    [House Hearing, 116 Congress]
    [From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]

                         ENGINES OF ECONOMIC MOBILITY:
                         THE CRITICAL ROLE OF COMMUNITY
                          COLLEGES, HISTORICALLY BLACK
                         COLLEGES AND UNIVERSITIES, AND
                        MINORITY-SERVING INSTITUTIONS IN
                         PREPARING STUDENTS FOR SUCCESS

    =======================================================================

                                    HEARING

                                   BEFORE THE

           SUBCOMMITTEE ON HIGHER EDUCATION AND WORKFORCE INVESTMENT

                             COMMITTEE ON EDUCATION
                                   AND LABOR
                         U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                         ONE HUNDRED SIXTEENTH CONGRESS

                                 FIRST SESSION

                                   __________

                  HEARING HELD IN WASHINGTON, DC, MAY 22, 2019

                                   __________

                               Serial No. 116-25

                                   __________

          Printed for the use of the Committee on Education and Labor

    [GRAPHIC NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

               Available via the World Wide Web: www.govinfo.gov
                                       or
                  Committee address: https://edlabor.house.gov

                                    __________

                        U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE
    36-600 PDF                  WASHINGTON : 2020

    --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

                        COMMITTEE ON EDUCATION AND LABOR

                 ROBERT C. ``BOBBY'' SCOTT, Virginia, Chairman

    Susan A. Davis, California           Virginia Foxx, North Carolina,
    Raul M. Grijalva, Arizona            Ranking Member
    Joe Courtney, Connecticut            David P. Roe, Tennessee
    Marcia L. Fudge, Ohio                Glenn Thompson, Pennsylvania
    Gregorio Kilili Camacho Sablan,      Tim Walberg, Michigan
      Northern Mariana Islands           Brett Guthrie, Kentucky
    Frederica S. Wilson, Florida         Bradley Byrne, Alabama
    Suzanne Bonamici, Oregon             Glenn Grothman, Wisconsin
    Mark Takano, California              Elise M. Stefanik, New York
    Alma S. Adams, North Carolina        Rick W. Allen, Georgia
    Mark DeSaulnier, California          Francis Rooney, Florida
    Donald Norcross, New Jersey          Lloyd Smucker, Pennsylvania
    Pramila Jayapal, Washington          Jim Banks, Indiana
    Joseph D. Morelle, New York          Mark Walker, North Carolina
    Susan Wild, Pennsylvania             James Comer, Kentucky
    Josh Harder, California              Ben Cline, Virginia
    Lucy McBath, Georgia                 Russ Fulcher, Idaho
    Kim Schrier, Washington              Van Taylor, Texas
    Lauren Underwood, Illinois           Steve Watkins, Kansas
    Jahana Hayes, Connecticut            Ron Wright, Texas
    Donna E. Shalala, Florida            Daniel Meuser, Pennsylvania
    Andy Levin, Michigan*                William R. Timmons, IV, South
    Ilhan Omar, Minnesota                    Carolina
    David J. Trone, Maryland             Dusty Johnson, South Dakota
    Haley M. Stevens, Michigan
    Susie Lee, Nevada
    Lori Trahan, Massachusetts
    Joaquin Castro, Texas
    * Vice-Chair

                       Veronique Pluviose, Staff Director
                     Brandon Renz, Minority Staff Director

                                     ------

           SUBCOMMITTEE ON HIGHER EDUCATION AND WORKFORCE INVESTMENT

                     SUSAN A. DAVIS, California, Chairwoman

    Joe Courtney, Connecticut            Lloyd Smucker, Pennsylvania,
    Mark Takano, California                Ranking Member
    Pramila Jayapal, Washington          Brett Guthrie, Kentucky
    Josh Harder, California              Glenn Grothman, Wisconsin
    Andy Levin, Michigan                 Elise Stefanik, New York
    Ilhan Omar, Minnesota                Jim Banks, Indiana
    David Trone, Maryland                Mark Walker, North Carolina
    Susie Lee, Nevada                    James Comer, Kentucky
    Lori Trahan, Massachusetts           Ben Cline, Virginia
    Joaquin Castro, Texas                Russ Fulcher, Idaho
    Raul M. Grijalva, Arizona            Steve C. Watkins, Jr., Kansas
    Gregorio Kilili Camacho Sablan,      Dan Meuser, Pennsylvania
      Northern Mariana Islands           William R. Timmons, IV, South
    Suzanne Bonamici, Oregon                 Carolina
    Alma S. Adams, North Carolina
    Donald Norcross, New Jersey

                                C O N T E N T S

                                  ----------
                                                                       Page

    Hearing held on May 22, 2019.....................................     1

    Statement of Members:
        Davis, Hon. Susan A., Chairwoman, Subcommittee on Higher
          Education and Workforce Investment.........................     1
            Prepared statement of....................................     4
        Smucker, Hon. Lloyd, Ranking Member, Subcommittee on Higher
          Education and Workforce Investment.........................     5
            Prepared statement of....................................     6

    Statement of Witnesses:
        Boham, Dr. Sandra L., ED.D., President, Salish Kootenai
          CollegeS...................................................    46
            Prepared statement of....................................    48
        Dubois, Dr. Glenn, Ph.D., Chancellor, Virginia Community
          College System.............................................    35
            Prepared statement of....................................    37
        McHatton, Dr. Patricia, Ph.D., Executive Vice President of
          Academic Affairs, Student Success and P-16 Integration,
          University of Texas Rio Grande Valley......................    26
            Prepared statement of....................................    28
        Verret, Dr. Reynold, Ph.D., President, Xavier University of
          Louisiana..................................................     8
            Prepared statement of....................................    11

    Additional Submissions:
        Chairwoman Davis:
            Graduation Rate Initiative...............................    91
        Takano, Hon. Mark, a Representative in Congress from the
          State of California:
            Letter dated May 20, 2019, from SEARAC...................    93
            Prepared statement from OCA - Asian Pacific American
              Advocates..............................................    95
        Trone, Hon. David J., a Representative in Congress from the
          State of Maryland:
            HBCU's Make America Strong: The Positive Economic Impact
              of Historically Black Colleges and Universities........    99
        Questions submitted for the record by:
            Grijalva, Hon. Raul M., a Representative in Congress from
              the State of Arizona

            Levin, Hon. Andy, a Representative in Congress from the
              State of Michigan

            Norcross, Hon. Donald, a Representative in Congress from
              the State of New Jersey................................   110
            Sablan, Hon. Gregorio Kilili Camacho, a Representative in
              Congress from the Northern Mariana Islands

            Scott, Hon. Robert C. ``Bobby'', a Representative in
              Congress from the State of Virginia

            Trahan, Hon. Lori, a Representative in Congress from the
              State of Massachusetts

        Responses to questions submitted for the record by:
            Dr. Boham................................................   116
            Dr. Dubois...............................................   119
            Dr. McHatton.............................................   126
            Dr. Verret...............................................   137

                         ENGINES OF ECONOMIC MOBILITY:
                         THE CRITICAL ROLE OF COMMUNITY
                          COLLEGES, HISTORICALLY BLACK
                         COLLEGES AND UNIVERSITIES, AND
                        MINORITY-SERVING INSTITUTIONS IN
                         PREPARING STUDENTS FOR SUCCESS

                                  ----------

                            Wednesday, May 22, 2019

                           House of Representatives,

                       Committee on Education and Labor,

           Subcommittee on Higher Education and Workforce Investment

                                Washington, DC.

                                  ----------

        The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:17 a.m., in
    room 2175, Rayburn House Office Building. Hon. Susan A. Davis
    [chairwoman of the subcommittee] presiding.
        Present: Representatives Davis, Courtney, Takano, Harder,
    Levin, Omar, Trone, Trahan, Castro, Sablan, Bonamici, Adams,
    Norcross, Smucker, Guthrie, Grothman, Stefanik, Cline, Watkins,
    and Timmons.
        Also present: Representatives Scott, Foxx, Wild, and Hayes.
        Staff present: Tylease Alli, Chief Clerk; Katie Berger,
    Professional Staff; Nekea Brown, Deputy Clerk; Emma Eatman,
    Press Assistant; Christian Haines, General Counsel Education;
    Ariel Jona, Staff Assistant; Stephanie Lalle, Deputy
    Communications Director; Richard Miller, Director of Labor
    Policy; Max Moore, Office Aid; Veronique Pluviose, Staff
    Director; Katherine Valle, Senior Education Policy Advisor;
    Banyon Vassar, Deputy Director of Information Technology;
    Courtney Butcher, Minority Director of Member Services and
    Coalitions; Bridget Handy, Minority Communications Assistant;
    Amy Raaf Jones, Minority Director of Education and Human
    Resources Policy; Hannah Matesic, Minority Director of
    Operations; Kelley McNabb, Minority Communications Director;
    Casey Nelson, Minority Staff Assistant; Brandon Renz, Minority
    Staff Director; Alex Ricci, Minority Professional Staff; Mandy
    Schaumburg, Minority Chief Counsel and Deputy Director of
    Education Policy; and Meredith Schellin, Minority Deputy Press
    Secretary and Digital Advisor.
        Chairwoman DAVIS. Good morning and welcome everyone. The
    Subcommittee on Higher Education and Workforce Investment will
    come to order. We are happy that you're here. I note that a
    quorum is present.
        I also want to ask unanimous consent that Ms. Wild of
    Pennsylvania and Ms. Hayes of Connecticut be permitted to
    participate in today's hearing with the understanding that
    their questions will come after all members have completed
    their questions.
        The committee is meeting today in a legislative hearing to
    hear testimony on engines of Economic Mobility, the Critical
    Role of Community Colleges, Historically Black Colleges and
    Universities and Minority Serving Institutions in Preparing
    Students for Success.
        Pursuant to committee rule 7c, opening statements are
    limited to the chair and the ranking member and this allows us
    to hear from our witnesses sooner and provides all members with
    adequate time to ask questions. I recognize myself now for the
    purpose of making an opening statement.
        Today we will examine the critical role of historically
    black colleges and universities, HBCU's, tribal colleges and
    universities, Hispanic serving institutions and community
    colleges in providing low income students and students of color
    with a quality higher education.
        Our first three bipartisan hearings have so clearly
    demonstrated that a college degree remains the surest path to
    financial stability for Americans across the country. This is
    particularly true for low income students and students of color
    who's educational and work force opportunities have
    historically been limited by intergenerational poverty and
    systemic racism.
        In fact, studies show that students with parents in the
    bottom quintile of the income distribution can double their
    chances of moving up the income ladder if they obtain a degree.
    However, Federal data released this morning on college
    enrollment reveals a 50 percentage point gap between low income
    students and their wealthy peers. We have much work to do.
        HBCU's, tribal colleges and universities, Hispanic serving
    institutions, and community colleges continue to do this work
    and demonstrate their commitment and ability to provide these
    students with the benefits that come with a quality education.
    Founded for the specific purpose of educating black students
    because other institutions would not, HBCU's continue to live
    up to their mission of providing a community where black
    students can thrive.
        HBCU's make up less than 3 percent of colleges and
    universities yet they produce almost 20 percent of all black
    graduates.
        Tribal colleges and universities, TCU's were developed as
    part of a political and social movement to regain tribal
    autonomy and to combat centuries of forced assimilation and
    destruction of native communities. Today there are 35
    accredited TCU's serving students from more than 230 federally
    registered tribes.
        Hispanic serving institutions educate more than 3 out of 5
    undergraduate Latino students and one quarter of all
    undergraduate students. Among 4-year institutions, Hispanic
    serving instructions propel low income students to top income
    brackets at a rate three times, three times that of
    predominantly white institutions.
        Hispanic serving institutions can also act as cultural hubs
    for Latino students, many of whom earn their degree and return
    to work in their own communities. These institutions are
    effective engines of economic mobility because they meet
    students where they are and are dedicated to educating the
    whole person.
        HBCU's and TCU's in particular embed appreciation for the
    identity and culture of the students they serve in their
    foundational missions. Honoring ancestors, sustaining
    traditions and engaging honestly with American history all
    serve to signal to students that they belong in college.
        Many other institutions such as Asian American and Native
    American Pacific Islander serving institutions and
    predominantly black institutions also serve low income students
    and students of color. These institutions are forced to do more
    with less.
        To be designated as a minority serving institution,
    colleges must not only enroll a substantial number of students
    of color but it must also enroll a substantial number of Pell
    students and have fewer resources than peer institutions.
        In my own State, the California State University system is
    a model for how minority serving institutions can help students
    overcome barriers to higher education. Reflecting the
    population of the State, more than half of CSU students are
    people of color. One in 3 students are the first in their
    family to attend college and more than half of all students
    receive Pell grants.
        Community college also play a crucial role in providing
    higher education to low income students and students of color.
    These 2-year colleges often provide a local and affordable
    option for students who are priced out of 4-year institutions.
        In fact, community colleges enrolled 1 in 3 black students
    and nearly half of Latino, Asian American and Pacific Islander
    and first generation students. More than a third of low income
    students attend community colleges.
        The great work being done cross the country by HBCU's,
    TCU's, minority serving institutions and community colleges is
    unfortunately hampered by deeply inadequate funding. Persistent
    and systemic underfunding of HBCU's has been extensively
    documented.
        The Federal Government has never fully fulfilled its
    obligation to support native students at TCU's and less than
    half of designated HSI' have received a grant through HSI
    specific programs. And the average community college receives
    about half the amount of per student funding received by public
    4 year colleges.
        With this funding inequity, we must ask ourselves how are
    these institutions still producing such strong results? How is
    that? As our witnesses will highlight, when we invest in HBCU's
    and tribal colleges and universities, Hispanic serving
    institutions, and community colleges, we empower hundreds of
    thousands of students each year with the most powerful tool
    available to achieve success, a college degree.
        And lastly, as we honor the 65th anniversary of Brown v.
    Board, and wrestle with the promise unfulfilled, it becomes
    evident that just like our K12 system we spend more money to
    educate wealthy college students and students who are
    underserved by our education system.
        Depriving the institutions that serve our most vulnerable
    college students of the resources made available to
    predominantly white 4 year universities is contrary to our
    values and the best interest as a Nation.
        Congress has a responsibility to strengthen and invest in
    institutions that are promoting economic mobility as we
    continue to work toward a reauthorization of key Federal higher
    education policy. We must understand the critical work these
    institutions are doing to address the specific needs of today's
    students and invest, invest in these initiatives. Thank you
    President Verret to Dr. McHatton, Chancellor DuBois, and
    President Boham for being with us today.
        I now yield to the ranking member, Mr. Smucker, for his
    opening statement.

