Latest Coverage

"The number of state low-income children eating breakfast at school jumped 55 percent in the past four years, according to an annual report released Tuesday by Advocates for Children of New Jersey. Nearly all major urban school districts now serve breakfast 'after the bell,' according to Nancy Parello, spokeswoman for the nonprofit."

"Education is the solution to issues related to poverty, said Michael Burke, the new chancellor of the Riverside Community College District. 'This is the fight in America and a theme throughout my entire career,' he said. Burke sees poverty and race issues as the challenges in the district, home to Riverside City, Moreno Valley and Norco colleges, just like they were at his last job as president of Milwaukee Area Technical College."

"The growth of QuestBridge has broader lessons for higher education and for closing the yawning achievement gap between rich and poor teenagers. College admissions officers attribute the organization's success to the simplicity of its approach to students. It avoids mind-numbingly complex talk of financial-aid forms and formulas that scare away so many low-income families. QuestBridge instead gives students a simple message: If you get in, you can go."

"Charter school students in Utah are whiter and wealthier than their traditional public school counterparts, according to a report released this week. The National Alliance for Public Charter Schools ranked Utah 24th out of 26 states for the health of its charter school movement, with Utah scoring low marks for racial and economic diversity."

"The Tennessee Treasury Department is announcing a program to help low-income families build college savings. Under Tennessee Investments Preparing Scholars, the state will provide enhanced matches for money invested by families that have accounts in the Treasury Department's TNStars college savings program and meet the income requirements."

"Rather than asking individuals to increase their value, we need to transform how we as a society value the work individuals do. Recently when President Obama admonished corporate CEOs to stop complaining about regulations, he roused a sharp retort from the corporate world, accusing him of "not getting it" and not doing enough to remove uncertainties caused by regulations that discourage companies from hiring."

"The topic of poverty was examined through group discussion and analysis Thursday afternoon in the Gordon Parks Museum at Fort Scott Community College. About 30 people attended a free workshop entitled 'Bridges out of Poverty' inside the Danny and Willa Ellis Family Fine Arts Center to learn more about the hidden rules of poverty, middle class and wealth in order to have a better understanding of the driving forces behind the three socioeconomic classes."

"The U.S. Department of Education has given the University of Alabama at Birmingham a $47 million grant for the Gaining Early Awareness and Readiness for Undergraduate Programs, which aims to increase the rate of low-income high school students who are prepared to enter a level of higher education."

"As selective colleges try to increase economic diversity among their undergraduates, the University of Chicago announced Wednesday that it's embarking on an unusual effort to enroll more low-income students, including the elimination of loans in its aid packages. What's more, the elite school will no longer expect financial-aid students to hold jobs during the school year and application fees will be waived for families seeking aid. The initiative includes scholarships, career guidance and a guarantee of paid summer internships, officials said as they announced the No Barriers program. The university will offer more than 100 workshops across the nation to demystify the admissions and financial aid process."

"With the deadline for high school seniors to enroll in Gov. Bill Haslam's first-in-the-nation offer of a free two-year postsecondary education now one month away, a report by 24/7 Wall Street shows how urgent and absolutely essential Tennessee Promise is to the state."

"New state ratings reveal that dozens of Minneapolis and St. Paul schools are among the lowest-performing schools in Minnesota and are failing to close the achievement gap between white and minority students. Statewide, education officials identified 155 struggling schools. The ratings signal which schools are performing poorly and which are beating the odds among those that accept federal poverty money."