Why Bridges?
Understanding the Problem
65% of jobs require some level of postsecondary education, with 30% of those jobs requiring only some college or an associate’s degree. Additionally, the average tuition and fees at community colleges is less than ⅓ of the yearly cost at a four-year public institution and ⅒ of the cost at a four-year private nonprofit institution.
It’s more important than ever to build bridges to good jobs that earn living wages, sustain families, and offer continued career development and advancement.
The Opportunity Gap
Black, Latine and low-income students are often faced with challenges that impact their ability to develop skills beyond a high school diploma.
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Postsecondary students are often faced with challenges outside of school that impact their skill development, degree completion, and ultimately their job qualifications when entering the workforce. These challenges, like poverty, lack of affordable housing, lack of family support, and other competing responsibilities, are too-often left to students to manage on their own.
To prepare students for careers that earn a living wage, we must invest in education pathways that recognize and support them through the unique, historic barriers they face along the “middle skills” pathway. Strengthening the availability and access to quality opportunities for advancement allows us to meet the needs of Black, Latine and low-income Chicagoans by addressing the systemic inequities that have long limited their options to obtaining higher earning careers.
The Support Gap
Institutions often lack supports that put students on pathways to careers: such as academic advising, wellness services, and racial equity in the classroom.
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Postsecondary education has long centered white, middle-to-upper-income students and their needs while leaving Black, Latine and low-income students to navigate life after high school with less resources. Institutions often lack comprehensive academic and financial supports that put students on pathways to careers as well as culturally competent social and emotional supports.
It is not enough to simply “get into college.” Students need a range of institutional and community support in order to be successful, including accessible academic and career advising, coordinated student support services, mental health and wellness services, and overarching culture shifts centering equity in the classroom and across the campus.
Research shows that offering these additional supports for students can be critical drivers of program completion with limited debt, and the lack of these institutional supports contributes to lower retention and graduation rates among Black, Latine and low-income students, ultimately harming their ability to enter careers that will offer living wages and economic security.
The Wage Gap
Here in Chicago, less than half of households (48%) earn a living wage. The gap is even worse for Black and Latine families.
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As the American workforce grows more diverse, it is essential for workers of color and those from low-income backgrounds to be able to gain the economic security of obtaining well-compensated jobs capable of withstanding recessions and downturns.
The lack of affordable postsecondary education is directly tied to the wage gap we see for Black, Latine and low-income people throughout their lives. Here in Chicago, less than half of households (48%) earn a living wage, according to the Metropolitan Planning Council, and the gap is even worse for Black and Latine families: less than 30% of Black households and roughly 36% of Latine households earn a living wage.
Affordable postsecondary education and workforce development programs are the solution. The same study found that only 29% of individuals without a college degree earn a living wage and that Black Chicagoans are more likely to work in industries like healthcare and hospitality where people without a college degree earn less. Without access to affordable postsecondary education, marginalized communities also lose access to good, family-sustaining jobs.
The classic prescription of four-year college alone is a solution that does not reflect reality for many students.