    Prepared Statement of Hon. Susan A. Davis, Chairwoman, Subcommittee on
                   Higher Education and Workforce Investment

        Today, we will examine the critical role of Historically Black
    Colleges and Universities, Tribal Colleges and Universities, Hispanic-
    serving institutions, and community colleges in providing low-income
    students and students of color with a quality higher education.
        Our first three bipartisan hearings have so clearly demonstrated
    that a college degree remains the surest path to financial stability
    for Americans across the country. This is particularly true for low-
    income students and students of color whose educational and work force
    opportunities have historically been limited by intergenerational
    poverty and systemic racism. In fact, studies show that students with
    parents in the bottom quintile of the income distribution can double
    their chances of moving up the income ladder if they obtain a degree.
    However, Federal data released this morning on college enrollment
    reveals a 50-percentage point gap between low-income students and their
    wealthy peers. We have much more work to do.
        HBCUs, Tribal Colleges and Universities, Hispanic-serving
    institutions, and community colleges continue to do this work and
    demonstrate their commitment and ability to provide these students with
    the benefits that come with a quality education.
        Founded for the specific purpose of educating Black students
    because other institutions would not, HBCUs continue to live up to
    their mission of providing a community where Black students can thrive.
    HBCUs make up less than 3 percent of colleges and universities yet
    produce almost 20 percent of all Black graduates.
        Tribal Colleges and Universities (TCUs) were developed as part of a
    political and social movement to regain Tribal autonomy and to combat
    centuries of forced assimilation and destruction of Native communities.
    Today, there are 35 accredited TCUs serving students from more than 230
    federally registered tribes.
        Hispanic-serving institutions educate more than three out of five
    undergraduate Latino students and one quarter of all undergraduate
    students. Among 4-year institutions, Hispanic-serving institutions
    propel low-income students to top income brackets at a rate three times
    that of predominantly white institutions. Hispanic-serving institutions
    can also act as cultural hubs for Latino students, many of whom earn
    their degree and return to work in their communities.
        These institutions are effective engines of economic mobility
    because they meet students where they are and are dedicated to
    educating the whole person. HBCUs and TCUs, in particular, embed
    appreciation for the identity and culture of the students they serve in
    their foundational missions. Honoring ancestors, sustaining traditions,
    and engaging honestly with American history all serve to signal to
    students that they belong in college.
        Many other institutions, such as Asian American and Native American
    Pacific Islander Serving Institutions and Predominantly Black
    Institutions, also serve low-income students and students of color.
    These institutions are forced to do more with less. To be designated as
    a minority-serving institution, colleges must not only enroll a
    substantial number of students of color, but it must also enroll a
    substantial number of Pell students and have fewer resources than peer
    institutions.
        In my own State, the California State University system is a model
    for how minority-serving institutions can help students overcome
    barriers to higher education. Reflecting the population of the State,
    more than half of CSU students are people of color, one in three
    students are the first in their family to attend college, and more than
    half of all students receive Pell Grants.
        Community college also play a crucial role in providing higher
    education to low-income students and students of color. These 2-year
    colleges often provide a local and affordable option for students who
    are priced out of 4-year institutions. In fact, community colleges
    enroll one in three Black students and nearly half of Latino, Asian
    American and Pacific Islander, and first-generation students. More than
    a third of low-income students attend community colleges.
        The great work being done across the country by HBCUs, TCUs,
    minority-serving institutions, and community colleges is unfortunately
    hampered by deeply inadequate funding:
        * The persistent and systemic underfunding of HBCUs has been
    extensively documented.
        * The Federal Government has never fully fulfilled its obligation
    to support Native students at TCUs.
        * Less than half of designed HSIs have received a grant through
    HSI-specific programs.
        * And the average community college receives about half the amount
    of per-student funding received by public 4-year colleges.
        With this funding inequity, we must ask ourselves how are these
    institutions still producing such strong results? As our witnesses will
    highlight, when we invest in HBCUs, Tribal Colleges and Universities,
    Hispanic-serving institutions, and community colleges, we empower
    hundreds of thousands of students each year with the most powerful tool
    available to achieve success: a college degree.
        Last, as we honor the 65th Anniversary of Brown v. Board and
    wrestle with a promise unfulfilled, it becomes evident that just like
    our K-12 system, we spend more money to educate wealthy college
    students than students who are underserved by our education system.
    Depriving the institutions that serve our most vulnerable college
    students of the resources made available to predominantly white 4-year
    universities is contrary to our values and our best interest as a
    Nation.
        Congress has a responsibility to strengthen and invest in
    institutions that are promoting economic mobility. As we continue to
    work toward a reauthorization of key Federal higher education policy,
    we must understand the critical work these institutions are doing to
    address the specific needs of today's students and invest in these
    initiatives.
        Thank you--President Verret, Dr. McHatton, Chancellor DuBois, and
    President Boham--for being with us today.
        I now yield to the Ranking Member, Mr. Smucker, for his opening
    statement.
                                     ______

        Mr. SMUCKER. Thank you, Madame Chair, for yielding. We are
    all here today because we believe that every American should
    have the opportunity to pursue post-secondary education and we
    know doors are opened by college degree and we understand the
    importance of making this kind of opportunity achievable for
    everyone in our country.
        Higher education can help set individuals on the right path
    to achieve the American dream. And while it's not the only
    pathway to a high quality, family sustaining job, it provides
    many with the opportunity to get their foot in the door to a
    lifelong career.
        As a result of the economic policies that we put in place,
    the good news is today's graduates are entering a booming job
    market. We have over 7 million job openings and at least 6.7
    million unemployed. So I'm very proud of the opportunities our
    economic growth will create for the next generation and believe
    that if we give students access, those who are willing to work
    hard, make good decisions have an excellent opportunity to
    succeed. That access is a critical piece of the pie.
        Higher education should be accessible and attainable
    regardless of circumstance which is why the Federal Government
    has made it a clear priority to ensure that low income and
    first generation students have the tools that they need to
    prepare for post-secondary education commitments and manage the
    costs associated with earning a degree.
        As we continue to consider what must be done in any
    reauthorization of the Higher Education Act, we have the
    opportunity to ensure that restructuring and innovation of our
    higher education system provides all students that access to
    opportunities that offer those pathways to success, both inside
    and outside of the conventional classroom.
        That could mean alternative pathways to a 4 year degree
    such as offering programs to teach in demand skills so that
    students can take only the courses they need to do their jobs,
    dual enrollment pathways and opportunities later in life to
    rescale.
        For any of these changes to take place, we must recognize
    that the dollar, the money is an important part of the
    conversation and institutions need to be willing to take
    responsibility for the outcomes of their students.
        Stories like one from this weekend where a billionaire
    gifted an entire graduating class with paying off their student
    debt are great examples of one person's capacity for excellence
    and generosity. But they also illustrate something that's too
    easily forgotten, that nothing is free and someone always pays
    the price.
        This means that Congress and other institutions need to
    step up to the plate, do all that we can respectively to make
    higher education an investment that doesn't cost more than it
    reaps. And that is true for students and for taxpayers who are
    investing.
        In the Promoting Real Opportunity Success and Prosperity
    through Education Reform, the PROSPER Act, that was a
    comprehensive proposal to reauthorize the HEA in the last
    Congress, Republicans included reforms that allowed students
    greater access to Federal student aid, promoted earn and learn
    programs, increased flexibility in spending institutional aid
    and reform the Federal work study program to better prepare
    students for future employment in their chosen fields.
        These bold ideas for affordable and accessible post-
    secondary education recognize that for too long, the Federal
    Government has complied with a myopic view of what post-
    secondary education is and why people pursue any kind of higher
    education. We must recognize that postsecondary education needs
    to work for students and not the other way around.
        This committee should continue to consider these reforms
    top priorities as it discusses policy changes that could be
    included in the reauthorization of the HEA. We need to be
    striving on both sides of the aisle for new ideas that will
    increase opportunities for all American students regardless of
    circumstance and support their efforts to succeed and prosper.
    With that I yield back.

    Prepared Statement of Hon. Lloyd Smucker, Ranking Member, Subcommittee
                  on Higher Education and Workforce Investment

        Thank you for yielding.
        We're all here today because we believe that every American should
    have the opportunity to pursue postsecondary education. We've seen the
    doors opened by a college degree, and we understand the importance of
    making this kind of opportunity achievable for everyone in our country.
    Higher education should be accessible and attainable, regardless of
    circumstance, which is why the Federal Government has made it a clear
    priority to ensure low-income and first-generation students have the
    tools they need to prepare for postsecondary education commitments and
    manage the costs associated with earning a degree.
        As we continue to consider what must be done in any reauthorization
    of the Higher Education Act, we have the opportunity to ensure that
    restructuring and innovation in our higher education system provides
    all students equal access to opportunities that offer pathways to
    success--both inside and outside of the conventional classroom. This
    could mean alternative pathways to a 4-year degree, such as offering
    programs to teach in-demand skills so that students can take only the
    courses they need to do their jobs, dual enrollment pathways, and
    opportunities later in life to re-skill.
        For any of these changes to take place, we must recognize that
    money is an important part of the conversation, and institutions need
    to be willing to take more responsibility for the outcomes of their
    students. Stories like one from this weekend, where a billionaire
    gilted an entire graduating class with paying off their student debt,
    are great examples of one person's capacity for excellence and
    generosity. They also illustrate something too easily forgotten: that
    nothing is free, and someone always pays the price. This means Congress
    and institutions need to step up to the plate, and do all they can
    respectively, to make higher education an investment that doesn't cost
    more than it reaps-for students and taxpayers.
        In the Promoting Real Opportunity Success and Prosperity through
    Education Reform (PROSPER) Act, which was a comprehensive proposal to
    reauthorize the HEA in the 115th Congress, Republicans included reforms
    that allowed students greater access to Federal student aid, promoted
    earn and learn programs, increased flexibility in spending
    institutional aid, and reformed the Federal work study program to
    better prepare students for future employment in their chosen fields.
    These bold ideas for affordable and accessible postsecondary education
    recognized that for too long, the Federal Government has complied with
    a myopic view of what postsecondary education is and why people pursue
    any kind of higher education. We must recognize that postsecondary
    education needs to work for students-not the other way around.
        The committee should continue to consider these reforms top
    priorities as it discusses policy changes that could be included in the
    reauthorization of the HEA. We need to be striving, on both sides of
    the aisle, for new ideas that will increase opportunities for all
    American students, regardless of circumstance, and support their
    efforts to succeed and prosper.
                                     ______

        Chairwoman DAVIS. Thank you. Without objection, all other
    members who wish to insert written statements into the record
    may do so by submitting them to the committee clerk
    electronically in Microsoft Word by 5 p.m. on June 4. And I
    will now introduce our witnesses. Again, thank you all very
    much for being here.
        Dr. Reynold Verret is the 6th president and second leg
    leader of Xavier University of Louisiana, a private Catholic
    liberal arts historically black college and university. Before
    his presidency in 2015, Dr. Verret served as provost as
    Savannah State University and Wilkes University. Dr. Verret
    received his undergraduate degree cum laude in biochemistry
    from Columbia University and a PhD in biochemistry from the
    Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
        Dr. Patricia McHatton is the Executive Vice President for
    Academic Affairs, Student Success and P-16 Integration at the
    University of Texas Rio Grande Valley, a Hispanic serving
    institution. Dr. McHatton has served in a variety of leadership
    positions including Dean at the College of Education,
    Department Chair, and Associate Dean for Teacher Preparation.
    She earned a PhD from the University of South Florida in
    curriculum and instruction with an emphasis in special
    education and urban education.
        Dr. Glen DuBois is now the longest serving chancellor in
    the history of Virginia's community colleges, hired in 2001.
    Since then, he has led the system of 23 colleges and 40
    campuses through two successful strategic plans and a third
    called Complete 2021 which aspires to triple the number of
    credentials that colleges put into Virginia's economy.
        Dubois earned his PhD in higher education administration,
    research and policy from the University of Massachusetts. He
    holds a master's degree from Eastern Kentucky University, a
    bachelor's degree from Florida Atlantic University and an
    associate of science degree from the State University of New
    York and Farmingdale.
        Dr. Sandra Boham is the President of Salish Kootenai
    College, a tribal college and university, a TCU, located in
    Montana after serving as Vice President of Academic Affairs.
    She has more than two decades of experience working in higher
    education both in Montana and California.
        Dr. Boham is an enrolled member of the Confederated Salish
    in Kootenai Tribes of the Flathead Indian Reservation. She
    earned her doctorate of education in educational leadership
    from the University of Montana, holds a masters of education
    from Montana State University and a bachelor of arts in
    sociology from the University of Montana.
        Again, welcome to you all. We appreciate all the witnesses
    for being here and for you all being here and certainly look
    forward to your testimony. I just wanted to remind you that we
    have read your written statements and they will appear in full
    in the hearing record.
        Pursuant to committee rule 7d and committee practice, each
    of you is asked to limit your oral presentation to a 5 minute
    summary of your written statement. I also wanted to remind you
    that pursuant to Title 18 of the U.S. Code, section 1001 it is
    illegal to knowingly and willfully falsify any statement,
    representation, writing, document, or material fact presented
    to Congress or otherwise conceal or cover up a material fact.
        Before you begin your testimony, please remember to press
    the button on the microphone in front of you so that it will
    turn on and we all can hear you. As you begin to speak, the
    light in front of you will turn green and after 4 minutes, the
    light will turn yellow to signal you have one remaining minute.
    And when the light turns red your 5 minutes have expired and we
    will ask you to please wrap up.
        We will let the entire panel make their presentations
    before we move to member questions and when answering a
    question, please remember to once again turn your microphone
    on. First to recognize is Dr. Verret. Thank you.

         STATEMENT OF REYNOLD VERRET, PH.D., PRESIDENT, XAVIER
                        UNIVERSITY OF LOUISIANA

        Mr. VERRET. Thank you. Subcommittee Chairwoman Susan Davis,
    Ranking Member Lloyd Smucker, and members of the subcommittee,
    thank you for this opportunity to address you. My name is
    Reynold Verret. I serve as the 6th president of Xavier
    University of Louisiana. It was founded by Saint Katherine
    Drexel and the Sisters of the Blessed Sacrament. My institution
    is Catholic and also an HBCU, historically black college.
        The ultimate purpose of Xavier is to contribute to the
    promotion of the just and humane society. This preparation
    takes place in diverse learning environments that incorporate
    all relevant learning means including research experiences and
    community service.
        I was asked to testify before the subcommittee today on the
    institution as an engine of economic mobility, and the programs
    that demonstrate this at the institution. How these programs
    prepare students for careers and a brief history of HBCU's why
    they were created, why they are important.
        HBCU's were created as early as 1837 to provide African
    Americans access to higher education. Noted for their
    contributions to educating black low income and educationally
    disadvantaged Americans, the 101 HBCU's today constitute the
    class of institutions that satisfies the statutory requirements
    and definition of HBCU's as defined by the Higher Education Act
    of 1965.
        In my home State of Louisiana, according to and economic
    impact study, by the UNCF, the United Negro College Fund, the
    impact of the 6 HBCU's in the State on our regional economy and
    employment impact of 8,454 jobs. The total economic impact of
    $924--$923 million and a lifetime earnings of $94--$9.4
    billion.
        For Xavier specifically, the regional impact of our
    institution is an output impact of $200 million in our
    regional, a value added impact of $135 million, a labor income
    impact of $95 million and an employment impact of 1,715 jobs.
    Xavier is considered to be one of the best value schools in the
    Nation for quality education according to the U.S. News and
    World Report.
        However, as our students come close to realizing their
    dreams of higher education, the more expensive these goals
    become. Tuition at Xavier is $22,503 per year. This is
    considerably lower than its peer institutions.
        More than 93 percent of Xavier undergraduates qualify for
    need based or other forms of financial aid and more than 65
    percent receive Federal Pell grants. We are grateful for your
    bipartisan support and forgiveness of the HBCU Hurricane
    Katrina supplemental loan that helped us recover from the
    disaster.
        Xavier leads in preparing African American physicians in
    the Nation and also sending African American PhD's in the
    sciences. At Xavier, we are innovating our programs and
    preparing our students for the work force and a changing work
    force. We are launching 14 new high quality programs including
    the BS in neuroscience and the only physician's assistance
    program, master's program in the State of Louisiana and a PhD
    in education.
        We believe that all children deserve great teachers and
    thus we are also engaged in preparing highly qualified teachers
    for our primary and secondary schools. The expansion of our
    program offerings over the past 3 years allowed Xavier to meet
    the evolving needs of students to be globally competitive and
    to meet the talent needs of our regional and National work
    force.
        Xavier's Student Academic Success Office provides the
    resources and support systems to assist all students in being
    successful. A UNCF Lilly Foundation grant has allowed us to
    focus on creating career pathways and our faculty embrace a
    culture of successful students that is a tradition at Xavier.
        I am happy that the Fiscal Year 2020 Labor HHS
    Appropriation bill includes much needed increases in funding
    for HBCU's and hopes its passage through the House and Senate
    will ultimately follow. Title III parts B through F remain
    important programs for HBCU's for the HBCU community and should
    be fully funded. Senators Doug Jones and Tim Scott and
    Representatives Alma Adams and Mark Walker recently introduced
    the FUTURE Act, a bipartisan, bicameral piece of legalization.
    This bill extends the mandatory funding of Title III, Part F
    for HBCU's of $85 million for STEM initiatives until 2021. It
    is my hope that Congress passes this bill before this stream of
    funding expires on September 30, 2019.
        I must say to you the Nation has need of the ability,
    creativity, and ingenuity of the students we educate. In order
    to prosper and compete globally we will continue investment in
    them secures all of our futures.
        I want to thank you and if you want more my written
    testimony has been submitted. Please review it. Thank you very
    much.
        [The statement of Mr. Verret follows:]

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        Chairwoman DAVIS. Thank you. Dr. McHatton.

