Cedar Rapids, Kirkwood look to make workforce scholarships permanent

CEDAR RAPIDS — While businesses struggle to find enough skilled workers to fill jobs, local officials are exploring ways to help needy students train for those jobs — and to make that scholarship help permanent.

Last year, the city of Cedar Rapids launched the College Career Connection program in partnership with Kirkwood Community College, marking the first “College Promise” program spearheaded by an Iowa city.

The effort uses federal American Rescue Plan Act funds to fill financial gaps for those entering Kirkwood’s career and technical education programs.

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Those programs include health care careers, such as nursing or dental hygiene, the trades, such as construction or welding, and information technology, such as computer software development.

So far, Matt Falduto, Kirkwood’s senior director of financial aid, said 249 “unique” students have received the scholarships this year and last year. Late year, 148 scholarships were awarded, 130 this year, though that total could grow as the academic year goes on. (Some students received the scholarship both years, when is why the totals don’t match.)

Eligible students will automatically receive the scholarship if their expected family contribution — as determined through the Free Application for Federal Student Aid — is $16,000 or less. This figure is a measure of how much students can be expected to contribute toward their education for the year and is used to determine their eligibility for financial aid.

Students will receive grants totaling up to $6,000 a year, filling the gaps for students when state, federal and other financial aid doesn’t cover their need. The average amount awarded has been $1,900 per student, Falduto said.

“That hits our neediest students but also goes up a little bit higher, too, and that was important to the program,” Falduto said. “There's a lot of programs out there for the most needy students.

“We wanted this one to be a little bit more expansive — still needy students, but perhaps students who sometimes get forgotten when we're looking at different financial aid programs and who they serve.”

Pandemic funds

The Cedar Rapids City Council in 2022 allocated $500,000 of its $28 million share of federal American Rescue Plan Act funds to launch the new workforce scholarship initiative. In September, the council awarded another $576,387 in ARPA funds to the program.

When the program was created, it was intended to round out the state’s Last Dollar Scholarship, a form of aid under Future Ready Iowa that is intended to cover remaining gaps between federal and state grants, scholarships and tuition and fees.

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Jasmine Almoayyed, Kirkwood’s vice president of continuing education and training services, said some students were impacted when the state changed the expected family contribution level from no requirement to $20,000 or less.

Almoayyed said some students were initially under the impression that they would receive that scholarship, but were no longer eligible when that rule changed. The city funding gave Kirkwood latitude to support those students who otherwise qualified this year but cold not meet the $16,000 expected family contribution.

“It helps serve those in-demand workers and trying to produce more of them because the big thing with Kirkwood students is that most of them tend to stay in the area,” Almoayyed said. “... By investing in these students, hopefully on the back end, they're going to come out as employees of these companies, with the types of skills and qualifications that they're looking for.”

Measuring success

Through the COVID-19 pandemic, Falduto said Kirkwood awarded emergency grants for students and received more than 1,000 applications asking for assistance. He said he read every one of those, heard students’ stories and how their challenges go beyond paying for tuition and books, but also paying for rent, food and transportation.

When Kirkwood surveyed how those emergency grants impacted students, the replies, he said, included, “This saved my life. This kept me on the path to success. I wouldn't have been able to stay in college without these funds.”

“The students that we're helping with this Cedar Rapids Career Connection grant are the same students who we helped with that,” Falduto said. “I'm confident that these types of funds, these no-strings attached funds — they're not loans, they don't pay them back — I know that they're having an impact. Our students are telling us that.”

Falduto said he suspects Kirkwood will be better positioned to measure the true impact of the program after another year of it.

To assess the program, he said, officials will look at completion rates of students who received this grant compared with other students to see whether more scholarship recipients graduated, for instance. Kirkwood also may survey graduates and see what impact this had on their ability to start a career and move forward.

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Program’s continuation

Mayor Tiffany O’Donnell said the scholarship numbers were extremely encouraging and show there's a need for this support. As the city looks to grow its workforce population, the best opportunities lie in supporting the students who are already here, she said.

“As a city, it’s really smart to invest in the students who’ve already chosen Cedar Rapids as home,” O’Donnell said. “It’s also our responsibility to make sure we not only provide accessible training for them, but when necessary reduce any financial barriers.

“If we’re going to say we want to grow our population, it’s more than just words. These types of opportunities are important for the city to offer as we not only recruit new people, but equally or more important, keep the best and brightest who are already here.”

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It’s unlikely revenue from the city’s general fund, supported with property tax dollars, can provide long-term funding for the program.

The next step, according to city and Kirkwood officials, would be to take data from this pilot program to find philanthropic support.

Linn County worked on a similar program with Kirkwood, awarding $1 million in ARPA funds to students with financial need without restrictions on the programs in which students enroll.

Kirkwood President Lori Sundberg said the college has had no conversations with the county about continuing the program.

As for the Cedar Rapids program, City Manager Jeff Pomeranz said city officials will sit down with the business community, Greater Cedar Rapids Community Foundation and Kirkwood representatives and determine a course of action.

“We’re prepared to lead the way,” Pomeranz said. “We’ll put a committee together and then we’re going to work to raise money for the effort for the future.”

Sundberg said the college has a strong pool of donors who are committed to growing the workforce and supporting students. Kirkwood, she said, will partner with the city as it leads efforts to secure long-term funding for the program.

“We will tell the story as we always have by showcasing our students’ success,” Sundberg said.

Comments: (319) 398-8494; marissa.payne@thegazette.com