Odessa College has received several grants through the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board aimed at making higher education more affordable and preparing more residents for high-need jobs in the workforce.
The college received two rounds of $1.5 million each for the Texas Reskilling Grant in January of 2021.
OC also was awarded $500,000 for the Texas Reskilling and Upskilling Through Education initiative in November 2021 and $250,000 for the Repayment Grant.
The deadline to distribute the funds is Sept. 30.
“Along the way, the Coordinating Board has made changes to expand the requirements to include more student eligibility and they have extended the deadlines. We work with them on a regular basis. All of the colleges and universities who were awarded send end of semester reports and then they have made adjustments in response to those reports,” Vice President of Advancement, Business and Governmental Relations Jacqui Gore said.
“Initially, the criteria were so narrow, very few students qualified so they’ve made adjustments so that more students would qualify. And then they’ve extended both round one and round two that we were awarded, extended the deadline to Sept. 30, 2022. …,” Gore said.
“We received word on this (the Repayment Grant) in December of ‘21 and were able to start awarding in January of ‘22. Each of these has a unique focus. The first one, and that’s where we have spent a lot of our time over the last year, is the Texas Reskilling grant.
“They’ve made adjustments to the criteria along the way in hopes to include more student eligibility. We just received a new change to the Texas Reskilling Grant this week. The criteria all along for the Texas Reskilling Grant, the student must be a Texas resident and complete the FASFA. They must be Title 4 eligible, impacted by COVID, and it’s just a yes or no question …,” Gore said.
These dollars are COVID relief funds, so that’s why it’s a required question on all three grants, she said.
You also have to be enrolled in one of the eligible programs, but it must be a high-skill, high-wage program.
OC worked with its economist Blair Roberts as they were applying at the end of 2020.
“We reviewed our programs that had high wages and showed a need for skilled workforce. Those are the programs that are eligible. The students must be enrolled in those programs, and not enrolled anywhere during the previous long semester, or six months. That still applies …,” Gore said.
“… Up until this point, as long as the student had not been enrolled over the last six months or long semester, and met all the other criteria, then they could be awarded. The newest change that just came from the Coordinating Board this week is now students with no college are eligible. So newly enrolled students may also apply. It opens it up to a first time in college student,” she added.
Grants Coordinator Audrey DeLeon said this also includes one of the identified certificates.
“.. You can quickly go through the application in five minutes or less. We were not taking a lot of people’s time, first name, last name, telephone number, email address, date of birth, Social Security number, mailing address, city, state, Zip,” Gore said.
She added that they are asking applicants to rank the areas where they have been most impacted by COVID such as child health care and tuition and fees, to give them an idea of how they have been impacted by COVID.
It also asks them to indicate their field of study.
There are a wide variety of eligible programs from automotive and diesel technology to bachelor’s degree programs.
“We have a committee that meets monthly to discuss how to get the word out to eligible students. Any challenges that we’ve had in awarding the students, reports on how many students have been awarded and then we work as a group to prepare the report for the Coordinating Board,” Gore said.
She added that they had more than 800 students apply to date and 58 students have been awarded.
“We’re very excited about this new change the Coordinating Board just announced because we feel like that will allow us to award a larger number of students,” Gore said.
She added that prospective recipients have to meet all the criteria.
“That is one of the conversation points that we had with our Coordinating Board contacts is letting them know some of the challenges that we’re having,” Gore said.
DeLeon said it’s not just OC.
“It’s other schools that have been awarded, as well” that are facing the same challenges, DeLeon said.
“They’re working with us to be able to help more students,” she added.
Gore said another change was that Pell Grant-eligible students are able to get the grant and it could be in addition to the Pell grant.
“… That’s very helpful to those students, so those are some changes that have allowed us to award more students who might not have been awarded earlier in the process. …,” Gore said.
Gore added that this is all in an effort to help students in this area get an opportunity to reskill and upskill.
“So in all of our discussions with the Coordinating Board, they were very pleased that Odessa College applied for the dollars, because they know how COVID impacted the Permian Basin. When we were first talking about this, our economy was not doing well at all … so … we had a very clear case saying students in the Permian Basin need this help to reskill and upskill,” Gore said.
The Coordinating Board wants the college to distribute all the money so the college can help as many students as possible.
“… That’s our hope that we can get more information out and encourage students who have attended college in the past. It could have been 20 years ago that they attended college; maybe they took a class or two. Come on back. It’s time to get back in college. We can help you in this. Texas Reskilling Grant allows us to award up to $2,500 per semester to cover tuition and fees. We can cover all of your tuition in these designated programs,” Gore said.
For someone taking 12 hours, it would be $1,200 to $1,500 for tuition and fees, depending on the program. Some programs are more expensive than others, she said.
The TRUE Grant is $500,000 and will be specifically for construction management. It will be offered in fall 2022 and will be a Level I certificate.
Also, the automation Level I certificate, which is an existing program, Gore said.
“Students may be eligible for up to $2,500 in tuition assistance, or up to $500 for additional cost of attendance, including textbooks and supplies,” she added.
DeLeon said they will also be able to hire an instructor for the new construction management program and acquire supplies and materials.
“… With this one, they wanted schools to be innovative and come up with new ideas based on the demands or needs of their local economy,” DeLeon said.
Gore said both of the programs are in direct response to industry needs.
“So back probably 12 years ago, Chevron approached Odessa College about building an instrumentation and automation laboratory, because they needed skilled workforce, because so much in the oil field was becoming automated. That program has just continued to grow a lot of interest from students, and a lot of interest from employers. We have a number of employers who approached Odessa College about speaking to our students and recruiting our students. And then the construction program, the reason we’re adding it now is in direct response to the City of Odessa request and local builders letting us know that they need skilled workforce in the area,” Gore said.
DeLeon said she also thinks the Higher Education Coordinating Board’s intention was to have OC come up with programs to help students quickly.
“So these are certificate programs so that they can get them, go through the program, get trained and then immediately be able to go to work within a shorter amount of time, as opposed a to degree,” she added.
DeLeon said the goal was to have students earn their certificate in six months or less.
On the Repayment Grant, Gore said it truly gives people a second chance.
“All of these are exciting, but this one is very unique in really giving someone another opportunity at higher education. So many students start school, start college and they don’t necessarily know what they want to do, they don’t know what they want to major in, they may take out student loans. And in the end, they may leave their higher education institution with an unpaid balance. Maybe they decide, oh, this is difficult, I’m not doing well, and walk away and leave an unpaid balance for various reasons,” Gore said.
“That follows that student throughout their lifetime, prohibiting them from enrolling at any other higher education institution. Many people then decide, I want to go back, but until they pay that unpaid balance they’re unable to. So what this grant does is clear their unpaid balance up to $1,000. That’s right. And we have $250,000 to award,” Gore said.
The students’ debt will be cleared once enrollment in a specified term is confirmed by OC, so they must enroll and then the prior debt will be cleared, she added.
“This is also available if that student wants to attend college elsewhere …,” Gore said.
She added that as DeLeon was preparing the grant application, they had data on how many students had an outstanding balance going back to 1995 through summer of 2021 — the total number of students and what the average owed was.
Students had to have incurred the debt before the fall of 2021.
DeLeon said they had more than 3,000 students that owed less than $1,000.
“That was our, you know, focus and what we anticipate is that if we were to award those students, the average would be about $400. …,” DeLeon said.