     STATEMENT OF PATRICIA ALVAREZ MCHATTON, PH.D., EXECUTIVE VICE
       PRESIDENT FOR ACADEMIC AFFAIRS, STUDENT SUCCESS, AND P-16
         INTEGRATION, THE UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS RIO GRANDE VALLEY

        Ms. MCHATTON. Good morning, Chairwoman Davis, Ranking
    Member Smucker, and honorable committee members. I am Patricia
    Alvarez McHatton, Executive Vice President of Academic Affairs,
    Student Success and P-16 Integration at the University of Texas
    Rio Grande Valley.
        I'm grateful for the opportunity to address you today and
    want to especially thank you for giving me an ability to share
    some of the wonderful work that's happening at the University
    of Texas Rio Grande Valley. We are a distributed campus
    spanning approximately 120 miles along the U.S. Mexico border
    all the way from Brownsville to Rio Grande City.
        Our fall 2018 enrollment was over 28,000 students. We
    graduate over 5,000 students each year. 87 percent of our
    students are Hispanic, 59 percent are first generation, 76
    percent of all undergraduate students receive some form of
    financial aid and 81 percent of undergraduate students
    receiving financial aid are Pell grant eligible.
        Most importantly, our students are committed to their
    education and to giving back to their community. The work we do
    is guided by five priorities with students' success at its
    core. We ensure students success by providing educational
    opportunities, engaging in research that impacts the Rio Grande
    Valley and beyond, expanding healthcare and medical education
    which is essential given that we are a medically underserved
    community with some of the highest rates of diabetes in the
    Nation, and collaborating with our community as true partners
    in our work.
        Our tuition is capped at 12 credit hours which means
    students do not pay for any courses above the 12 credit hours.
    Not only are they graduating in a timely manner but they are
    doing so with less debt. Our promise program exemplifies our
    commitment to ensuring our students graduate in 4 years. As
    part of the program, students take part in targeted career
    development opportunities, high impact practices, meet with
    mentors on a regular basis, and complete 15 hours a semester or
    30 hours in a calendar year.
        But getting them graduated is insufficient. We need to make
    sure that once they graduate they enter viable careers that
    address community needs. To do so we work in tandem with
    employers, educators, work force systems, and communities to
    ensure our current and future work force needs are met.
        First, we believe that teaching is the foundation of all
    professions. Therefore we have a responsibility to prepare
    teachers who understand not just content and pedagogue but also
    the applicability of what is learned to real world
    environments.
        We strive to ensure that our faculty are representative of
    our student population because it is important for our students
    to see individuals who look like them and sound like them in a
    variety of positions. And we have benefited from Federal
    funding to support initiatives that attract underrepresented
    faculty in our institution and help build capacity within our
    faculty.
        So how do we work with our stakeholders to ensure we have
    the right programs and opportunities for our students? We have
    representatives on economic development center and chamber
    boards throughout the valley. Recently at the request of Star
    County's EDC, we conducted an analysis to determine which
    industries are growing and expected to grow in the county and
    we are aligning educational programs to meet that work force
    need.
        We systematically bring stakeholders together to share
    cultural perspectives, talents, challenges, and opportunities
    and through this process, communities are empowered to provide
    input into university policies, curriculum, research, and
    initiatives.
        We offer opportunity for K12 learners to take part in
    summer camp that inspires them to enter STEM fields and high
    tech jobs and provide high school students opportunities to
    partner with faculty in research endeavors. We offer research
    and development support to local industries.
        The Center for Advanced Radio Astronomy and Stargate both
    support the development of future leaders in space exploration,
    commercial space industry, and related technology developments
    which is especially important now that Space X has moved into
    the RGV.
        And it isn't just the STEM fields that we focus on. The
    College of Fine Arts has a relationship with the Rio Grande
    State Center in Harlingen whereby art student's work directly
    with patients as part of the rehabilitation.
        We are in the process of launching our PhD program in
    clinical psychology which has a focus on Hispanic mental health
    and this is but one of many other programs that we are
    launching. In collaboration with nonprofits, governmental
    support organizations, and the business community we support
    entrepreneurial activity innovations through our Weslaco
    Regional Commercialization and Innovation Center and NSFI core
    teams program.
        The School of Medicine continues its mission to close gaps
    in healthcare and expand educational opportunities for its
    students. The South Texas Diabetes and Obesity Institute, the
    Institution of Neuro Science and the RGV Alzheimer's Center are
    engaged in research to address health disparities and the
    region.
        In closing, I want to point out that HSI's provide
    Hispanics the greatest access to college education. They
    represent over 15 percent of all higher ed institutions yet
    serve 66 percent of Hispanic undergraduates.
        In 2016, HSI's awarded 56 percent of all degrees to
    Hispanic students and are at the forefront to increase
    educational access and success for the Nation's Hispanic.
        I thank you for this opportunity to share the work being
    undertaken at UTRGV and stand ready to work with you in
    ensuring all students are ready for success.
        [The statement of Ms. McHatton follows:]

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        Chairwoman DAVIS. Thank you. Dr. DuBois.

        STATEMENT OF GLENN DUBOIS, PH.D., CHANCELLOR, VIRGINIA
                        COMMUNITY COLLEGE SYSTEM

        Mr. DUBOIS. Chairwoman Davis, Ranking Member Smucker,
    members of the committee, good morning. The fact that I'm
    sitting here before you today is proof positive that community
    colleges are indeed engines of economic opportunity.
        I am a community college graduate. I was the first in my
    family to attend college. Truth said I was disinterested in
    high school and if it were not for my mother's persistence, I
    would have never even considered going to a community college.
    Today I'm chancellor of the Virginia Community College System.
    We operate 23 colleges across 40 campuses. I'm also a founding
    board member of a group called Rebuilding America's Middle
    Class, RAMC. It's a coalition of more than 100 community
    colleges focused on advancing post-secondary access and
    affordability.
        Our colleges were created to do what no one else really
    would do, respond to Virginia's unmet needs in higher education
    and work force development. Cost and convenience are the two
    biggest reasons why students choose to attend a community
    college. We are open access. We give everyone a chance. For
    many we offer a second chance. For those of limited means,
    demanding responsibilities, difficult schedules, we offer what
    might be their only chance.
        One example where location and access really makes a big
    difference is rural Virginia. Rural Virginia barely trails the
    rest of the State in high school graduation, in college
    attainment. There we have to convince families who have never
    before needed anything beyond high school, in some cases beyond
    6th grade to get a good job, we have to convince them to send
    their children to college.
        Our Rural Virginia Horseshoe Initiative 10-year goals
    include cutting in half the areas high school dropout rate and
    doubling its college credential completion rate. We are
    pursuing that through student coaching practices and helping
    more students finish short term pathways that lead to
    employment.
        We also serve a huge number of students who begin at their
    community college with the aspirations to eventually transfer
    to a university and complete the bachelor's degree. In
    Virginia, our tuition and fees are approximately 1/3 the
    comparable cost at a public university.
        But let me be very clear. It is rare for a community
    college student to complete an associate degree in 2 years. And
    much of that has to do with life circumstances of those we
    serve. Simply Stated, our students today are older, they're
    poorer, more likely to be first generation, just like I was,
    and they are more likely to attend class part time, not full
    time working a full time job or multiple part time jobs.
        We also have to help more adult students earn post-
    secondary credentials. Careers exist today that simply didn't
    when these adults were 18. These opportunities offer family
    sustaining wages, healthcare, a regular schedule, and paid time
    off. They don't require a bachelor's degree but they do require
    skills that we offer in our short term format.
        We call our short term training programs Fast Forward. It's
    our fastest growing segment. These programs are more
    affordable, they're more realistic for adults, the schedules
    work for them, and most importantly these programs fill
    critical business needs.
        In nearly 3 hours, pardon me, 3 years, our colleges put
    more than 13,000 high demand credentials into the Virginia
    economy. Those credentials are business verified as high demand
    and aimed directly at the employer challenge of finding trained
    and skilled employees.
        The ability to use Pell grants for these short-term
    programs would be transformative. We could serve so many more
    students unleashing an incredible engine of economic mobility.
    Our typical Fast Forward student has to come up with about
    $1,000 bucks out of pocket on day one. Survey after survey
    after survey confirms that the amount of $1,000 bucks is simply
    out of reach for too many American families.
        Pell eligibility would make all the difference. Should Pell
    grants be extended to these students I would suggest that you
    do so with a solid system of accountability just like we have
    established in Virginia.
        For the same reason that the Federal Government invests in
    those pursing traditional academic degrees, we should invest in
    those pursing high quality, stackable, postsecondary work force
    credentials and boost America's community colleges as an even
    more powerful engine of economic mobility. Thank you.
        [The statement of Mr. DuBois follows:]

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        Chairwoman DAVIS. Thank you. Dr. Boham.

    STATEMENT OF SANDRA L. BOHAM, ED.D., PRESIDENT, SALISH KOOTENAI
                                COLLEGE

        Ms. BOHAM. Kifuke Witnam. Madame Chair and distinguished
    members of the subcommittee, I am Dr. Sandra Boham. I'm an
    enrolled member of the confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes
    and President of Salish Kootenai College in Pablo, Montana. I'm
    also a member of the board of directors of the American Indian
    Higher Education Consortium and I am very honored to be here to
    speak with you today.
        Tribal colleges are place based, mission focused
    institutions. To tribal colleges and universities, economic
    mobility means preparing individual American Indian and Alaska
    Native students for success as well as strengthening and
    sustaining our tribes, tribal communities, lands, language and
    cultures.
        Salish Kootenai College like all TCU's was established for
    two reasons. One, the near complete failure of the U.S. higher
    education system to address the needs of or even include
    American Indians and Alaskan natives and two, to preserve our
    culture, language, lands, and sovereignty.
        Located in some of the most impoverished, remote, and
    beautiful areas in the Nation, tribal colleges have grown from
    one institution in 1968 to 37 today. Operating 75 campuses in
    16 States. We serve 130,000 students and community members each
    year and from more than 230 federally recognized tribes. My
    home State of Montana has 7 tribal colleges and about half of
    all American Indians enrolled in higher education in Montana
    attend a tribal college.
        Tribal colleges are accredited institutions chartered by
    federally recognized tribes for the Federal Government. All
    tribal colleges offer associate degrees, 16 offer bachelors'
    degrees, and 5 offer masters degrees. All taught from a
    foundation grounded in our tribe's distinctive and resilient
    world views.
        Today, we are facilitating economic growth and
    sustainability. Over the past 45 years, we have developed solid
    work force programs responsive to tribal needs.
        Salish Kootenai College offers bachelor's degrees in forest
    management, hydrology, wildlife, fisheries, education, nursing,
    tribal governance, and tribal historic preservation. We are
    aggressively working to sustain our tribal languages because
    language, culture, and community are essential to native
    student success and completion.
        At SKC we developed a Salish language teacher
    apprenticeship program that includes a yearlong immersion in
    Salish language. We focus on the adults because they are
    essential to teaching our language. For us, the situation is
    critical.
        Just a few years ago, the number of fluent Salish speakers
    fell to 18. Our goal is to educate 40 Salish language teachers
    who will give our children a clear path, clear vision of the
    world as a Salish person and set them on a good path. The
    program is also a path to economic mobility. In the first few
    years, every student who completed the program was hired in the
    local schools.
        This program demonstrates a synergistic dual nature of
    economy mobility in native people. Academic success is
    important, equally important to us is to strengthen our
    community and perpetuate our culture. These twin missions,
    individual and community, are inseparable. We cannot fail at
    either without putting the other at risk.
        A more obvious contributor to the economic mobility is the
    availability of jobs. Through a multi-year partnership with the
    Department of Energy, Tribes and Industries, Salish Kootenai
    College and four other TCU's are establishing advanced
    engineering skills to operate digital manufacturing equipment.
        Salish Kutenai College partnered with Northrup Grumman, the
    United States Air Force, Salish SNK technologies and the
    college to--in a mentor protege program to help us create the
    work force and develop economic opportunities through that
    program.
        As new jobs are created, the tribal colleges will educate
    students to fill those positions. One of the ways we have
    created job creation is that we need a pipeline of skilled
    workers. Because our high school dropout rates are too high,
    and many students were enrolling at SKC unprepared for college
    STEM courses, we developed dual credit. But that wasn't enough.
    So we recently opened a STEM academy for high school juniors
    and seniors.
        Students take classes at their own high school in the
    morning, come to Salish Kootenai College in the afternoon to
    complete their science and math courses and then they are ready
    to enter STEM programs and have doorways open for opportunities
    that they might not have had before.
        The academy is already in its second year of existence
    demonstrating success. Through strategies like this, tribal
    colleges are transforming Native America and Indian country one
    student at a time. Thank you.
        [The statement of Ms. Boham follows:]

