Event Thursday: Financing College Success (with Special Guest Speakers)

While a lot of people are off relaxing for the Memorial Day week, we’re in the midst of one of our busiest weeks in a while. Hot on the heels of today’s inequality event we’re really pleased to be hosting another exciting event tomorrow, May 31^st. Financing College Success: Innovations to Promote Readiness, Access, and Completion will investigate the ramifications of student debt, inadequate college savings, and college affordability on the economic outcomes of low-income students, and better still we’ll be looking at some potential solutions that are being tested to address those problems.

While student debt dominates headlines, the financial road to college success is determined long before that debt starts piling up. The financial lives and experiences of K-12 students have a significant impact on their college readiness. As recent work by William Elliott and colleagues has demonstrated, children form savings habits and college-bound identities from a young age. Meeting national goals for college enrollment and completion requires us to focus on the many steps that occur well before students set foot on a college campus.

We’re very excited to be welcoming two new speakers to the event, Under Secretary of Education Martha Kanter and Congressman Chaka Fattah (D-PA). Rep. Fattah has long been a leader in promoting college prep for students from low- and moderate-income families and we’re excited to hear from him and Dr. Kanter, who is something of a path breaker in her current position.

How can we eliminate college access barriers? What are the best ways to get students invested in higher education opportunities from a young age and to prepare them financially to be able to attain those goals?

We’ve got a great panel to examine those issues and some exciting programs that are demonstrating possible routes to success. Professor Elliott will be here, along with Debra Saunders-White from the Department of Ed, Kevin Carey from Ed Sector, and Evelyn Ganzglass from CLASP.

Please join us in person (RSVP) or online beginning at 2:30pm (Eastern time) for what’s sure to be an exciting event. Just look at this lineup:

Opening Speakers
Martha Kanter
Under Secretary, U.S. Department of Education

The Honorable Chaka Fattah
Member, U.S. House of Representatives

Featured Speakers
Willie Elliott III
Assistant Professor, School of Social Work
University of Kansas

Debra Saunders-White
Deputy Assistant Secretary for Higher Education Programs
U.S. Department of Education

Kevin Carey
Policy Director
Education Sector

Evelyn Ganzglass
Director, Workforce Development
Center for Law and Social Policy