Milliones 6-12 and Perry, which it plans to continue without the scholarship and to launch next year at Westinghouse Academy 6-12, Ghubril said. 

How has the Promise impacted Pittsburghers?

Though there is limited research to show whether promise programs improve college graduation rates, Miller-Adams said the scholarships are often successful at creating “college-going cultures” within high schools, allowing students to think more deeply about life after graduation without feeling limited in their options.

And because the programs expand opportunities for low-income and marginalized students to access college, they provide insight into the types of support these students need to be successful, she said.

“There was a lot of learning that came out of The Pittsburgh Promise that is going to be of value to the community even after the program ends,” she said. 

James Scheidter, 29, used his Promise funds to enroll at the Community College of Allegheny County instead of entering the trades directly out of high school. He earned an associates degree related to heating and air conditioning [HVAC], which he says allowed him to more quickly acquire the skills he needed to move up in the profession. 

He started an HVAC business five years ago with a friend from college and struck out on his own last year. His wife received the Promise, too, which she used for her bachelor’s degree at Slippery Rock University. Scheidter estimated that the family has about $30,000 in student loan debt, and without the Promise, their debt would have at least doubled. 

“I felt like I made the right move,” Scheidter said. The couple purchased a home in Butler County five years ago, and his wife is able to be a stay-at-home mother to their two children.

Samantha Soto, 27, received $40,000 in Promise dollars after graduating from City Charter High School in 2014. She enrolled in Indiana University of Pennsylvania, where the scholarship covered a sizable portion of her tuition and fees. Without the Promise, she said that tuition increases at the university would have likely caused her to drop out halfway through. 

“With the amount of money that the Promise gave me, even after tuition went up, I'm like, ‘OK, I only have two years left. I know I can take out this debt and graduate, and I at least have a college degree,’” said Soto, who estimates that she accumulated at most $20,000 in debt for her bachelor’s degree. 

Soto later received a dual master’s degree in business administration and sustainability from Chatham University. She now works at UPMC and, on the side, sells homemade body care products in compostable containers. She’s grateful that the Promise helped her, but she doesn’t believe it’s an effective solution to the rising cost of college. 

“When I went to college, it covered tuition, and then it covered a little bit of my books, a little bit of my meal plan, a little bit of my on-campus housing. And I know that if I go and I look at tuition rates today, it might not do all of that for someone, which would put them in the same situation that I would have been in without the Promise.”

What could the loss of the scholarship mean for PPS?

The Promise cites increasing graduation rates at PPS as an example of the scholarship’s impact. The district’s four-year graduation rate increased by about 12 percentage points among Black students and 10 percentage points among white students between the 2011-2012 and 2021-2022 academic year, according to data from the state Department of Education.

PPS spokesperson Ebony Pugh said in an email that the Promise has “certainly” helped to improve the district’s graduation rates, but she added that student support services and the work of school staff have been other factors. She said the district will try to further improve graduation rates by working with its equity advocates, who offer support to marginalized students.

The Promise, however, has not been able to offset enrollment declines in PPS since launching in 2008. Between the 2008-09 and 2022-23 academic years, enrollment fell by about 30% across the district, to 18,652 students. The district is projected to lose nearly 6,000 students by 2031.

Pugh said that it’s difficult to determine whether the loss of the Promise will impact enrollment. She noted, however, that the Promise “continues to be an attract and hold strategy” for the district and was likely a deciding factor for some families to enroll. 

What comes next?

“Last-dollar” scholarships such as the Promise make a big difference for students who are ineligible for federal Pell Grants but may not have enough money for college. Creating statewide tuition-free college programs, as other states have done, could be a solution for universities to enroll public school students, Miller-Adams said. 

Though the Promise plans to advocate for policy changes in the state, Ghubril said it was too early to meaningfully elaborate on what that work might entail. 

In the absence of the scholarship, Pugh said the district will need to help students and families be aware of other forms of financial assistance they might not have considered because the Promise was in place. 

PPS Board of Directors member Gene Walker said the district should focus on providing an equitable education to all students, closing the gap between charter and private schools and making tough decisions about its spending to be affordable and attractive. 

The end of the Promise spurred “a little bit of disappointment,” he said, “not in the fact that they're not able to continue, but that we haven't been able to make the systemic changes that make organizations like The Pittsburgh Promise not necessary.” 

Lajja Mistry is the K-12 education reporter at PublicSource. She can be reached at lajja@publicsource.org.

Emma Folts covers higher education at PublicSource, in partnership with Open Campus. She can be reached at emma@publicsource.org. 

This story was fact-checked by Rich Lord.

The post The Pittsburgh Promise helped thousands of students pay for college. As costs rise, the funding is going away. appeared first on PublicSource. PublicSource is a nonprofit news organization serving the Pittsburgh region. Visit www.publicsource.org to read more.