6 Questions about Short-Term Pell with Mary Alice McCarthy

Postsecondary education will play a key role in America’s economic recovery following the COVID-19 pandemic, as students seek new credentials to equip them with the skills and employment opportunities, they need to live stable and secure lives. One pathway gaining in popularity is shorter-term credentials designed to get students back in the workforce as soon as possible. Some have proposed using the Pell Grant program to finance training programs as short as 8 to 15 weeks of instruction. However, doing so could have negative implications for students (especially students of color) and taxpayers if done without significant quality guardrails. In our latest video we sat down with Mary Alice McCarthy, Director of the Center on Education and Skills at New America Education, to dig into the topic