School is in Minnesota’s future. It’s also in Minnesota’s past but what worked 20 or 120 years ago, won’t work quite so neatly tomorrow. Minnesota’s workforce development is predicated on post-K-12 education with the additional expectation that workers will engage regular, on-going learning over their laboring lives.
Today, about 450,000 Minnesotans are pursuing a post-secondary education. Unsurprisingly, a little over half are 24 or younger. Among undergraduate students, 66% are 24 or younger, accounting for two of every three undergrads. That also means that one of every three are 25 or older.
Due in substantial part to the national economic recession and subsequent slow recovery, the 25-34 year old age group grew dramatically, particularly at two-year higher education institutions. Typically, these students have children and balance work, school, and family responsibilities. They are every bit as eager as 18-24 year old students to learn but are having a very different college experience. That experience is transforming higher education.
Time--and Money
Minnesota’s two-year community colleges have rapidly responded, adding more early morning and late evening classes. They’ve expanded online courses, delivering on the community college dream of creating access to higher education’s transformative path. While this expansion has its challenges, program, it turns out, is the easy part. Financing college is much more difficult.
Under student financial aid guidelines, full-time students qualify for more aid than part-time students. Given the growing percentage of part-time, working 25-34-year-old students, that seems naïve and outdated. More critically, lack of financial aid access creates an additional barrier to higher education.
We say that we understand that on-going education and life-long learning is important but we don’t act like it. Even today, our expectation default is that college is for 18-to-22-year-olds. As a result, we tend to shape our higher ed access accordingly until something shakes us up, forcing change.
Lessons from Swimming
During my first two college summers, when I was 19 and 20, I lifeguarded and taught swimming lessons at the Tracy Municipal Swimming Pool. Assisting in our adult swimming classes, I came to understand the complex barriers to adult learning. If you’re 40 and haven’t learned to swim, at least in some rudimentary fashion, the first instructive step is figuring out what’s kept you from learning to swim.
Sometimes it’s lack of access to facilities and instruction. Sometimes it’s psychological--fearing the water. In those cases, stroke instruction is simple compared to helping people develop comfort in the water. Focusing on access, with the expectation that swimming is a valuable, beneficial skill, guides the program. Working adults generally don’t have an hour, from 1:30 to 2:30, say, to take a swimming lesson. They need alternatives.
That’s Minnesota’s higher ed challenge. Without constant upgrade, Minnesota’s workforce degrades. Higher ed access, in all forms, moves our state forward. Improving access requires a change in attitude, robust financial aid, and scheduling flexibility. College no longer starts at 18, ending four years later. Minnesota’s higher education policy must keep pace with need and demand.
John Van Hecke is Executive Director and Fellow at Minnesota 2020. This is an abridgement of an article that first appeared on Minnesota 2020's web site.