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Welcome to the Capital Area College Access e-newsletter!

Your source for college, career, and financial assistance resources to support post-secondary attainment in the Capital Region.
CapCAN: Promoting College & Career Access
in the Capital Area
CapCAN Seeking Summer College Ambassadors
A few summers ago, CapCAN took this wonderful group of students up to the UP to explore the four universities. Besides the awesome trip, these students became college ambassadors back in their schools the following school year. While we can't roadtrip to the UP yet, we want to recreate the vibe among some rising high school juniors, seniors and college freshmen.

CapCAN is excited to launch its first College Ambassador Summer Leadership (CASL) initiative. We are hoping to recruit 8 students ages 16-19 to participate in a 6 week series of college and career readiness experiences. The CASL ambassadors will go on some local college visits, meet career ambassadors, learn about the college going process and financial aid. Help us recruit some students!

In celebration of Financial Literacy Month, we interviewed our friend and partner, Amber Paxton of the City of Lansing Office of Financial Empowerment. In this episode of #CapCANKnows learn about the fantastic opportunities to plan and save for college and your financial future.
As part of our Equity Audit and review of our college access data, we are sharing our Annual Report and an overview of the college attainment of low-income and students with disabilities in our region.

We are really excited to announce our College Access Champions of the Year, LCC C3R and Sophia Mackoul! You can join us in the virtual celebration on Facebook or Fox 47 in late April. See our calendar below.

And we are back to doing in-person events!!! If you would like us to present or table at your upcoming events to promote postsecondary opportunities please give me a shout!

Be Well! Michele Strasz

#CapCANKnows:
feat. Amber Paxton (City of Lansing)
Amber Paxton has worked for the City of Lansing for 9 years as the director of its Office of Financial Empowerment.

The OFE is part of the Department of Neighborhoods & Citizen Engagement, and oversees four programs for Lansing residents: The Lansing Financial Empowerment Center, which offers free one-on-one financial counseling; Lansing SAVE, a children's savings account for post-secondary education which auto-enrolls students at Kindergarten; Bank On Lansing, which seeks to assist the unbanked and underbanked in returning to the financial mainstream; and a wrap-around services program for returning citizens.

Amber is a proud graduate of University of Michigan-Flint. She has three grown children and two perfect grandkids, and when not hanging out with them or working, is usually knitting.
Summer Camps and College and Career Readiness Programs
In person adventures are back!!! And more virtual experiences abound.

Check these sites for program information, registration, cost or scholarship information to enroll a child or teen to explore
pre-college and career options!
Equity Data Focus
By: Ashley Justice, Program Manager
In 2021, CapCAN conducted an equity audit to explore opportunities to engage our community to increase educational equity in college access. In preparation for this, we pulled dis-aggregated college access data from MISchoolData.org to examine college readiness and enrollment trends of students who are low-income, students who have an active IEP or 504 plan, and/or students of color. We confirmed that there are high disparities for these particular populations in college readiness and enrollment data, especially for the Class of 2021 that was exacerbated by the pandemic. However, this data is not unique to our community. Statewide, other communities saw trends similar to Ingham and Eaton counties. 

Below we examine the college equity data for students who are economically disadvantaged and students with disabilities for both Ingham ISD and Eaton RESA. Our findings show that we still have a lot of work to do to continue to promote postsecondary opportunities for these groups of students.

Ingham ISD

It’s important to note that Ingham ISD percentages show a slight increase in college enrollment (54.2% enrolled in 2020 as compared to 56.8% of graduates enrolled in 2021), but when we look at the numbers, we see that there are over 300 less high school graduates for the class of 2021 than in the Class of 2020 (Class of 2021 had 2,666 graduates, and Class of 2020 had 3,011 graduates), The number of students enrolled in college dropped from 1,631 graduates enrolled in 2020 to 1,513 enrolled in 2021.

Due to this, we will also use the Class of 2019 in the comparison since the number of graduates was closer to the class of 2021 (Class of 2019 had 2,737 graduates of which 1,781 graduates enrolled in college).

When looking at socioeconomic status, we see that there has been a decline in the number of economically disadvantaged graduates enrolling in post secondary education from 2019. 48.7% of the Class of 2019 students who were identified as economically disadvantaged enrolled in college. That number dropped to 43% for the Class of 2021. 

Ingham ISD numbers are higher than the State of Michigan average. 47.6% of economically disadvantaged Michigan graduates enrolled in college in 2019 as compared with 38.5% enrolled in 2021. While this is good news that Ingham is above the state enrollment rate, less than half of our economically disadvantaged students in Ingham enrolled in college in 2021.

Students who have a disability have more disparities in college enrollment with 33.2% of the Class of 2019 enrolled in postsecondary education. There was a steep drop in the Class of 2021 with only 25.7% of students with disabilities enrolling in college. This trend is very similar at the state level with 31.6% of students with disabilities enrolling in postsecondary education in 2019, and 23.8% in 2021.

Eaton County

Eaton RESA has shown a steady decline over the past few years in college enrollment, but this was heightened during the pandemic. The Class of 2019, size of 957 students, saw 54% of its graduates enrolled in post-secondary education. This number dropped to 46.8% in 2020 (Class size was 1,115) and 43.3% in 2021 (Class size was 1,037). 

Similar to Ingham County (48.7% to 43.0%) and Michigan (47.6% to 38.5%), there is a significant drop in college enrollment of ERESA students who are economically disadvantaged, 33.4% in 2019, and 26% in 2021. This is about 12 percentage points lower than the state average in 2021.

Eaton RESA rate of college enrollment among students with disabilities was at 26.6% in 2019 and declined to 22% in 2021. The 2021 enrollment number is closer to Michigan’s overall enrollment of students with disabilities in 2021 (23.8%), but still falls below the state average


When looking at this data, it is immediately apparent that there were significant drops in college attainment for students with disabilities and students who are economically disadvantaged. CapCAN will continue to monitor the trends in the data using it to empower systems change through our collective partnerships. CapCAN continues to support College Advisers and Counselors in our region to help students navigate the college-going and financial aid process to help address these disparities. CapCAN has also partnered with the school districts to support students with disabilities to understand how to use their IEP for accommodations in college.

If you or a student need assistance in the college-going process, please reach out to your College Adviser, School Counselor, or you can contact us at collegequestions@capcan.org to schedule a one-on-one appointment.

Source: County-wide data is pulled from MI School Data. Nationwide data comes from the Student Clearinghouse.
Annual Report:
Educational Attainment in Ingham and Eaton Counties
Click the image to enlarge!
CapCAN in the Community
CapCAN is here, there and everywhere talking to students, parents, and community members about the importance of a post-secondary education.

The Wilson Talent Center welcomed the Class of 2020 and 2021 to a Back to Your Future event to help them reengage with college and career opportunities after high school graduation. Watch for more events this spring and summer in the community!
CapCAN and C3R partners supporting seniors on the Autism Spectrum as they transition to Lansing Community College at the Ready for Launch event! (Watch this media clip for more info.)
Upcoming Events
Capital Area College Access Network | 517-203-5011 | capcan.org
Readiness. Access. Retention. Empowerment.