    [GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

        Chairwoman DAVIS. Thank you. Thank you very much and thank
    you all for helping us by being within the time limits. We
    appreciate it.
        If I could, under committee rule, I'm going to move now to
    questioning of witnesses under our 5 minute rule and I will be
    followed by the ranking member and then we will alternate
    between the parties.
        If I could start with you, Dr. Boham. You've spent more
    than 2 decades working with tribal communities and, excuse me,
    in higher education in Montana and in my home State of
    California. And I know that includes working with adults who
    are trying to finish their GED and with upward bound programs
    to improve college access.
        So I wonder if you could just share with us a little more
    really on the personal level how your experience working in
    different facets of higher education and in different tribal
    communities influence your approach to your role as president
    of Salish Kootenai College. What really mattered?
        Ms. BOHAM. Thank you, Madame Chair.
        Chairwoman DAVIS. Thank you.
        Ms. BOHAM. What really matters is opportunity and assisting
    students to believe that they can in fact accomplish anything
    that they set their minds to accomplish. What we know is that
    having a very--and we know this through recent research and
    studies, tribally we have known it for a long time but only
    recently have there been--has there been research done in the
    area.
        But we know that self-efficacy is a key piece in whether
    students will be successful. More than GPA's, more than high
    school graduation or predictive tests of entrance exams, if the
    student is committed and believes that they can accomplish
    their goal, with support they can.
        We also know that a strong sense of who you are and in our
    case that's around your tribal identity, is also key to having
    students be successful in college, in high school and in the
    work force. So we know that base connection to your culture,
    what--at whatever level that is, language, dance, song, skills,
    that is--it creates what we call predictive resiliency and
    protective factors that help students to navigate through
    difficult times.
        Chairwoman DAVIS. Thank you. And does that come from
    individuals, from teachers, professors, etcetera or are there
    actually community members who help contribute to that as well?
        Ms. BOHAM. It comes from all of those things.
        Chairwoman DAVIS. Um-hum.
        Ms. BOHAM. Yes.
        Chairwoman DAVIS. Thank you very much. Dr. McHatton, excuse
    me, McHatton, as we know, universities are cultural hubs and
    they are centers for the community as well and people want to
    be there. They want to experience the university and the
    community setting. I certainly know that is true for CSU's and
    I am wondering how the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley
    ensures the local community is included in campus efforts to
    identify and address local leads including the demand for an
    educated work force.
        How do they find their way to really having a meaningful
    impact on that process?
        Ms. MCHATTON. Great, thank you so much. We have a variety
    of initiatives in which we strive to bring our community into
    our environment. One of the things that we've done is we have
    tried to change the environment so it becomes a family friendly
    environment. And that means that our families feel comfortable
    coming on to our campus, spending time and engaging in
    conversation.
        An important initiative that we have done as a result of
    funding from NSF is to provide culturally responsive
    professional development for our faculty in tandem with
    community members and together they redesigned the syllabi in
    order to utilize the culture and heritage and assets of the
    community as an entree into the content.
        In addition to that, our community engagement and economic
    development center also has opportunities for community to come
    together and have conversations.
        The outreach that we do with economic development centers
    in which we have individuals participating on their boards and
    those types of things also provide important information for us
    to be able to think about what other programs that we should be
    offering.
        Chairwoman DAVIS. Sounds like what you are also doing is
    sustaining that effort with the community which I think is
    really important and always looking for ways to do that because
    sometimes people burn out, right. How do you keep them engaged?
    I mean what--
        Ms. MCHATTON. Well, I have to tell you what we find in our
    community is that there is so much strength and commitment to
    our students and to the education because they know what a
    difference that's going to make. Not just for the individual
    but for the family and also for our region. They give
    willingly. It's just absolutely amazing.
        One example is we have a common area in the College of
    Education. We had a group of community organization individuals
    that came and completely built a brand new garden in that area.
    So we just, we find opportunities for them to come and take
    part.
        Chairwoman DAVIS. Thank you very much. I want to turn now
    to the ranking member or his designate for the purpose of
    questioning the witnesses. Thank you.
        Mr. SMUCKER. Thank you. Dr. DuBois, interested in your
    comments in regards to expanding the Pell grant funds for
    shorter term work force programs. As you know, currently the
    requirements of programs must be at least 1600 or 600 hours in
    length and need to be taught over a span of 15 weeks. You
    mentioned Fast Forward. What--how many weeks do most of your
    fast forward programs last?
        Mr. DUBOIS. Thank you for the question. They last typically
    6 weeks. Some a little longer, some a little less. We have
    completion rates north of 90 percent. We have job placement
    rates similar and we are seeing in looking, on a lookback we
    can see earnings increasing anywhere from 20 to 50 percent. And
    20 percent of the students that we put through these programs
    in the last 3 years before they came to us, they were on public
    assistance and now they're not.
        So these are short term opportunities that lead to jobs
    that employers are really screaming about. Think welding,
    pharmacy technicians, CDL's. Its, increasing of these jobs
    require certifications and licenses.
        Mr. SMUCKER. Great results. What would you recommend as we
    consider changes to the policy? How many hours do you recommend
    that we set for minimum time eligibility requirement?
        Mr. DUBOIS. Six weeks or 150 hours.
        Mr. SMUCKER. Six weeks 150 hours.
        Mr. DUBOIS. Yes, sir.
        Mr. SMUCKER. Thank you. Dr. Verret, I would like to learn a
    little bit more about your student academic success office.
    What types of career pathways have you created through the
    office? Your microphone, yes.
        Mr. VERRET. First of all, we have a great depth in the STEM
    and the professional health areas. We educate more African
    Americans than any university in the country going to become
    MDs. We send more African Americans into doctoral programs of
    advanced science and advanced studies in the sciences. That but
    also we are also very we have students who enter the law,
    social service, teaching professions as well.
        The career pathways programs is to allow students because
    we are a liberal arts and sciences institution, to enable
    students to undersee the plasticity of their degrees because
    very often, students who are coming into history or English
    also have the pathway to medical school if they wish to because
    there is a need of those. Likewise, our chemists become
    attorneys and also may go into policy fields as well for them
    to understand much more broadly what their fields are.
        We are also speaking with our chambers of commerce and also
    the economic the work force as to what are the professions that
    are needed. For example, data science which is reimagining what
    we traditionally teach in computer science for the emerging
    industries, DX is coming to our region to actively think of
    what majors, data science--
        Mr. SMUCKER. I guess those discussion with the chamber are
    leading to a better transition to--
        Mr. VERRET. Yes.
        Mr. SMUCKER [continuing]. jobs after graduation?
        Mr. VERRET. Because we are thinking of what those work
    force needs are but also we also know that many forms of, many
    jobs that we, that will be emerging in the next 5 to 10 years
    we don't, we can't fully envision. So it's also interesting--
    educating them to be flexible to have habits of mind, to think
    critically and in depth to be able to form their careers rather
    than just think of their next jobs because we are in a changing
    work force at this time.
        Mr. SMUCKER. How are you integrating that career focus
    curriculum into dual enrollment programs?
        Mr. VERRET. We have dual enrollment programs with some of
    the high schools in our region that send students to us. And
    those, some of those students matriculate to Xavier--some of
    them go to other campuses as well.
        We also have summer programs of long standing in the
    sciences, in language arts, which bring a number of students in
    our, during our summers. Some of them come to our university,
    many of them go to other colleges that is, that has been part
    of our mission.
        Mr. SMUCKER. Are you finding some of those dual enrollment
    programs help students to make choices that would lead to the
    careers that they're interested in?
        Mr. VERRET. It is important to catch the imagination of
    young people early in their lives about, and catch their
    passions as well so that they do not choose and drift away.
    Because one of the struggles for our populations as well is
    understanding that there is a pathway to higher ed. For many of
    us students who are first generation there is no one who can
    actually--and who knows helps navigate. We have to show them
    one of the paths that this is possible and we are engaging
    doing that.
        Mr. SMUCKER. Thank you.
        Chairwoman DAVIS. Thank you. Mr. Takano.
        Mr. TAKANO. Thank you, Chairwoman Davis, for holding this
    important hearing on the role of community colleges and
    minority serving institutions. A report by Harvard economist
    Raj Chetty found that the income and economic mobility of low
    income students increases when they attend minority serving
    institutions.
        Providing proper resources and funding to MSI's is critical
    to ensuring success and income mobility for low income
    students. Now I have two letters from students about the Asian
    American and Native American Pacific Islanders Serving
    Institution programs or AANAPISI.
        One student attends Irvine Valley College in California and
    notes that quote it was not until my time at Irvine Valley
    College I was able finally in a space where I saw others that
    looked like me, met others who understood me, and really got to
    embrace my Asian American identity.
        The other letter is from a student attending Highline
    College in Des Moines, Washington and she wrote the AANAPISI
    program has shown me that I am not alone on this journey and I
    refuse to believe in the saying that quote, ``College is not
    for everyone unquote because I believe--I proved to myself that
    it's possible.''
        This reinforces the critical role that minority serving
    institutions like AANAPISIs have on the growth and success of
    students once they have a sense of belonging and, Madame
    Chairwoman, I would ask that these letters be entered into the
    record.
        Chairwoman DAVIS. So ordered.
        Mr. TAKANO. My first question is to Dr. McHatton. Doctor,
    why is it important to have programs and student support
    services that have a cultural lens to them?
        Ms. MCHATTON. As a Latina myself who did not have a teacher
    that looked like me or talked like me until I was in my PhD
    program, I recognize how important it is to have someone that
    can serve as a mentor and that understands the cultural
    heritage and ideals and values that I believe in.
        I think part of what we really need to ensure is to have
    opportunities to have our students see people who look like
    them as you just read from one of the students that you learned
    but more importantly, to think about how does culture,
    heritage, how does that serve as an entree into content? Into
    helping individuals learn?
        How does language and being bilingual or trilingual benefit
    the access of education? So I think there is a lot of items and
    opportunities that serve to support students in minority
    serving institutions in ways that other institutions may not.
        Mr. TAKANO. Wonderful. Both students mentioned the
    experience they've had because of the AANAPISI program. How
    critical are programs like AANAPISIs to ensuring retention and
    college completion?
        Ms. MCHATTON. I think they're essential. I think one of the
    things as a Hispanic serving institution what we found is the
    strong familial roles and the way that we understand the
    importance of committee--community for our students. We need to
    attend to that because part of that informs the way that our
    students take courses.
        We need to understand that a lot of our students give back
    by working, by supporting part of their family, you know,
    taking care of other siblings, those types of things. So we
    need to think about how do we develop programs that attend to
    that reality for our students and ensure that we provide them
    those opportunities.
        Mr. TAKANO. Well, thank you. I know that over 90 percent of
    the students at the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley self-
    identify as Latino and the campus is committed to providing
    educational opportunities that are culturally specific and
    responsive.
        Dr. McHatton, as the vice president who is responsible for
    student success, what does it mean to provide support to
    students?
        Ms. MCHATTON. I think the first thing is that we need to
    demonstrate all the way from upper administration down to our
    staff that all of us are together in this mission to make sure
    that students are successful. We need to think about things
    like student employment. We know that if students are employed
    on campus they're more likely to stay and finish their
    programs. We need to provide advisors that are able to engage
    with them.
        We need to have faculty have the necessary skills to
    understand their role in connecting with students, especially
    for those students in the middle. Our high need students are
    high touch with our advisors but there is a group of students
    that are faculties connect with on a daily basis and they're
    instrumental in making sure that our students are successful.
    So we have a variety of different programs and opportunities so
    that we are sure we are addressing the students from multiple
    points right, multiple touch points.
        Mr. TAKANO. Well, Dr. McHatton, I wish I had more time with
    you but I, my time has run out and I yield back, Madame Chair.
        Chairwoman DAVIS. Thank you. Mr. Guthrie.
        Mr. GUTHRIE. Thank you for having this, Madame Chair, and
    thanks for everybody being here and this committee, the full
    committee has been working together, both sides of the aisle to
    try to figure out how do we reach out to more people. We all
    know there are more jobs with skills than people with skills to
    fill them and that is our, that is the answer to the income
    issues that we need to address as a Nation as you get people
    skilled to move forward.
        And of course we would, I kind of grew up in the model
    where everybody is either expected to go to college or they
    went to work before. That was the area where I lived and if you
    didn't go to college you could go make a middle class income at
    Ford. And I had a professor one time when I was in grad school
    say that if it is going to be low skilled or low educational
    level obtainment required, that is going to go to low skilled
    countries and everything else is going to move to high skilled.
        And as manufacturing has moved back to our country which is
    has, a lot of the low skills just being automated. I mean, that
    is kind of the, what has happened. It is not like they are
    coming back and having massive plants of people working there.
    It is automating what can be routinely done. But what that has
    done is opened up a tremendous opportunity for people who can
    operate the machinery and repair the machinery and program the
    machinery and it doesn't take the 4-year degree to do so.
        And I know it is important that we bring people in at, I
    love Mr. Takano's line of questioning because we have to reach
    the people in--however they can be reached and we have to be
    open to that. But my kind of concern is how do we, the
    nontraditional, Dr. DuBois you talked about it. I wish every
    kid could go from 18 to 22 and be in college and, you know,
    have summers off and do that but it is just not the reality for
    people who are trying to get replugged in because maybe there
    job changed, I mean, their skills aren't, are no longer--either
    they didn't have skills that were required or their skills are
    on longer as valid but there is tremendous opportunity.
        So how do you gentlemen in Virginia because we are very
    similar. Of course we are a few years ago broke off from you
    guys, in Kentucky. We are very, but we have very similar where
    we have urban centers and we have urban community colleges and
    then we try to serve branches where we try to serve more of our
    rural area. And so kind of the challenge of the urban rule, how
    you are reaching rural Virginia, because we are trying how do
    we reach rural Kentucky because lot of times the factories
    aren't there.
        When I say factories I mean these are people who program
    CNC machines. These are highly skilled people who get good
    wages, going to make six figures without a 4-year degree if
    they have these particular skills. So how do you kind of deal
    with the urban rural differences in Virginia that we sort, we
    have also as well in Kentucky.
        Mr. DUBOIS. Thank you for the question. There are adults
    both in rural Kentucky and urban Kentucky. Many of these adults
    are working but they're going, they're living from paycheck to
    paycheck and their entire household is living from paycheck to
    paycheck.
        In Virginia, about 40 percent of our households are one
    emergency away from being in financial stress. Even though
    they're working, many of them hate their job or they want to
    make more money, or both. So when you look at the traditional
    academic menu at a university or a community college, what they
    see is inappropriate because it's a 4-year pathway to an
    associate degree. They can't give you 4 years.
        They have rents, they have car payments, they have kids.
    They can maybe give you 26 weeks because they just got laid off
    and that's how long their unemployment insurance lasts so what
    can we offer in 26 weeks? Perhaps they can give you 6 weeks if
    we offer it right.
        And we do know and your comments I think touched on it,
    that there are very, very good jobs out there that remain
    unfilled that employers want that do not require a bachelor's
    degree but do require something beyond a high school diploma.
    12th grade is no longer the finish line my friends, to have a
    shot at a middle class lifestyle. But you don't need a
    bachelor's degree either.
        So we have pivoted in Virginia to a much more sincere
    interest I think in helping adults. There are a lot more of
    them. And if you've been paying attention to our birthrate,
    there is going to be fewer and fewer and fewer 18 year olds.
    There is many more 25 to 45 year olds that need our help. So we
    have pivoted to try to do more to help adults and they are
    coming to us enrolling in our short term training programs.
        Think of it as they want to have a better life but they
    don't necessarily want a degree on their wall but they want a
    better W2 on their wall. Once they get it, what we are starting
    to see is what's next? Perhaps now that I have some college
    benefits and my employer I might just come back and start
    working on that associate degree. These are stackable kinds of
    pathways. They seem to be working very, very well in Virginia
    and we have had some--we quite frankly we have had some help
    come from the State to try to help us lower the entry level
    price from $4,000 which is way beyond reach to about $1,000 and
    still according to my testimony and our research, is still a
    barrier for lots of Kentucky households and Virginia
    households.
        Mr. GUTHRIE. Thank you. Well, I was going to ask another
    question, my time is expired so I appreciate it and I yield
    back.
        Chairwoman DAVIS. Thank you. Ms. Trahan.
        Ms. TRAHAN. That came faster than I thought, I apologize.
    Thank you so much all of you for being with us here today. This
    testimony is so helpful. You know, I grew up in a working class
    family in Lowell, Massachusetts. I attended public schools my
    whole life and like you, Chancellor DuBois, I was the first
    person in my household to graduate from college.
        In Massachusetts we are fortunate to have some of the best
    public schools and institutions in the country however, high
    quality college degree remains far out of reach for too many
