College enrollment has finally recovered, thanks in large part to the surge in enrollment at community colleges. Two-year career and technical education (CTE) programs are feeling this growth acutely with some of the largest enrollment increases of any sector in higher education.
How are the students fueling higher education’s recovery faring financially? Compared to their peers at four-year universities, two-year community college students have higher financial need. They are more likely to come from low-income households with less financial support from family, and they often face gaps in financial aid packages. The result is a risky balancing act: many community college students work long hours, take on debt and sacrifice essentials like food just to stay enrolled.
This precarity may soon intensify: the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA) cut the social safety net that many students rely on like Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). For already food-insecure students, such changes could push degree completion further from reach.
At the same time, OBBBA delivered a historic win for community colleges. For the first time in the program’s 53-year tenure, short-term job training programs now qualify for Pell Grant funding. This is no small breakthrough, but to fulfill its promise, community colleges must strengthen partnerships with local employers by co-designing curriculum, ensuring training maps directly onto jobs in high-demand sectors and offsetting costs for students.
Model A: ‘Earn as you learn’ structure
The Ford Automotive Student Service Education Training (ASSET) program shows what this can look like in practice. Operating at 41 community colleges nationwide, the ASSET program weaves classroom instruction and paid dealership internships in a two-year “earn as you learn” structure. The payoff is clear: students gain hands-on experience, industry-recognized certifications and a paycheck; dealerships secure a pipeline of highly-skilled technicians who are already trained in-house; colleges boost retention for current students and build a network of resources and opportunities for future students; and the broader economy benefits from a skilled, diverse workforce committed to long-term success in their local communities.
A new study, “Drive to Thrive: Student Success in Career & Technical STEM” from The Ohio State University’s College Impact Laboratory, is examining the financial payoff of industry-education partnerships. Early findings highlight ASSET’s advantages: ASSET students have lower student loan burdens than their peers in other automotive programs and are more likely to use federal loans rather than riskier private options.
Students’ enduring struggles
Yet, even with the well-structured earn-as-you-learn scenario, financial strain lingers: some students still struggle to meet their basic needs, like eating regularly. One student reflected on the challenges of making ends meet while enrolled in such technical programs: “You’ve got to budget a lot more… You need to eat more ice water soup, you know?”
Even when students have some familial support, the classroom-intensive periods require serious budget changes. Another student described how recurring dips in income affect his food budget despite living with a parent: “[I’m] just trying my hardest to reduce the cost [of food], and I also do unfortunately have to reduce the amount [of food I eat]. I have had to do that a couple times.”
And it’s not just food insecurity. Students are also coping with other non-negotiable expenses, such as medical bills and the cost of gas for long commutes to work or school. Sometimes, the only way students cope is through avoidance. “Let’s just say every time I open MyChart [medical invoices]… Ooh, I’m not paying that. I don’t have two grand to give you. I’m just going to wait until it goes away. Is that the most financially responsible decision for me? It is right now.”
Compounding these issues, instructors have observed a growing number of students who support their families with their internship earnings. “The student may not be having to pay the mortgage or that kind of thing, but they are having to contribute to the family… They come in with a larger set of responsibilities than any students I’ve ever seen in the past. They are dealing with these problems at a younger age,” reported one ASSET program coordinator. “That has them starting out in a [financial] hole.”
Building financial resilience
This is why “Drive to Thrive” is going beyond tracking CTE community college students’ financial outcomes. The study is boosting students’ financial literacy with an educational workshop designed specifically for automotive technology students. Developed by Columbus State Community College’s Faculty Fellow for Student Financial Wellness, Jack Popovich, the curriculum covers key concepts like budgeting, saving and investing for the future.
The workshop has had a tangible impact for both instructors and students. As one instructor put it, “The information delivered to our students has the potential to change the rest of their lives. It is information that our students have been begging for and severely needed. You guys have done great work…and delivered us an extremely useful tool to fight financial illiteracy.” Students agree, reporting that the workshop “allowed me to see my financial means from a much better standpoint” and “You’ve given me motivation to make improvements.”
Drive to Thrive also provides direct financial support to participating students and institutions thanks to generous funding from the Educational Credit Management Corporation (ECMC) Foundation, underscoring that real progress requires investment alongside collaboration and innovation.
Sustaining the comeback
Community colleges are not just stabilizing U.S. higher education enrollment; they are powering it. But if this recovery is to endure, growth alone will not be enough. We must ensure that students in the nation’s burgeoning CTE sector can enroll, persist, graduate and thrive financially. That means pairing new federal programs like Workforce Pell with intentional industry partnerships, rigorous data collection and sustained investment in student financial wellness. Drive to Thrive is a model for colleges looking to build capacity and infrastructure to monitor workforce training programs and to collect, analyze and report verifiable outcomes data to meet new federal requirements.
The long-term goal is clear: reduce the cost of college, maximize its return and make sure that the students driving higher education’s comeback are not left behind.
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Dr. Matthew J. Mayhew is the William Ray and Marie Adamson Flesher Professor of Educational Administration with a focus on higher education and student affairs at The Ohio State University. He is the lead author of more than 100 articles and How College Affects Students: 21st Century Evidence that Higher Education Works.
Dr. Courtney DeRoche is a postdoctoral researcher at The Ohio State University’s College Impact Laboratory, where she co-manages the “Drive to Thrive: Student Success in Career and Technical STEM” project.
Susannah Townsend is a Ph.D. candidate in the Higher Education and Student Affairs program at The Ohio State University with over 10 years of experience working in institutional research.
Dr. Emily T. Creamer is the research director of The Ohio State University’s College Impact Laboratory, where she co-manages multiple mixed-methods research projects, including the “Drive to Thrive” project.
