Source: Education Dive
JPMorgan Chase announced Monday that it is giving $350 million over five years to community colleges and career training programs. Eyes are on community colleges to provide the training panacea for the current skills gap as well as affordable ways for people to refresh or add to their skill sets throughout their lives. But the institutions charged with providing these solutions are largely underfunded, according to a recent policy paper from The Aspen Institute’s Economic Strategy Group. Its authors recommend a performance-based federal funding program that they say could add 3.6 million 18-to 24-year-olds with college degrees and upskill another 28 million workers by 2030. The cost is steep, however: $22 billion per year. Still, the researchers say that’s what’s needed to close the per-student funding gap between community colleges ($11,400) and public four-year institutions ($14,900).