    students, especially students of color and low income. These
    are students who often work two jobs to make ends meet, they
    need to miss classes to take care of their loved ones.
        My district houses a number of community colleges, Mount
    Wachusett, Middlesex and Northern Essex. They educate and
    support diverse student populations.
        These community colleges they offer flexible class
    schedules, so students can come and learn and achieve at a
    lower cost. Unlike certain schools that boast the proportion of
    students that they reject, community colleges take pride in
    educating the top 100 percent of students.
        Because community colleges serve a higher share of
    underrepresented students of color yet receive the lowest share
    of resources to do so, I am wondering if you have any
    recommendations on how the Federal Government could step in to
    address systemic barriers to equal opportunity and ensure that
    community colleges are equipped to be engines of economic
    mobility.
        Mr. DUBOIS. Thank you for the question. For the record, I
    started my teaching career at Northshore Community College.
        Mr. TRAHAN. Oh, terrific.
        Mr. DUBOIS. In Massachusetts.
        Mr. TRAHAN. That's right outside.
        Mr. DUBOIS. A neighbor of yours. Very good question. Our
    students unlike our experiences when we all went to college
    are, they are facing tremendous life difficulties. I think in
    previous testimony this committee heard about some of those
    insecurities around food and housing and, you know, legal
    problems, they have financial problems. Almost when you think
    about it insurmountable. So what can we do?
        Our students need, they don't need academic advisors, they
    need social workers. They need life coaches when we meet them
    on day one. Our students need, they don't speak college. They
    don't know how to navigate college. They need a, think of a
    navigator that worked for us that can see our students as we
    need to get you college ready by day one.
        That, when a student shows up at August 10 and we are
    starting classes 2 weeks later, that's a challenge to get that
    student ready by day one. And the next challenge we have is if
    we can help that student complete the first 5 attempted
    courses, their chances of success really soar. Five out of 5.
    If it's only four out of 5 you can cut their chances in half.
    Three out of 5, cut it in half again. Two out of 5, wasting
    time and money.
        You are right. We are dealing with some of the Nation's
    students that have the most difficult life circumstances and we
    are simply funded at the lowest levels in higher education. We
    have become like the higher education emergency room for
    America. And yet we have to, we have to serve our students with
    essentially a part time work force called adjuncts. I don't
    know of a hospital in the country that would operate with part
    time nurses. So we do need help. It is tough work,
    Congresswoman.
        Ms. TRAHAN. I appreciate that. Especially the coaching and
    the services that are required to keep people on the path to
    gradation and success. You know some students at community
    colleges, they plan to transfer when they are admitted to a 4
    year institution or they continue after receiving their
    associate's degree. But they are faced with, you know, setbacks
    whether its, you know, courses or credits that don't transfer
    easily.
        I am wondering if you have any recommendations on what we
    can do to take the friction out of the system to make it easier
    for students to continue their education. And I say that, I
    direct the question to Chancellor DuBois but certainly if
    anyone else has comment.
        Mr. DUBOIS. I'll be brief. I think one of the things
    Congress can do in reauthorization is simply to require every
    State to have a guaranteed transfer apparatus between, among
    their community colleges and their public universities. That's
    a start.
        We have that in Virginia. We have guaranteed arrangements.
    They work but the problem that we are having, Congresswoman, is
    students typically they get there but they need to spend an
    extra semester because not everything counts.
        Ms. TRAHAN. Right.
        Mr. DUBOIS. Time is the enemy when you look at student
    success. And it's also, it also adds an extra financial burden.
        Ms. TRAHAN. Yes.
        Mr. DUBOIS. So we are working out the kinks but I think at
    a very minimum, Congress should require that there State public
    systems have guaranteed articulation agreements in alignment.
        Ms. TRAHAN. Thank you. Did anyone else want to comment?
    Thank you.
        Mr. VERRET. One of these things that we find essential
    because we receive, we have articulation agreements with our
    local community colleges. To make them effective what we have,
    what we do is to reach students at the beginning of their
    community college experience so they understand the pathways
    that they have to take. So at what course they would need to
    take if they were coming to a psychology major at our
    institution or aspiring to the pharmacy track if you take the
    right chemistry course.
        That discussion of those pathways that we, that we do for
    distinct majors with our neighboring colleges help students
    understand and waste less time. And also that it also tells
    them that they can be part of our community even before they
    are finished their associate's degree as well. Those
    connections are very, should be made very early.
        Chairwoman DAVIS. Thank you very much. Mr. Cline.
        Ms. TRAHAN. Thank you.
        Mr. CLINE. Thank you, Madame Chair. I am glad to see
    Chancellor DuBois here even if he is from Mass. I went to
    college in New England so I went to a lot of, went to school
    with a lot of students from Lowell and suburban Boston and,
    Chancellor, your roots are strong when it comes to higher
    education, you have a great experience up there in
    Massachusetts.
        I want to praise the work of you and your team and the
    Virginia Community College system has done revolutionary work
    and really made Virginia one of the standout programs in the
    country when it comes to community colleges. The flexibility
    that is provided to your institutions to be able to meet the
    needs of the public even in rural areas like mine, has been
    fantastic.
        The innovation that is going on, you decentralize so you
    allow your institutions to meet the needs of your communities
    so Virginia Western in Roanoke is meeting needs that might not
    be happening up in Blue Ridge. Folks down in agriculture Dabney
    Lancaster focused on, you know, it is near the homestead so you
    might have some golf course management courses. You might have
    some dining catering type courses.
        It is a fantastic balance and you are providing that bridge
    where in Buena Vista, Virginia a student at Parry McCluer High
    School can take courses at Dabney in HVAC maintenance and
    repair and then the companies that have found Buena Vista and
    located their HVAC manufacturing operations have located in
    Buena Vista provided free materials to those courses, to those
    students. They work on those--on the--on building these
    machines and then when they graduate they have got a job
    waiting for them.
        They can stay in rural Virginia, raise their family, and
    reinvigorate the school system. Reinvigorate the community. It
    is a fantastic cooperative effort and breaking down those
    transfer barriers between high school and community colleges, 2
    year and 4 year degrees, something Virginia has worked very
    hard to do.
        I have worked to establish the Transfer Grant Program along
    with Chairman Callahan. Worked to set up branch campuses so
    that they have small entities that kind of are satellite
    entities in places where they might not have a lot of
    population. And now we are moving into online courses where we
    are trying to get even the community colleges but especially
    our 4 year institutions to develop agreements where you can put
    a lot of courses online to reach those people who have
    different kinds of schedules.
        All this innovation is happening in Virginia and your
    leadership is to be commended. The one thing I noticed about
    your testimony and I just want to repeat it, you mentioned that
    the typical bachelor's degree graduate leaves Virginia public
    universities with nearly $30,000 in student debt on average,
    correct?
        Mr. DUBOIS. Correct.
        Mr. CLINE. And in the paragraph prior, if you take your
    first 2 years at a community college, get your associates
    degree, transfer to a 4-year institution in Virginia, 4 year
    public, finish your bachelor's degree in 2 years you save more
    than $50,000 on the price of that bachelor's degree. Correct?
        Mr. DUBOIS. That is correct.
        Mr. CLINE. Now I know that's a rare circumstance.
        Mr. DUBOIS. If everything works perfectly.
        Mr. CLINE. Right. And I know that is a rare circumstance
    but you are charting, providing that solution. We have been
    sitting here in hearings asking how do we bring down the cost
    of a college education? And you are providing the solution.
        So when I am confronted with parents who can't get into
    Virginia Techs engineering program because its acceptance rate
    is something like 10, 12 percent, it is amazingly low, I am
    able to provide them with an alternative. Virginia Western has
    the exact same courses you would take at Tech, you are 50 miles
    away. You know, and you are going to be able to save the money
    and transfer to Tech, enjoy those last 2 years at Tech, go
    Hokies, and then finish with a Tech engineering degree which is
    second to none.
        So I am thrilled with what you are doing. I am sorry I, you
    know, I used up all my time praising you but I do want to thank
    you for all the work and thank you for being here today and I,
    if you want to respond to that you are more than welcome.
        Mr. DUBOIS. Thank you, Congressman Cline. We are glad you
    are here, we miss you in the State legislature and its, sir,
    for the record, I'm really from Brooklyn, not Massachusetts.
    But we can in Virginia, we can guarantee that any father or
    mother, that their child can graduate UVA, William and Mary,
    Virginia Tech, James Madison University if they enroll at a
    community college, graduate from a community college at the
    prescribed GPA of the university. And it does work, it has some
    kinks here and there but it does work.
        We can--if you can look for ways to leverage the community
    college you'll be saving tax payers a lot of money.
        Chairwoman DAVIS. Thank you very much. Mr. Castro.
        Mr. CASTRO. Thank you, Chairwoman. Mr. DuBois, I had a
    question for you. I know you can't speak as a representative of
    all community colleges but I spent time in Texas as a vice
    chairman of the higher ed committee for a two terms and a lot
    of the challenges that we had with our community colleges I
    think they provide, they do a great job with many students that
    they transfer to 4 year universities in Texas at least those
    students do better than the students that actually started at 4
    year universities which is a great thing.
        Yet, our community colleges were beset by many challenges.
    Figuring out developmental education, developmental education
    is the graveyard of higher education. Their completion rates in
    Texas at least, our completion rates were lower than a lot of
    high school graduation rates.
        And so part of my concern over the years is that if
    somebody makes their decision just based on cost, in other
    words, going to the cheapest place, they may not necessarily
    have the best chance of finishing off.
        And so what is Virginia, what are community colleges doing
    with articulation agreements with 4 year universities to make
    sure that folks can transfer with development education, with
    all these challenges? How do you assess the improvements that
    have been made over the years?
        Mr. DUBOIS. Thank you for the question. I think you, if you
    look around the Nation increasingly you are going to be finding
    more and more community colleges moving away from the
    developmental education because often it is kind of a bridge to
    nowhere. And instead, they're, your and we are moving that way
    in Virginia. Tennessee is already there, Florida is already
    there.
        Instead of putting students in college courses for the
    first semester with co-requisite help along the way, it is
    difficult work but the research that I'm looking at now, its
    promising to move away from developmental education. Direct
    placement with the help that they need.
        And I would also add like I, in a previous comment, when
    our students come to us, they need someone that can help them
    on day one navigate, get ready, get set, get in the right
    courses, get their financial aid, get their text book
    materials. And then because they have all of this self-doubt,
    they really need people to believe in them and to get through
    those first five courses. If we can do that, we are going to
    help a lot of students.
        Mr. CASTRO. And, Dr. McHatton, I had a question for you. As
    a Texan here at the panel, I was in the legislature we spent a
    lot of time trying to get a medical school that was what was
    then UT PanAm where my wife graduated from school. She is from
    Alton, Texas in the valley. You know, UTRGV is really is the
    anchor university for an area that is millions of people but in
    many ways had been ignored in terms of its educational
    resources for decades. And so we also made strong pushes for
    more doctoral programs for example.
        Can you tell me because I think it is so meaningful to an
    area that is overwhelmingly Latino there, the progress on all
    these fronts? A number of doctoral programs, graduate programs,
    so forth.
        Ms. MCHATTON. So, yes, absolutely. We are thrilled to have
    the school of medicine because it has been a real game changer
    in the region. Over the past couple of years, we have added
    multiple graduate programs so we have got the PhD in clinical
    psychology. We are working on physical therapy. We are looking
    at a podiatry PhD graduate program. We are also doing some
    graduate certificates there is a psychiatric nurse
    practitioner, mental health nurse practitioner.
        We have put in graduate programs in sustainable
    agriculture, teacher leadership, applied behavioral sciences,
    statistics. We have got several on big data, data analytics. We
    have got several biomedical graduate programs, bioethics.
        So what we are trying to do is really assess what are the
    needs within the region and we find that healthcare, the STEM
    fields, and hospitality, we also have a brand new program in
    hospitality and tourism are all fields that are very important
    in that region. So those are the programs that we have engaged
    in trying to develop these new--
        Mr. CASTRO. And how about the graduation rate? You know,
    I'll give you an example. Probably a dozen years ago at UTSA in
    San Antonio, the 6-year graduation rate was 32 percent. Only 32
    percent of people had graduated after 6 years. Where are we on
    that front?
        Ms. MCHATTON. So we just graduated our first class because
    we have really only been in business and operation for 4 years.
    We don't have the data back yet. So our goal is to do a, at
    least to start off with at least a 30 percent 4 year graduation
    rate but clearly our goal is to do much more than that.
        And some of the programs that we have in place, the cap on
    the tuition, the promise programs, those types of things are
    all things that are helping us to try and get students through
    the pipeline in a much more meaningful and timely manner.
        Mr. CASTRO. Thank you, I yield back.
        Chairwoman DAVIS. Thank you. And we now turn to our chair,
    ranking chair of education and labor, Dr. Virginia Foxx.
        Ms. FOXX. Thank you, Madame Chair, and I want to thank our
    witnesses for being here today. Dr. DuBois, you talked about
    the Fast Forward funding program for the students who complete
    the classing credential and that it is designed only to pay
    after the students complete. Did the--I assume the legislature
    set it up this way and why was it designed this way and how has
    that accountability metric been received by community college
    leaders?
        Mr. DUBOIS. Thank you for the question. We actually
    proposed the funding formula that way to the State legislature.
    Most funding formulas if not all of them are on the basis of an
    enrollment. We thought it would be much more attractive to say
    no, we will--we are proposing a funding formula that we will
    receive our funds upon completion. And I think it was
    irresistible. In fact, in the legislature we only got two no
    votes. So it went through.
        So why did we propose it that way? Because we knew by
    research that when we were doing these things when students had
    to pay a lot of money to get in, we knew that their completion
    rates were north of 90 percent. Why is that? Because it's not a
    4-year pathway. Its 6 weeks or 8 weeks or maybe, you know,
    maybe 16 weeks. So we knew we had a good track record so why
    not? Let's propose it as a paid for performance. In fact our
    former Governor brags that it's the Nation's first pay for
    performance.
        It was different for our college leaders so we had to--in
    fact our payment in Virginia comes in two forms. Complete the
    program and then the State gives us an installment of funds and
    then when the student gets the certification of license, we get
    our second installment of support.
        So that caused us, our leaders to develop relationships
    that we didn't have before. For example, with the Department of
    Motor Vehicles. We don't give the CDL test, they do. So we
    needed to form these kinds of, align these data relationships
    so that we could certify that the student completed the
    program. We knew that but then completed the exam and get the
    license or the certification. So it took some changes on our
    part.
        Are there some complaints about the funding from our
    leaders? Sure. But for the most part, it is working. The
    legislature has incrementally increased the funding for this
    program every year for the last 3 years and we still run out of
    money. That's how huge the demand is among employers. If I
    might give an illustration just to drive home the fact.
        Ms. FOXX. If you don't mind, I don't--
        Mr. DUBOIS. Oh, I don't.
        Ms. FOXX. I only have 2 minutes left and I need to ask some
    other questions. I'm happy to you to send that to me.
        Dr. Verret, would you tell me what led you to get those
    dual enrollment programs off the ground and have you seen an
    uptick in enrollment at Xavier as a result? And what are your
    outcomes for students who take dual enrollment?
        Mr. VERRET. Well, our outcome is that they will persist in
    college and continue in college. The programs are based on, in
    our mission because our mission is not just an accomplishment
    at Xavier, but we worry as much that students will never go to
    any college. So our connections with that has been, is a long
    standing mission for us. But they're going to college whether
    they come to Xavier or not, is to us a success as long as they
    go to college.
        Ms. FOXX. Right. And nobody has mentioned this but the
    research shows that students who take one dual enrollment
    course are three times more likely to graduate and others of
    you have not emphasized that very much. But this is an area I
    have a great deal of interest in is working on dual enrollment
    because we know it is so successful.
        I just have one more comment. Dr. DuBois, I have to just
    take exception to your suggestion that the Federal Government
    requires States to have articulation agreements. I really don't
    see--nowhere is the word education in the constitution. We
    ought not to be involved in education at all but to involve
    the--involve us more to tell the States to do something they
    are already doing or most of them are already doing, you have
    articulated that yourself. And that we know works, I don't
    understand why the leadership in the States don't understand
    what you understand.
        Time is more valuable than money and, I mean, you can
    always replace money. You cannot replace time. And so requiring
    students to--who are going to a baccalaureate program to repeat
    courses is irresponsible on the part of the educational
    institutions. And the citizens should be demanding that not be
    allowed to happen. Thank you all again very much. I yield back.
        Chairwoman DAVIS. Thank you. I now turn to Mr. Sablan.
        Mr. SABLAN. Thank you very much. Good morning to all our
    witnesses. Madame Chair, thank you very much for this series of
    hearings on issues that I hope will lead to the, a robust
    Higher Education Act reauthorization. And but particularly this
    latest hearing on minority serving institutions is important to
    me.
        I as chair of the other education subcommittee, I was--
    always it broke my heart and some of the programs, failures of
    programs under the Bureau of Indian Education for early
    childhood K through 12. But, Dr. Boham, today your testimony
    gives me some hope and I really like but.
        So your testimony States that your college and Oglala
    Lakota College call it the Nation in preparing and graduating
    Native American nurses with more than 90 percent of their
    graduates certified as registered nurses and working in local
