Looming Budget Cuts for Federal Work-Study: Complacent Acceptance or Catalyst for Change?

Dea Marx Ed.D., Program Director, Student Success and Academic Assurance, University of Missouri-Kansas City

Jessica Flinkman, Graduate Assistant, Student Success and Academic Assurance, University of Missouri-Kansas City

The proposed federal budget for the 2020 fiscal year includes massive cuts to the Federal Work-Study (FWS) program. President Trump’s budget proposal decreases FWS funds by 50 percent, $630 million less than 2019 (Nguyen, 2019), and restricts the disbursement of funds to only undergraduate students. While the proposed budget includes drastic cuts, the Trump Administration is also calling for the FWS program to be revamped, focusing on apprenticeships and internship opportunities for students (Busta, 2019). In support of this, Jim Blew, the Education Department’s Assistant Secretary for Planning, Evaluation, and Policy development, exhorted a new direction for FWS programs that emphasized career-building opportunities for students instead of a subsidized workforce for the campus (Nguyen, 2019). The political attention aimed at the FWS indicates change is imminent, but the modifications that would best serve students are still to be determined. 

In 2016, the National Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators’ (NASFAA) published a report on FWS and stated, “due to the dearth of empirical study on the best practices, innovation, and implementation of FWS, little is known about promising practices and innovative approaches to benefit students, institutions, or employers” (p. 10). In this post, we provide the original intent of FWS, a glimpse at national efforts towards revamping FWS programs, and one catalyst fueling the call for innovations. We also assert that as researchers and practitioners it is our responsibility to transform the FWS program; therefore, we provide our own research on improving the FWS program at the University of Missouri-Kansas City.

Original Intent

The Department of Labor created the Economic Opportunity Act of 1964 with the goal to “stimulate and promote the part-time employment of students in institutions of higher education who are from low-income families and are in need of the earnings from such employment to pursue courses of study at such institutions” (p. 513). Over the last 56 years, little research has been conducted that provides empirical evidence of the effectiveness of FWS. In a nationwide examination of the FWS program, Scott-Clayton (2017) stated that the “original justification to encourage students to work while enrolled in order to pay their way through college is profoundly outdated” (p. 1). Scott-Clayton also encouraged fellow researchers to invest their energy in “innovating, experimenting, and rigorously evaluating this half-century old program that still appears to have a valuable place in a modern college completion and career readiness agenda” (p. 4).

National Efforts Toward Revamping FWS Programs

In 2019, the Department of Education spearheaded one effort to provide opportunities for FWS program innovation through a national pilot program, Experimental Sites Initiative (ESI). ESI offered higher educational institutions (HEIs) an opportunity to request a waiver that allowed changes in funding allocations to include private-sector companies, increased hours, and more opportunities for work experiences aligned with students’ program of study (Federal Student Aid, 2019a). ESI was designed to test how restructuring the traditional FWS program requirements would “increase partnerships between institutions and industry, improve student retention and completion, reduce student debt levels, and yield strong post-graduation employment outcomes” (Federal Student Aid, 2019b). This new initiative reflected Trump Administration’s priorities, without cutting FWS funds, by creating opportunities for HEIs to explore new policies and practices that address the evolving needs of students and employers in the 21st century.

Catalyst Fueling the Call for Innovations

Current research reveals students’ perceptions of FWS jobs range from beneficial to monotonous. One example of a catalyst for change in FWS is the inconsistencies of students’ experiences across campuses. Flinkman (Author 2) described her own experience as a work-study student:

Reflecting on my experiences working for a FWS program as a nervous freshman, my first on-campus job…was custodial work in the student center. I had envisioned scrubbing, cleaning toilets, and mopping floors. It turns out my supervisor barely had any work for me. I just had to vacuum and wipe baseboards. In fact, I barely ever saw my supervisor. I found myself cleaning extra things to overcome my boredom. Because of the lack of supervision and challenges, I applied for another job: a media lab assistant. While this job required more training and supervision, I spent most of my hours eating candy, drinking coffee, and doing homework.

Flinkman’s experience is not unique and is part of the fuel that prompts the criticism and calls for reform. However, NASFAA (2016) stated “current literature does show that FWS is a potentially impactful tool” (p. 10). This impact is reflected in students’ reflections of jobs that provided meaningful experiences. Martinez (2019) spoke of his FWS experience as a student at Texas A&M as highly positive:

I was very fortunate to end up in that first work-study position as a tour guide. It started a chain of events that led to this awesome career that I love. My second work-study role as a peer counselor taught me important problem-solving skills and opened my eyes to the field of higher education. I was a political science major as an undergraduate, and I would have never found this career path had it not been for my work-study jobs.

