Obama’s plan to make community college free, explained

*This is a game changer. According to the National Conference of Sate Legislatures 58 percent of Latinos currently enrolled in higher education are attending community colleges. Yet the national completion rate for Latinos in two-year institutions is 32 percent. The biggest obstacle is money. The problem with this game changer is that it has no chance of making it through the new congress. This could be the beginning of a series of legislative volleys between the GOP led congress and the White House – each tossing initiatives to the other, knowing full-well that they won’t survive the other’s scrutiny. It serves two purposes, it gives each a cover with their base and it paints the opposition as intransigent.  VL

By Libby Nelson, Vox

Obama is proposing two years of free community college for students who attend at least half-time and maintain a grade point average of at least 2.5. That wouldn’t cover the entire cost for most students — students who finish community college in two years are rare — but the White House estimates it would save 9 million students around $3,800 per year in tuition if every state chose to participate.

The White House said details will be in the president’s 2016 budget request but declined to offer specifics on how much the program would cost. It’s not clear how the program would work, how the grants to states would be structured, or how the federal money would interact with the Pell Grant, federal aid for low-income students that about 38 percent of all community college students receive.

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