    community settings.
        You also testified that before Oglala Lakota college or OLC
    launched its nursing program, none of the nurses employed by
    the Indian Health Service to work on the Pine Ridge Reservation
    in South Dakota were native. Of the 70 nurses working on the
    reservation in 2013 80 percent were OLC graduates.
    Congratulations.
        What can small community colleges like the one I have in
    the Marianas in my district, what can these colleges with
    health work force shortages and high indigenous populations
    learn from Salish who take Salish Kootenai College success?
        Ms. BOHAM. Thank you for that question. Part of what we do
    really well in our nursing program is we create culturally
    confident healthcare so we are caring for our own and you have
    heard from other witnesses that our communities' value and one
    of their primary motivators is the opportunity to give back
    into the community. And I think our nursing programs exemplify
    that need and concern and wish to give back.
        Part of what we also do around our nursing program and we
    have implemented it college wide but particularly in our
    nursing program where students have high stress, demanding
    academic requirements, and clinical requirements as well, we
    provide wrap around services as well. So we have early alert
    systems and if students are beginning to show stress or look
    like they might be faltering, the early alert system is
    accessible from our custodial staff to me.
        And if we see a student that maybe we are used to seeing
    every day and we haven't seen them for a day or they miss a
    class, we have an electronic system where an actual person goes
    then to find this individual and make sure everything is okay.
    And if there are issues, we connect them to services and
    resources.
        We know that because nursing is the kind of demanding
    program it is that it's really important to have preschool
    services available for women and young men who are primary
    caregivers to their children. But I think overall, the big
    thing is that culturally confident, culturally congruent care.
    We want to take care of our--
        Mr. SABLAN. Right. Dr. Boham again, I, you provided a ray
    of light, I mean, you have--that it is possible to break this
    chain in native or in American--Native American schools and I
    am encouraged.
        My time is up so I will submit other questions for the
    other witnesses but congratulations is not a word I would use
    because this is a small step but I hope it grows not just with
    your program but also to other places and in our country like
    the Northern Marinas where we have a small community college
    and we have a huge need for work force investment.
        Madame Chair, thank you very much for today's hearing and I
    yield back.
        Chairwoman DAVIS. Thank you. Mr. Watkins.
        Mr. WATKINS. Thank you, Madame Chair, and thanks to the
    panel for being here. Every American deserves a chance to seek
    post-secondary education regardless of the circumstances. I
    have seen firsthand how the tribal colleges and universities
    are providing tribal students with the education they need for
    the future employment of their chosen profession.
        I am proud to say that in my district we have Haskell
    Indian Nations University in Lawrence, Kansas. Haskell is
    dedicated to building the leadership capacity of the students,
    providing well rounded extracurricular and education
    opportunities.
        A few months ago I had the pleasure of speaking with
    several of the students as they came here to D.C. During the
    discussion it was clear that the students were desired to
    remain local after graduation and serve their tribes and their
    communities. To that end, it becomes essential for the tribal
    college and universities to develop career pathways for their
    students by expanding partnerships between TCU's and local
    employers.
        Dr. Boham, in your testimony you mentioned that your tribal
    college has developed a strong model for work force development
    offering education and development programs that are responsive
    to local employer needs. Could you please explain the
    partnership between your college and the local employers that
    foster this cooperation? Speaking specifically to how it's
    benefited your students post-graduation?
        Ms. BOHAM. Thank you. We, first of all, we work with our
    tribal economic development and organization and so they do
    economic development studies once every 5 years and gather
    through surveys of the membership as well as employers and
    tribal entities in the community what the projected employment
    needs are and what areas people are interested in looking for
    work in.
        We also partner with our county J-sec or job counsel and so
    we are connected to them and they're also looking--it consists
    of employers. And so they come to a meeting once a month and we
    talk about what's going on in the economics of the community
    and what jobs we are needing and what jobs people are phasing
    out of.
        But at Salish Kootenai College because we serve 200--well,
    we serve about 70 different tribes at any given time, we have
    branched our relationships out beyond just our local community
    for the students that are going to be returning to their
    communities and we work with their tribal colleges or with
    their job development people at the State level just for those
    same kinds of information and trends.
        The other thing that we do is we have an extensive
    internship program on a national level. And so we have to
    develop a lot of partnerships so that students get that
    internship opportunity so they know what the work is going to
    be like, they create those relationships for themselves within
    those professional arenas and that's a huge piece.
        And then we also have developed something similar to our
    friend here in that we in listening to our employers and
    looking at what they need, we have built almost all of our 1
    year and 2 year programs that are aimed at folks needing to get
    employment to be in stackable certificates.
        So they can take a 1-year program but it's all broken down
    into pieces and so if they start and then they need to go to
    work for a little bit and then come back, they will have a
    credential that will allow them to stop out and return without
    losing time, money. And it also provides for those that need to
    work through their college career, it will allow them a livable
    wage, maybe it's an EMT certificate or it might be a phlebotomy
    certificate or it might be a flagging certificate that will
    allow them to continue to work while they're going to college
    with a wage that's above minimum wage.
        Mr. WATKINS. Well, thank you, doctor, appreciate it. Madame
    Chair, I yield back my time.
        Chairwoman DAVIS. Thank you. Ms. Bonamici.
        Ms. BONAMICI. Thank you, Chair Davis, and Ranking Member
    Smucker. And with all due respect to Dr. Foxx, there is a
    Federal role in education and it's an important one.
        The Federal--many of the Federal laws in education came out
    of the Civil Rights Era and as we approach the Higher Education
    Act reauthorization, I think we need to really honor that by
    promoting equity and safeguarding the opportunities for
    everyone to get a higher education.
        And of course the HBCU's and minority serving institutions
    and community colleges are a really important part of meeting
    that equity role and we need to make sure that you all have the
    resources and the policies to help your students succeed.
        I want to start by congratulating Dr. McHatton for your
    universities national chess championship which I understand is
    twice in a row. I have long been supportive of chess education,
    especially in the K12 system, tremendous academic benefits but
    I wanted to say congratulations. That's a big accomplishment.
        But I want to start with Dr. DuBois. Thank you for your
    testimony today talking about your--Virginia's community
    college system. I am also a community college graduate. I went
    on after my great 2 year legal assistant program to get a
    bachelor's degree and a law degree both at the University of
    Oregon. So I would--I know firsthand the critical role that
    community colleges play in opening doors of opportunity because
    they opened doors of opportunity for me.
        In my home State of Oregon, the community colleges
    typically serve large populations of students of color, low
    income students. They are doing some innovative work but
    challenges remain, especially the resource challenge and the
    obstacles encountered by students that deter completion.
        A couple of those you mentioned in your testimony,
    homelessness and food insecurity. And I saw your story about
    the student who couldn't concentrate and he went in to speak to
    the professor and ended up staring at the granola bar on his
    desk because he--and he hadn't eaten for 2 days.
        So can you talk a little bit about how your colleges are
    addressing homelessness and food insecurity and also
    importantly, what the Federal Government can do to help with
    that area?
        Mr. DUBOIS. Thank you. Thank you for the question. You
    know, admittedly these student insecurities are becoming much
    more of the dialog of the day with community college leaders. I
    mean, who would have thought that we have students that
    occasionally have to live in a car or going hungry. I mean, so
    what are some of the things that we are doing?
        We are not doing enough. We now have food pantries at all
    of our community colleges but we can't food pantry ourselves
    out of this. We need faculty and staff that know how to help
    someone who is eligible for SNAP sign up for it, sign up for
    SNAP. The--Pell is critical for these students. They also need
    actually more help than that because--
        Ms. BONAMICI. Right.
        Mr. DUBOIS [continuing]. Pell will cover the mandatory
    costs to attend but these students are facing all of these
    other kinds of difficulty so we are doing everything from
    asking the philanthropic community to step up. The best
    philanthropic dollar I think that we can raise now is for
    student emergency funds.
        I mean, and students don't have just one emergency. So we
    are--we are doing all that we can with the resources that we
    have, Congresswoman, but we run out of those resources very,
    very quickly.
        Ms. BONAMICI. Thank you. And I want to try to get another
    question in but I appreciate your response and certainly making
    sure that we are funding SNAP and Pell grants is critical.
        Dr. Verret, thank you so much for being here. I read your
    impressive background. I am the founder and co-chair of the
    congressional STEAM Caucus where we advocate for integrating
    arts and design into STEM fields. Because No. 1, it helps
    students become more creative and innovative and No. 2, it
    reaches more students, especially as students are going through
    the K12 system.
        I have toured, we have nationally recognized STEAM
    elementary schools that are really engaging students and
    helping them to be creative. So I wanted to talk about how, I
    know you have 70 percent of your, of Xavier's student body is
    female and I am excited, I'm also on the science committee and
    we are always talking about getting more women into science
    technology, engineering, math, I call STEAM.
        So how do you create a campus environment that encourages
    your female students to pursue those careers that are typically
    male dominated and white?
        Mr. VERRET. Well, if I would use a line from St. Francis of
    Assisi, that if you are preaching preach by example. The
    examples that we have before them on the faculty, women faculty
    want leadership who are researchers who are scientists who are
    engaged. That has been there at Xavier. I remind you that
    Xavier was the first Catholic university, college or university
    that allowed women and men to attend classes together. It was,
    it did not exist except that Katherine Drexel pushed it. So
    that, so in many ways, the sisters who founded us were
    feminists before the word was coined.
        But the other piece is that we have now women on leadership
    and what embraces all of our students is a culture of
    expectations. We expect students to rise high to reach high.
    And we show them that it's possible because others have done it
    before them.
        It also even applies to what we are seeing as an emerging
    crises on the other side that we are seeing a dearth of young
    males who are succeeding from K through 12 and who are
    exceeding to college as well. And we have had initiatives as
    well to reach out to them as well.
        Ms. BONAMICI. Terrific. And I see my time is expired.
        Mr. VERRET. Everyone succeeds together.
        Ms. BONAMICI. Thank you so much. I yield back.
        Chairwoman DAVIS. Thank you. Mr. Grothman.
        Mr. GROTHMAN. Yes. My question is meant for Mr.--first
    question for Mr. Verret, I don't know if have that right.
    Looked at your background, very impressive, and again
    congratulations on all you are doing at Xavier. I noticed prior
    to being at Xavier, you also had an executive position at
    Savannah State University.
        A couple hearings ago, you know, you can take it or leave
    it, but a couple hearings ago, we had a hearing based on the
    idea that we had to have more Federal involvement because we
    had too many schools that were too segregated and the
    implication being that schools that were too much of one racial
    background or the other was a real problem.
        Now we have a situation here in which we are calling for
    more money for historically black colleges. And I--you have
    done a tremendous job, I have no problem with putting more
    money in historical black colleges.
        The only thing I kind of wonder here where we are getting
    mixed messages on this committee whether it is really, really
    important to weigh in and make sure every high school is more
    segregated or, you know, and given your background and the
    success you have had at Savannah State and Xavier, I wondered
    if you would care to comment on that issue?
        Mr. VERRET. The first thing I would say is that the
    historically black colleges were never segregated except by
    law. But even at Xavier in the 30's and 40's we had students
    who were African, who were white at Xavier who could not
    receive their degree legally in Louisiana therefore their
    degree was awarded by Villanova.
        So we were always open to--we have others who, we have
    students who are not African Americans at Xavier who are with
    us and they have been with us before. But what I would say is
    that these HBCU's have been engines of bringing African
    Americans into the creative work force for this country and
    also of engines of social mobility.
        And they continue to produce. The country needs that
    talent, you know, because remember our talent base is what we
    cultivate in this country. What is happening in the TCU's also
    in the Hispanic colleges as well is about creating talent for
    this country.
        These schools when we produce, overproduce, punch above our
    weight, in educating students who become doctors, lawyers,
    policymakers, in all the fields that the country needs that's
    what we do. Investing in these countries--in these is not
    individual benefit for these students, it's a benefit for their
    communities and for their regions.
        Mr. GROTHMAN. No, I am not denying that you are doing a
    tremendous job. I am just wondering on the larger issue if you
    had a comment.
        Mr. VERRET. What I'm saying is that it's important that to
    help students engage with students of all ethnicities and they
    do.
        Mr. GROTHMAN. Okay.
        Mr. VERRET. Our students in our communities they work in
    hospitals and--
        Mr. GROTHMAN. Okay.
        Mr. VERRET [continuing]. and in our communities. They are
    interned throughout communities. Students from Tulane and
    Loyola engage with our students as well. So our students
    actually are very well integrated and others are welcome to us
    as well.
        Mr. GROTHMAN. Thank you.
        Mr. VERRET. And that's always happened.
        Mr. GROTHMAN. Thank you. I think all of you at some point
    or other in your testimony talked about poverty and the
    importance of lifting people out of poverty. And I wondered if
    you had any comments having dealt with so many people who at
    least by the Federal definition of poverty are in poverty. If
    there are anything you noticed about those families compared to
    other family units, that sort of thing, and if you are doing
    anything to make sure that the next generation or the
    generation that you touch that their children don't wind up in
    poverty? Yes, Mr. Verret.
        Mr. VERRET. If I may say, one of the--what we have seen not
    only in recent history but in also in the decades and almost
    century that we have been that our students when they receive a
    degree, this is not something that benefits them alone. It
    touches their families. What we see is that suddenly the
    nephews are coming to college, the sons, we are opening new
    doors. The benefit, there is a cascading effect that we see. So
    what we are seeing is that they do not return to poverty but
    what they do they lift communities out of poverty.
        Mr. GROTHMAN. Okay. And do any of the others you have any
    observations on what type of situation the Federal Government
    defines as a family in poverty and what you will do to make
    sure that the next generation does not wind up in poverty?
    Could you make any observations as to that?
        Mr. DUBOIS. Just very quickly, the best thing I think we
    can do is to help an individual get a post-secondary credential
    and--
        Mr. GROTHMAN. Are there no observations you have as to the
    type of you said you deal with your students the type of family
    situation that results in something being referred to as
    poverty? You don't know? Your mind is a blank?
        Mr. DUBOIS. No, the--we have poverty in our rural areas and
    we have poverty in our inner cities. The best--best that we can
    do is help them get a post-secondary credential because 12th
    grade is no longer the finish line.
        Chairwoman DAVIS. Thank you, Mr. Grothman, your time is up.
    Ms. Adams.
        Ms. ADAMS. Thank you, Madame Chairwoman, and thank you to
    the ranking member as well and thank you for your testimony.
    You know, where you start out in life doesn't have to determine
    where you are going to end up or just how far you can go.
        I grew up in poverty myself, poor black girl growing up in
    Newark, New Jersey but education is the pathway to greater
    opportunity. Most of you may know that my background of in
    terms of historically black colleges and universities are
    particularly important to me.
        I just said I taught on the campus at Bennett College in
    Greensboro for 40 years. I am a two time graduate of an HBCU,
    North Carolina A&T. And one of the first things I did when I
    got here was to put together the bipartisan HBCU Caucus with my
    colleague and now my cochair, Bradley Byrne. We have got 88
    members and some of them have been here today.
        We have accomplished a lot for our HBCU's but as has been
    already revealed today, Dr. Verret, thank you very much for
    being here and all that you are doing to make Xavier University
    our premier HBCU for graduating black doctors.
        I mean, if you look at the statistics, and to my colleagues
    while we only make up 3 percent of all colleges and
    universities, HBCU's are producing 17 percent of all bachelor's
    degrees that are earned by African American students, 24
    percent of all STEM graduates. So we have been producers. We
    have had little but we have done much.
        And, Dr. Verret, what is unique about the HBCU campus
    environment that attracts students?
        Mr. VERRET. I would say first of all is the culture of
    expectation. We expect them to succeed and expectations
    students rise to that. We embrace, we have a faculty that will
    embrace students and recognize that they--what they need
    individually we will address. We do that.
        Ms. ADAMS. Okay.
        Mr. VERRET. The other piece that is crucial is that we have
    the example of those who have come before them which is
    important to them as well.
        But the expectation piece is what I would call the secret
    sauce in the element because when we--when students come to us,
    many of them don't, may not have the education that they
    deserve. And students do not choose the schools they go to. So
    whatever gaps they may have, we meet them in their first year
    and help them repair. And what is amazing, what happens at the
    end.
        Ms. ADAMS. Yes, sir, I know. You filled some gaps for me.
    What sort of specific strategies do you use in creating a
    program and degree offerings that meet the job market demand?
    We have talked a lot about job market demand here.
        Mr. VERRET. Well, the HBCU's have been--first of all we
    educate our students very broadly which it gives them a lot of
    flexibility. Some of them go on to many levels and readapt to
    their jobs as they have to.
        Ms. ADAMS. Okay.
        Mr. VERRET. But what they do have is they have learned to
    work hard and on complex matters at HBCU's. And they become
    masters of their fields. But I also want to thank you for
    starting the HBCU Caucus. That has been a very important way of
    getting our voice here at--
        Ms. ADAMS. Great. Thank you and thank you for your
