Amarillo College’s No Excuses Poverty Initiative has attracted national attention

Amarillo College’s No Excuses Poverty Initiative has attracted national attention for the breadth of support it offers students.

"At Amarillo College, 55 percent of students are food-insecure, meaning they’re hungry, or at risk of hunger, compared with 43 percent of community-college students nationally, according to two studies released last year, including a detailed case study of Amarillo's No Excuses program. Both were led by Sara Goldrick-Rab, a professor of higher-education policy and sociology at Temple University and founder of the Hope Center for College, Community, and Justice.

Meanwhile, 59 percent of Amarillo College’s students were housing-insecure, meaning that they’re in danger of not being able to pay their rent, mortgage, or utilities, or have to move frequently, often into crowded living quarters, to make ends meet. That’s considerably higher than the 46-percent national figure for community-college students. Eleven percent had been homeless in the past year, on par with the national level."

Read more on the program and the students it serves at The Chronicle of Higher Education