The contrast between Martinez and Flinkman’s experiences illustrates the inconsistency in FWS experiences. This discrepancy should prompt HEIs to examine their individual FWS practices to create more effective programs. To prepare students to enter the professional work environment, innovative practices could create structure for students’ experiences, provide intentional supervision, and nurture the growth of professional skills.
Revamping our University’s FWS Program

In 2018, our own university created an initiative to address the discrepancies in work-study positions across campus. We designed a needs-assessment to gain an understanding of how students selected positions, what skills positions required, where we could improve students’ work experiences, and how supervisors built relationships and retained students. Based on the data, we developed a pilot program that offered professional development for both supervisors and students. Supervisors attended an initial four-hour professional development session; they also attended monthly collaboration meetings with supervisory topics such as mentoring student-employees, providing structured feedback, and utilizing summative evaluations. Students’ professional development included topics such as recognizing best practices for customer service, implementing SMART goals in the workplace, and applying supervisors’ feedback to increase their skills in the professional environment. Three progressive levels were developed to increase students’ professional skills over several semesters as student-employees. The first level focused on customer service skills, the second level concentrated on collaboration and project management, and the final level developed students’ leadership skills in the professional environment. Steeped in these professional development sessions, the pilot program challenged systemic traditions in our FWS program, and data were collected to determine the impact this new culture had on students’ work experiences.

Initial Findings

Findings illuminated students’ preference for positions that prepared them for professional work environments, including professional development opportunities aligned with their chosen careers. Professional development for supervisors was also vital to encourage a mindset of higher expectations towards the students’ professionalism. One supervisor reported her student was “responsive to formative feedback – displayed higher level of care about achieving her role and meeting expectations” in direct response to newly implemented program structures. New supervisors found monthly collaboration meetings helped them expand their expectations and build a community of support. One staff member with no supervisory experience stated:

Hearing how the others do things, who are way more experienced [than] I am, helped me feel more confident that I could do this job. Meeting people that I would not have contact with in my current position, gave me people to call when I had questions.

As new supervisors found support while implementing new expectations, experienced supervisors also found value in the collaboration. One 15-year veteran supervisor stated, “I enjoyed hearing some new ideas in the session on transferable skills. I talked to students about what they do – but hadn’t thought about talking to them about how they put that on their resumes.” Reframing program expectations through professional development assisted both new and experienced supervisors in aligning their positions and expectations to reflect a more professional readiness focus for students employed through the FWS program. Findings such as these may be used by other institutions as a springboard to examine their own current practices and students’ needs to evolve the FWS into a more contemporary version of itself.
Researchers’ Role in Revamping FWS

Researchers must respond to the call for empirical studies on promising practices and innovative approaches (NASFFA, 2016) in order to both modernize the program and respond to current students’ needs relating to preparation for professional experiences. While the final federal budget has not been approved, the proposed drastic cuts should serve as the catalyst for HEIs to proactively engage in research needed to offer policy makers options other than reduction of funds. More research will provide substantial information to guide program development and inform policy makers on new ways to restructure FWS programs to better address the contemporary needs of students, HEI personnel, and the businesses that will employ students post-graduation (Scott-Clayton & Zhou, 2017; NASFAA, 2016).

The proposed budget cuts would affect thousands of students, for which the availability of FWS funds is essential for access to higher education. If we as researchers and policy makers are complacent, national budget cuts will impact our students who already face massive financial challenges in pursuit of a degree. We advocate for increased collaboration between researchers and policy-makers to create innovative FWS experiences that support students’ degree completion as an alternative to the reduction in the current budget proposal. By working together, we can transform FWS programs, thereby preserving access, promoting completion, and preparing students for post-graduation employment success.

Federal Student Aid. (2019a, November) Experimental sites. U.S. Department of Education.
Federal Student Aid. (2019b, May) Publication of federal register notice inviting Federal
Martinez, O. (2019, April). My work-study job was the best part of my education. College

References

Busta, H. (2019, May) Federal Work-Study pilot to expand funding, flexibility. Education Dive. Retrieved from www.educationdive.com/news/education-depts-federal-work-study-pilot-to-expand-funding-flexibility/555225/

Economic Opportunity Act of 1964, Sec. 121, Pub. L. 88-452, Aug. 20, 1964, 78 Stat. 508

Retrieved from https://experimentalsites.ed.gov/exp/index.html

Work-Study participating postsecondary educational institutions to participate in the Federal Work-Study experiment under the Experimental Sites Initiative. U.S. Department of Education. Retrieved from https://ifap.ed.gov/eannouncements/052019PubofFRFWSExpUnderExpSitesInitiative.html

Covered. Retrieved from www.collegecovered.com/paying-for-college/my-work-study-was-the-best-part-of-college/

NASFAA. (2016, June). National Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators’ Federal Work-Study research: Literature review & policy scan. Public Agenda. Retrieved from https://www.nasfaa.org/uploads/documents/NASFAA_2016_Advocacy_Literature_Review_and_Policy_Scan.pdf

Nguyen, T. (2019, March). Here’s what Trump’s 2020 budget proposal means for higher ed. The Chronicle for Higher Education. Retrieved from file:///C:/Users/JRFDKZ/Downloads/ccf_20170622_scott-clayton_evidence_speaks.pdf

Scott-Clayton, J. (2017). Federal Work-Study: Past its prime, or ripe for

renewal?. Economic Studies. Washington, DC: Brookings Institution. Retrieved from

file:///C:/Users/JRFDKZ/Downloads/ccf_20170622_scott-clayton_evidence_speaks.pdf

Scott-Clayton, J. and Zhou, R.Y. (2017). Does the Federal Work-Study program really work—

and for whom? A CAPSEE research brief. New York, NY: Center for the

Analysis of Postsecondary Education and Employment.