    participation. What strategies could Congress pursue to make
    your job easier?
        Mr. VERRET. I'll begin the first one because affordability
    is a challenge for us.
        Ms. ADAMS. Okay.
        Mr. VERRET. We have our students who are Pell eligible in
    the lowest--in the lower 2/5 of the socioeconomic income
    distribution ladder. Those students, a small crisis in their
    families can lead to students not persisting and that we do
    see.
        Pell is crucial to us. Pell is critical to the HBCU
    community because we have 50 percent or more on most of our
    campus of students are Pell eligible. And that is the major
    struggle for us.
        Helping our students pay for college is an important piece.
    Pell is something that we cannot tell you more how important it
    is and that we want to see you do more for us.
        Ms. ADAMS. Absolutely. Could you elaborate on how or
    whether your local work force boards or chambers assisting in
    that regard in terms of aligning your programs with future work
    force needs?
        Mr. VERRET. They do and also we are engaged with them and
    also in creating internships where our students get to sample
    and practice while they are there. With our economic
    development agencies and also with our chambers of commerce we
    work closely to create internships for our students.
        So our students very often before while in their second or
    third year have practical experiences whether in the
    laboratories or whether it is in clinical or the work force
    settings.
        Ms. ADAMS. All right. Thank you very much. I just want to
    end with a comment that I always like to remember by W.E.B.
    DuBois who said of all of the civil rights for which the world
    has struggled and fought for 500 years, the right to learn is
    undoubtedly the most fundamental.
        Thank you all for believing in that right and thank you all
    for being here today. Madame Chair, I yield back.
        Chairwoman DAVIS. Thank you. Thank you. Mr. Levin.
        Mr. LEVIN. Oh, thank you, Madame Chairwoman. Well, thank
    you all so much for being here. I want to ask you about the
    situation of students when they come to you.
        Dr. DuBois, when I was running the Michigan work force
    system some years ago, something like 60 percent of students
    coming to community colleges nationally needed to start with
    remedial education of some kind. Is that still the case?
        Mr. DUBOIS. Yes, sir, in mathematics typically.
        Mr. LEVIN. And so can you talk to us about your connection
    in Virginia with the whole adult education system for people
    who because I know many of your students aren't coming straight
    from high school. And what we should do to better connect adult
    basic education with community college. My observation is that
    we--the systems are generally completely disconnected. Often AV
    is connected in the K12 education system. Very rarely is the
    instruction offered contextualized for a career pathway--
        Mr. DUBOIS. Right.
        Mr. LEVIN [continuing]. for a person. So I would appreciate
    your comments on that and I am very curious about what the
    situation is in HBCU's too, Dr. Verret. So I would like, you
    know, afterwards I would like to hear your thoughts.
        Mr. DUBOIS. Thank you for the question. In Virginia, the
    adult basic education world is a centrally a K12 sector
    responsibility. Having said that though, a number of
    superintendents have kind of subcontracted that out with their
    community colleges. I do believe that adults need to go to
    adult places.
        And my--this is my editorial. Many of these adults they
    come to us because they want a job. They want a better job.
        Mr. LEVIN. That's right.
        Mr. DUBOIS. And we should be putting more of them into a
    contextualized, applied, short time--short term pathway to get
    to that job. Once they get that job, I think they will raise
    the bar and move on with higher educational goals. But I agree
    with your preface that these pathways should be contextualized,
    applied in a vocational career area.
        Mr. LEVIN. Dr. Verret.
        Mr. VERRET. Well, I would agree with my colleague as well
    but I would also say that one of the remedial issue that you
    point to is the fact that many of our students do not get the
    pre collegiate preparation that they need. And I would extend
    it beyond mathematics because what we have found out is
    actually language arts are more of a barrier to mathematics and
    also to physics and to chemistry and everything, and to history
    as well.
        So that we have people, students who are getting degrees
    who may have high GPA's but that the ACT's and the SAT's don't
    seem to match. That is one of the crimes that is occurring in
    many ways that we are not getting the right teachers.
        And I would speak for the investment into K through 12 as
    well as to make our work much more doable. Being able to
    actually resource teachers because I do think great teachers
    really matter and we have not invested in our teaching
    profession especially in the K through 12 fields. And that's as
    essential as anything else this country could need.
        Mr. LEVIN. Well, in other countries, teachers are the
    people say lawyer, doctor, engineer, accountant, teacher, and
    we pay our teachers in this country much less than other
    professionals.
        Mr. VERRET. Right.
        Mr. LEVIN. We don't invest in them properly.
        Mr. VERRET. And our investment in teacher, in educating
    teachers is because of not only for a mission but we know that
    the work of building society is educating great teachers and
    getting them to our classrooms is crucial. We don't get away by
    skipping them.
        Mr. LEVIN. But let me just say don't we know what needs to
    be done here, don't we? I mean, for example if someone is
    learning English and they need, they come really for a job, for
    a career, so they can support their family. If we teach them
    Dick and Jane ran up the hill, they are going to stop coming.
        If we find out well, they could be an x-ray tech or they
    should be in a CNC operator and if we start talking--teaching
    them their basic skills tied to a career pathway they come
    back, right? And in that adult context as you say.
        So can someone give me some, I mean, I ran the Michigan
    work force system from 2007 to early 2011. Are we making any
    progress here in this regard nationally?
        Mr. DUBOIS. Just quickly I think in Virginia we are making
    our progress through our Fast Forward programs where we are
    simply an adult that needs help and to get some training we
    don't require the GED to be a welder. You need some basic
    reading skills to be a truck driver. Not necessarily, you don't
    necessarily have to have a high school diploma or equivalent.
        So we are, we have moved into more and more into that
    direction helping adults secure employment through short term
    training programs.
        Chairwoman DAVIS. Thank you. Mr. Trone, you are next.
        Mr. TRONE. Thank you, Madame Chairwoman Davis, Chairwoman
    Davis and Ranking Member Smucker for holding this hearing, and
    thank you to our witnesses.
        We know the community colleges and historically black
    colleges and universities and other minority serving
    institutions play a key role in providing college opportunities
    for low income students and students of color. We also know
    that while these institutions are doing the most work to close
    that achievement gap in advanced economic mobility they are
    severely under resourced.
        It is great to see the committee coming together in a
    bipartisan way to prioritize and address this issue and I look
    forward to working with all of you on this.
        Madame Chairwoman, I would like to enter into the record
    this report by the United Negro College Fund which is led by my
    close friend, Michael Lomax, who actually was the emcee when I
    was sworn in to Congress at our event just recently. And
    entitled the HBCU's make America strong, the positive impact of
    historically black colleges and universities.
        Chairwoman DAVIS. So ordered.
        Mr. TRONE. Thank you. The 2017 report found that the total
    economic impact in the U.S. is 14.8 billion annually, the
    equivalent of ranking among the top 200 corporations on the
    Fortune 500 list.
        In Maryland we have 4 HBCU's that generate a billion
    dollars in economic output and 10,000 jobs. A Maryland graduate
    can expect to make a million dollars more a year due to that
    credential.
        So, Dr. Verret, if we strengthened Federal investments at
    HBCU's, what do you see, what does it look like on long term
    ROI by making this investment look like? What is the return on
    investment?
        Mr. VERRET. The return investment is huge because right now
    it is critical that we, that we develop our talents. The talent
    that we have to build our new industries, whether it's the
    digital industries, it's the high tech industries and also our
    creative industries whether it's the movie industry, etcetera,
    is from these young people. That talent that we leave on the
    table underserves us because other countries I know are doing a
    real good job of educating their talents and they're not
    willing to share it.
        Mr. TRONE. Right. So we are building our diversity, we are
    building our diversity with better ways and different ways to
    look at the problems and challenges we have.
        Mr. VERRET. The creative minds that we have on the table
    and in our second and third grades should not be wasted.
        Mr. TRONE. Absolutely. Dr. DuBois, I know you have
    extensive experience in both community college systems and the
    criminal justice space. A top priority of mine is criminal
    justice reform. I believe the impact of education on these
    individuals that have been incarcerated, society as a whole is
    crucial.
        Research from Rand Corporation found that incarcerated
    individuals participated in education while in the correctional
    institution decreased recidivism 43 percent. How do we best
    strengthen and expand high quality education opportunities for
    justice impacted individuals and what would that impact on this
    be?
        Mr. DUBOIS. Thank you for the question. In the mid-90's I
    taught in Attica State Prison, a maximum security prison with
    Genesee Community College. So it's something I'm very familiar
    with. The research is clear, most prisoners are going to be
    released within 3 years. 90 something percent.
        Do we want--what do we want them armed with? A future? And
    if we do its going to be some kind of educational credential
    because the recidivism rates have been clear over 25 years. At
    one time the Federal Government was supporting prisoners
    through Pell. I think we have one college that participated in
    an experimental program with Pell. We would welcome the
    opportunity to receive more Pell support for incarcerated
    students.
        Mr. TRONE. Have you seen a State that's done a best case
    job in this area? Sometimes I hear Alabama but have you, do you
    know, anybody know of a State that's really worked with
    community colleges and correctional institutions hand in hand
    to help address this disaster?
        Mr. DUBOIS. In the 90's in New York, of the 30 community
    colleges of New York we probably had about 14 or 15 of them
    very involved in inmate higher education. It was a lot of
    research that was done back in those days. I can certainly make
    that available to you.
        Mr. TRONE. How do we help students in Virginia with their
    mental health disabilities? How do we get more money focused on
    that? What should we be doing to help you there?
        Mr. DUBOIS. That's a great question. I mean, we are
    struggling with that question just as we speak. It was only
    just 2 weeks ago where I announced a major task force on this
    very, very issue of student insecurities including mental
    health, financial problems, legal problems. These are the
    students that are coming to us today. We are, you know, we need
    answers, more and more answers to that kind of a situation.
        Chairwoman DAVIS. Thank you. Mr. Timmons.
        Mr. TIMMONS. Thank you, Madame Chairwoman, and thank you
    each for coming to testify before this subcommittee. I am going
    to begin.
        Dr. Verret, Xavier University of Louisiana has created an
    emergency fund to cover unanticipated student expenses. How are
    you able to establish this grant funding and what have the
    results been for students who end up needing this unexpected
    money?
        Mr. VERRET. Well, the emergency fund was founded 4 years
    ago when I arrived and it was first funded by--through alumni,
    our alumni, and also other friends of Xavier who were not
    alumni. Some members of the board, others have contributed into
    this fund.
        We have raised these funds because we have, we are aware
    that there are students who are in good academic standing,
    especially as they are in their third or fourth year about to
    finish while at risk of not persisting. It may be from tuition
    funding but it also may be other things for example clothing, a
    crisis, at home medical crisis and we apply that. It's small
    because we are not a rich institution and we do need more. But
    it parallels what my friends have been speaking about other
    needs including housing needs because we do give housing
    scholarships for homeless students.
        As we, in fact we have received the calls from homeless
    shelters that you have a student here, do you know about this?
    And those--and we have ways of responding. We need to respond.
    So we need resources to meet those needs.
        Mr. TIMMONS. Thank you. Do you have a ballpark of how much
    has been put into the fund or the average--
        Mr. VERRET. The average year we had somewhere around
    between $100 and $200,000 in the fund.
        Mr. TIMMONS. Thank you. Also, Dr. Verret, you note in your
    written remarks that a challenge for many students of color is
    their preparedness for college level course work. What are you
    doing to increase student retention at Xavier, particularly for
    those students who may struggle in their first year?
        Mr. VERRET. I would say it's not only for students of color
    but it clearly affects our urban students especially but what
    happens is that what we have is our in the first year our
    diagnostics early alert program would tell us students in their
    first, early first semester that there are needs. They are
    brought to our students' academic support. They are given
    academic support and make sure that the individualized tutoring
    that they need in certain areas is provided.
        We have--remember, Xavier does not, is not a selective
    institution. We have students from 18 to 34 on the SAT's. Those
    but those students who are in greater need, we are seeing
    progress because last year we saw especially among the group of
    greater pre collegiate challenges that their retention numbers
    have gone up significantly.
        Mr. TIMMONS. Do you think that this program could be
    modeled for other HBCU's?
        Mr. VERRET. It could be modeled for almost any other
    institution.
        Mr. TIMMONS. Okay. Thank you. Dr. Boham, you mentioned a
    TCU innovation core initiative to help entrepreneurs put their
    ideas into action. What are the goals behind this initiative?
    How do you anticipate the program will work and what are the
    expected results for students and local economies?
        Dr. Boham. Sorry. I'll give you the question again. You
    mentioned a TCU innovation core initiative to help
    entrepreneurs put their ideas into action. What are the goals
    behind this initiative? How do you anticipate the program will
    work and what are the expected results for students in local
    economies?
        Ms. BOHAM. The TCU innovation core, ICORE is built around
    the concept that in the research and work that students are
    doing with particularly science programs that they would find
    marketable patent programs that could then be scaled up and
    marketed to build the economy through creating new jobs and new
    enterprises.
        Mr. TIMMONS. Thank you. I yield back the balance of my
    time.
        Chairwoman DAVIS. Thank you. Ms. Wild.
        Ms. WILD. Thank you, Madame Chairwoman, and thank you to
    the panel for being here to speak today on this very important
    subject. I will tell you I am not a member of this subcommittee
    but I came to hear what I could of your testimony and have read
    your testimonies because I feel that this is such an important
    area for us to cover in this committee.
        I am a representative from the 7th District of
    Pennsylvania, the Lehigh Valley of Pennsylvania, Allentown,
    Bethlehem, Easton area where we have a wealth of institutions
    of higher learning.
        We have several very fine private 4 year colleges. We have
    a smaller parochial private college. We have a State school.
    But the pride and joy of our community are two incredibly good
    community colleges. Lehigh Carbon Community College and North
    Hampton County or North Hampton Community College.
        These two schools in my district are such high quality they
    offer a range of academic and career training programs. The
    statistics on those two schools is that after graduation from
    the 2-year programs, 93 to 94 percent of their alumni are
    either continuing their education or in a career. And I think
    that's a statistic to be so incredibly proud of. And both also
    serve a large population of students of color.
        Lehigh Carbon Community College is a Hispanic serving
    institution. North Hampton Community College is the No. 1
    associate degree granting college in Pennsylvania for Latinos.
    So if I seem like I am bursting with pride, I am a little bit
    about those two schools.
        Having said that, I have visited both of those schools
    since I was elected and I have learned from their
    administration about some of the challenges that the
    administration faces because in the face of constant decreases
    in funding, these kinds of schools, not just these two in my
    district, but these kinds of schools across the country, that
    are struggling so much to keep from raising tuition for their
    students. And by and large are doing a pretty good job of it
    but that money has to be taken from somewhere.
        And so what I am consistently hearing from them is that the
    schools are contracting the services that they provide to
    students. And that is--that too is a real harm to the students.
        And I would like you perhaps, Dr. McHatton, to address--
    well first, let me go to Dr. Verret and ask you about how
    student incomes--outcomes vary depending on what institutions
    are able to spend on the instruction and the student support
    systems.
        Mr. VERRET. I don't have a thorough study in front of me
    that I can refer you to but in my experience as--and I should
    mention I was at in Luzerne County so I know the other LCCC,
    Luzerne County Community College very quite well.
        But what I would say that based, the resource that we need
    to meet the needs of students where they are take time, it
    takes faculty. Our faculty we have very few adjuncts except a
    few professional practice, professor of practice.
        Ms. WILD. That's impressive.
        Mr. VERRET. So we have full time faculty who are engaged
    with students even in their introductory classes. That devotion
    is important for our students. It costs. And if you reduce
    those, if were you to reduce those services at Xavier, our
    outcomes would suffer. We know that.
        So it is important that when we speak of remedial or other
    needs or call it other, meeting students with the course that
    they need or the support structure that they need to persist in
    the subsequent courses rather than throwing them into deep
    water without knowing how to swim. That's criminal. What we
    need those resources are crucial. As we reduce those in the
    community colleges and any college around the country the
    outcomes will suffer.
        Ms. WILD. And some of the things that I was told and all of
    you may also have seen is that there is a greater need for
    things such as childcare on these campuses. There is a need,
    they both of the schools as well as some the 4-year schools in
    my district have food support programs, food banks. And then of
    course there is the issue of attracting and retaining good
    talent in the academic force. So I commend you for being able
    to keep full time professors as opposed to relying solely on
    adjunct personnel.
        I wanted to ask if I could, Dr. Boham, because I am very
    interested in your testimony about the work with local industry
    partners and to ensure that students are on a pathway to good
    jobs. And if you could just in the very short period of time I
    have left you, give us a little bit more information about how
    you make those connections with local industry?
        Ms. BOHAM. We do that in a very face to face kind of hands
    on way with our business partners but and a good example of
    that was one of the studies that we did said that we needed
    people in our hospitals that were certified medical assistants
    instead of the on the job training assistants that they had
    before. They were changing their practice which a lot of
    medical fields are doing, changing the scope and role of
    particular jobs.
        And so we implemented a certified medical assisting program
    that would meet the needs of those hospitals Statewide because
    it's two different providers and they're regional so they're
    not--it's not just Montana. But--
        Ms. WILD. Thank you very much, Dr. Boham. Sorry, it was my
    fault, I left you with very little time but thank you for your
    input.
        Chairwoman DAVIS. Thank you. Ms. Omar.
        Ms. OMAR. Thank you, Chairwoman. Thank you all for being
    here today to have this important discussion. I have a staffer
    who made the choice to attend a community college. He then went
    on to a 4-year university and eventually got a graduate degree
    in an Ivy League school.
        While that is the kind of stories that we would love to
    hear, not many have the opportunity of having that kind of
    progress achieved. Some of our students are getting stuck in
    community colleges. After 6 years in college, 4 in 10 students
    still haven't earned a degree and that as a Nation we have
    barely made any progress in increasing college graduation rates
    over the past 2 decades.
        And we know that underfunded colleges with low graduation
    rates disproportionately enroll students of color and low
    income students. College, community colleges that are less
    selective or open access receive less State funding and charge
    lower tuition. And affordability remains a challenge even at
    college with relatively low tuition costs.
        The full cost of college includes text books, supplies,
    living expenses, costs which are similar to colleges. Many
    students are low income--who are low income are working adults
    who face instability in jobs, who have family demands, who have
    emergency expenses.
        All of community college students nationwide, 40 percent
    are first generation college students. Among community college
    students 22 percent were both food and housing insecure during
    the last year and 80 percent experience both of those
    challenges as well as homelessness.
        To all of you I would love for you to share how your
    institutions are helping some of these students move through
    these challenges so that they can attain graduation.
        Mr. DUBOIS. Thank you for the question. Your description is
    certainly very accurate. We are challenged with students that
    are facing the most difficult life circumstances and we are
    funded at the lowest rate of any public sector of higher
    education. So it is fiscally a challenge.
        We often--we also are under pressure to not raise tuition
    and yet we have to. And we try to do that in a very modest and
    careful way. What we are doing in Virginia is we are trying
    to--whatever extra dollar that we have, we want to invest it in
    student services. We think that is the best bang for that
    dollar to help students be successful.
        Our students need coaching from day one. They need
    guidance, they need navigators. They need social workers. They
    need people who understand where the resources are in the
    community and put those students in touch with those resources.
        Ms. OMAR. Can you, yes. I can't see your names. So yes, if
    you want to take that.
        Ms. MCHATTON. McHatton. Yes. So I think along--
        Ms. OMAR. If we could be mindful of the time if you can--
        Ms. MCHATTON. Sure. Along with some of the things that have
    already been discussed, I think what is really important as far
    as our institution is building capacity within our faculty so
    they're able to stay connected and identify students early on
    when they're in need of particular support services.
        Developing a summer bridge program to prepare students who
    are first generation students and maybe might have some
    academic needs has been very successful. We have also had some
    peer led team learning and supplemental instruction so there is
    a lot of support, academic support throughout their first year
    and beyond in order to help them with any academic needs that
    they may have.
        Ms. OMAR. Thank you. And, Dr. Verret, if I can just have
    you follow that up with maybe a recommendations that you would
    have for us to implement in helping close this gap.
        Mr. VERRET. I would begin, it's about finding students in
    crises especially throughout the first year is crucial but
    other years as well.
        The early alert and how we use early alert is important for
    us because it is important that professors and instructors be
    able to identify a student who is actually not appearing in
    class. A student who is coming in very tired for another reason
    and to give a shout out to the early alert system so the people
    in student and student life to say you need to pull this young
    person in because we think something is going on, to look to
    see whether the student whose grades who is not performing in
    the first exam to pull him in.
        All those are indicators that something is going on. You
    may not know what it is but to get someone competent to engage
    with that student at that point and to build a structure that
    is necessary whether it is housing, whether it's--it could be
    food, it could be other things that are, that another crisis or
    a student was injured in some way. We need to find out.
        Ms. OMAR. I appreciate that. Education is the greatest
    equalizer but we also have to first equalize the situation so
    young people are able to attain that education. Thank you so
    much and I yield back.
        Chairwoman DAVIS. Thank you. Thank you. Ms. Hayes.
        Ms. HAYES. Thank you, Madame Chair, and again thank you for
    allowing me to wave on to this committee because this as well
    is not my committee and I have been listening. and, Dr. Verret,
    I can blame you for this today because generally my staff gets
    so upset because we spend so much time working and preparing
    for these hearings and I have these beautifully put together
    binders and then I hear something and I throw all of this away
    because I am so personally invested in the work that this
    committee does.
        You know, I went to a community college. And what I heard
    today was you talking about your thoughts about K12 education
    and it reminded me of an experience that I think would be
    tremendously relevant here.
        And during my time, I was a high school history teacher, 15
    years in the classroom. I taught African American history and I
    had so many students who had never even heard of an HBCU. So I
    created a unit on it, you know, in Connecticut you--and many of
    the southern States it is a part of the community, it is a part
    of the culture.
        There are so many kids who are outside of this network who
    until someone teaches them about it and that coupled with the
    fact that I also recognize in my time as National Teacher of
    the Year I traveled to over 40 States, saw something that was,
    I thought that was a Connecticut problem but it's a National
    problem and it is diversifying the educator work force and the
    number of teaches of color who are out there.
        And I happen to know that HBCU's produce more teachers of
    color than any other teacher preparation institutions. So I
    guess my question to you would be do you have any thoughts on
    how we expand this network, broaden the spectrum so that you
    are not just having this conversation with young people in
    Louisiana who might be thinking about entering the profession
    but also kids in Connecticut or?
        Mr. VERRET. What I would say is that we do need to resource
    and support teachers because we don't want, we want them--
    because we have students who are going to education who have
    high loans, have costs, who eventually have a family and they
    have to make a decision to leave the profession. We don't want
    that especially if they are good teachers.
        We need programs that support teachers because they are the
    most precious commodity. There is an example at the NSF,
    National Science Foundation, the Noyce Grant--which came out
    from the lack of STEM educators where we would actually provide
    tuition support for students who commit to teaching for the
    next 5 to 6 years after that and those many of those teachers
    remain in the teaching profession.
        We need for other disciplines as well whether its social
    studies, whether its special educators. We have to actually
    provide a way of even loan forgiveness for that because I do
    say the work that we do at our colleges whether its community
    colleges or HBCU's is only made easier by having students who
    come in with a basic fundamental, good K through 12 education
    that they deserve.
        Ms. HAYES. Thank you. But again, I don't think it is just
    about the money. I appreciate you saying that because that is
    very important but we cannot underscore the fact that just the
    capacity building.
        I went through community college, undergraduate, a master's
    program and a graduate program where I was the only African
    American in an educator preparation program in the State of--
    well, not in my State but in my program. You know, these are,
    we are an education State and I was the only person of color
    through my academic journey.
        Mr. VERRET. And the capacity building is a recruitment
    issue. For example what we do in a recruiting educators is
    beginning to speak of in high school with students who might
    consider becoming teachers. We have to do real outreach the
    same way we are doing--we have done in STEM in the last decade
    as we needed that. We have to do that.
        We also have to think well about the capacity of our HBCU's
    that are producing a large numbers of teachers and support
    their schools of education.
        I can speak for Xavier what we are doing but also I do know
    other HBCU's that have schools of education they need support
    to build their capacities as well.
        Ms. HAYES. Thank you. and, Dr. Boham, I notice that your
    campus is majority female and most of them are over 25 years of
    age. I know that my, a Congresswoman from my State just
    recently introduced a bill to provide childcare which I know is
    a challenge.
        I went back to community college as an adult, with a child,
    as a single parent. Can you talk about what types of supports
    this specific population needs to succeed and how we can help
    here in Congress?
        Ms. BOHAM. Childcare and quality child care that you can
    take your children to and know that they're going to be safe
    and well cared for is critical for our female and male
    students. We have a number of fathers that are primary care
    givers as well.
        And so we have on our campus a preschool and that is
    critical but we also need quality after school programs so that
    parents can focus on their schoolwork and not be worrying about
    the safety of their children. We also know that children that
    are in preschool and that go into kindergarten are going to
    have larger vocabularies and be better prepared and that
    preparation will follow them through their entire K12
    education.
        When I was working in the K12 system, literally a third of
    the native students that were defined in special ed between K3
    were there for language and it wasn't that they were actually
    special ed, it was the number of vocabulary words that they had
    and so these programs are critical.
        Chairwoman DAVIS. Thank you very much. I now turn to Mr.
    Bobby Scott who is the chairman of the overall Education and
    Labor Committee.
        Mr. SCOTT. Thank you, Madame Chair, and ranking member. Dr.
    DuBois, it is good to see you and I want to congratulate you on
    your success at the Virginia Community College system.
    Particularly in the success you have had in the short term
    programs that don't necessarily lead to a degree but lead to a
    good job.
        There is a consensus, a growing consensus that we ought to
    allow Pell grants to help finance these short term programs but
    there is a lot of concern that we want to make sure they only
    go to quality programs.
        Can you say a word about what elements there are in your
    program that we should look at as we evaluate whether or not a
    program is of such quality we want to allow Pell grants to help
    fund it?
        Mr. DUBOIS. Thank you, Congressman Scott. I could suggest
    to you there should be two elements and some kind of an
    accountability system. One is program completion and two is
    employment in a high demand, family sustaining wage job.
        Mr. SCOTT. Now how would--how do you work with local
    businesses to make sure that there will be a demand for your
    graduates?
        Mr. DUBOIS. So to receive any kind of State funding in
    Virginia, first of all we have to have demonstrated demand that
    has to be--that information and data needs to be collected by
    our local community college. It needs to be verified by my
    senior staff. And the State board has essentially granted me
    authority to certify that program as eligible for some State
    funds or not.
        And then the truth is really in the pudding when we look at
    job placement rates which are very, very, very high. And when
    we see the job placement rates and we will at some point how
    many pharmacy technicians will we need in Virginia? When we see
    those placement rates starting to come down, we will probably
    turn off the State support for those programs because we only
    want it to be in high demand.
        They differ region by region but the colleges do a very
    good job as demonstrated by job placement that we are--we have
    an accountable system.
        Mr. SCOTT. Yes, how do your programs differ in rural
    Virginia as supposed to urban Virginia?
        Mr. DUBOIS. In, it's interesting in Virginia, the--we have
    2 million people in rural Virginia and 6 million plus people in
    urban, in the other part of Virginia.
        40 percent of our Fast Forward credentials are now being
    earned in rural Virginia. The only difference I would suggest
    to you, the big one, is the jobs that are in demand in certain
    regions, let's say southwest, south side, are different from
    the jobs that are demand, Congressman Scott, in your region.
        For example in Grundy, they don't really, they're not
    really crying out for a lot of welders. But your major
    employer, that CEO goes to sleep at night and wakes up worrying
    about where can he find welders to build aircraft carriers and
    submarines.
        So we look at these regional differences and we pay a lot
    of respect to those regional differences to see what--we are
    not a kind of a franchise where we have the same menu across
    the board at 23 different community colleges.
        Mr. SCOTT. Thank you. Dr. Verret, Xavier has an outstanding
    reputation of producing minority medical doctors. Can you
    explain how you have that success, what you do to create that
    success?
        Mr. VERRET. Well, it begins first I think with the
    intentionality about advising as students arrive. In their
    first year we begin to prepare them for the pathway that they
    are headed to. What courses they need, what experiences they
    need to have and even how to prepare for the interviews and
    preparing their essays. They think about that.
        The other piece is also there is a curriculum that is very
    well set in mind by our, with our faculty. The faculty and
    there is a great commitment to how those, that curriculum is
    delivered and to make sure that these students are actually at
    the top of their games even when they take the medical entrance
    exams. So it is faculty, it is also the advising.
        Mr. SCOTT. Is that replicable? Can you replicate it?
        Mr. VERRET. It is replicable because we have had not only a
    number of HBCU's but also a number of other colleges
        PWI's, universities that have--that visit Xavier to see
    what we do.
        What is not easily replicable overnight is a faculty that
    is a faculty culture and a campus culture. That piece where
    faculty replicates itself when they hire people they--and
    choose, you know, new members of the faculty.
        There is a criteria of exactly can they deliver for our
    students? That piece is very intentional and we seek to retain
    that.
        Mr. SCOTT. Thank you, Madame Chair.
        Chairwoman DAVIS. Thank you very much. I appreciate that. I
    want to now recognize the ranking member for his closing
    remarks.
        Mr. SMUCKER. Thank you, Madame Chair, and thank you for
    scheduling this hearing. I thought it was an outstanding
    hearing.
        I would like to thank each of the witnesses for taking your
    time to join us today to talk about higher ed reauthorization,
    to talk about the impact that your schools are having. I would
    like to commend you not only again for being here but for the
    great work that you do educating students and really helping
    them have the opportunity to achieve that success, to climb
    that ladder of economic success.
        You know, we heard so many good things coming from the
    schools, the physician assistance at and the physician programs
    at Xavier, STEM development at UTRGV, Virginia Community
    College you talked about the Fast Forward program, that short
    term skill programming. The nursing program at SKC and that was
    just a little bit of what you talked about. Certainly, you
    know, I am just--I am glad you had the opportunity to highlight
    some of these excellent programs here today.
        You know, one of the things that we can do is promote
    excellence when we see it and I hope that you are able to share
    those best practices and other institutions can learn from the
    leadership that you are providing and the work that you are
    doing.
        I know the Federal Government can also do more to help
    these students and help the MSI's and community college serve.
    Not only help students not only access higher education but
    persevere to completion and succeed in the work force. And so
    as we are considering reauthorization we can talk about earn
    and learn programs, the work force Pell funding, more
    flexibility in spending for institutions and spending those
    funds and increased collaboration between institutions and
    local employers.
        So I look forward to continuing this conversation. We are
    certainly not all born into the same environment but that
    difference of initial circumstance should not mean that we
    shouldn't all have an equal opportunity to succeed. That is
    really the promise, excuse me, the promise of America.
        So I think it is really important the work that we are
    doing on this reauthorization is very important. It is
    important that we get it right so that all students can achieve
    a better life for them and their families.
        So again thank you for the work that you do. I would like
    to again thank the ranking member.
        Chairwoman DAVIS. Thank you and I want to thank our ranking
    member for those--
        Mr. SMUCKER. Or the chair I should say.
        Chairman DAVIS [continuing]. for those comments as well and
    thank all of you because you have brought some very important
    information. We know historically that the students you serve
    have not really had full access to our education system and so
    it is important that we move forward from today. And certainly
    as the work that you have been doing and, Chancellor, for many,
    many, many years we appreciate that.
        By offering culturally relevant programming that it
    recognizes, you know, how important identity is, how community
    and tradition, the HBCU's, TCU's and HSI's you not only educate
    students but empower them to be the next generation of leaders
    in their community and that is why it matters. That is why it
    is important to all of us that these opportunities are
    available not just to the students because we need them. We
    need them for our future and we all have to buy into that
    notion and know that it is not helpful when we short change
    your institutions when you are serving in many cases the most
    vulnerable students.
        And, you know, I think what is interesting about the
    multiple challenges that they face is that you are helping them
    where they are and acknowledging that you have to be adaptive
    in your programming and to be able to truly move with the times
    and what we need as a country.
        We have talked about so many of the programs, the models
    that you have brought and part of I think what we are trying to
    grabble with here is how to make them work right, how to scale
    them, and how to be certain the they are open and that they are
    exceptional. That they are prestigious for young people and
    that everybody leaves feeling that they have great value in the
    time that they have spent. Not that it has been time that has
    been wasted.
        Anyways as I think Dr. Verret mentioned it is so often we
    find that. So I want to thank you very much for that. We,
    Congress really can't expect institutions to continue
    disproportionately serving vulnerable students while
    simultaneously fighting to receive the vital funding from
    Federal, State and local governments that they need.
        So we have to continue as we work to reauthorize the Higher
    Education Act committee to supporting these institutions that
    are really resource strapped but on the front lines of our
    effort to provide Americans with equal access to higher
    education. Thank you very much.
        And I now want to ask unanimous consent to enter into the
    record a statement from the California State University of Los
    Angeles highlighting the best practices CSU LA uses to serve
    the Latino community.
        We appreciate your being here and there is no further
    vision--business, the committee stands adjourned. Thank you
    very much.
        [Additional submission by Chairwoman Davis follows:]

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        [Whereupon, at 12:47 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.]

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