Credit: Courtesy of California Pupil Aid Commission

Lupita Cortez Alcala, executive director of the California Educatee Aid Committee.

Credit: Courtesy of California Student Aid Commission

Lupita Cortez Alcala, executive director of the California Pupil Assist Committee.

Lupita Cortez Alcalá took over in January this twelvemonth as executive director of the California Student Assistance Committee, an agency that may not be publicly well-known simply is crucial to whether approximately 400,000 students receive financial aid from the state and become to go to college.

The commission administers the coveted Cal Grants – a total of $2 billion worth this twelvemonth – which provide from $1,656 to $12,240 a year to eligible students, depending on their needs and where they attend school. It likewise runs more recently established aid programs for undocumented students and for centre-class families that earn up to $150,000 a year and don't have assets of more than than $150,000, other than their homes and retirement accounts.

The 15 members of the commission are appointed by Gov. Jerry Brownish and the Legislature and meet 7 times a year. The unsalaried commissioners are paid just small stipends per meeting.

Alcalá is a veteran of the California State Section of Instruction, where she was deputy superintendent of instruction and learning support and worked on such bug as English language conquering and STEM education. Born in United mexican states, she moved to the San Diego area with her family unit at age 3; she afterward earned her bachelor'south degree, with the help of a Cal Grant, at UC San Diego and a main'due south at Harvard'due south School of Education.

Alcalá, 42, spoke recently with EdSource senior correspondent Larry Gordon nigh the challenges the agency faces and the needs of California high school and college students. Here is an edited version of their conversation.

To start out, what do yous see equally the biggest obstacles to California students getting the financial assist they need? Is it filling out the required FAFSA (Free Awarding for Federal Student Assistance) form or other factors?

I call up it's getting general data to students. I've been surprised at the number of students I've met and talked to in middle schools or loftier schools who have never heard of how to get into college. It's not a part of their everyday culture. I likewise think it's a lack of counselors and the depression ratio of counselors to students in Chiliad-12, non having those individuals who could provide them information on how to become into higher and what the process is for applying for financial assist.

Is there anything the commission should do to make information technology easier or more efficient?

Nosotros are sponsoring 900 Cash for Higher workshops across the state this application season to help families make full out the FAFSA. And we are actually excited about an earlier filing period next autumn. Earlier, the FAFSA filing menses (for Californians) was January to March 2. Often yous were also filling out your taxes and the timing didn't piece of work out well. Families were rushed and anxious. But the FAFSA season volition brainstorm Oct. 1 next fall. That means we can get the information out to students before about their eligibility, even before the application deadlines for Cal Land and UC and some individual colleges. Nosotros tin can let students know what they will be entitled to, which may motivate more students to actually apply to higher.

But aren't a lot of families yet agape to fill up out the FAFSA, even with the means the Obama administration has tried to simplify information technology? Is that anxiety justified?

I call up there are misconceptions from some middle-class families who think they make likewise much and then don't make full it out. Nosotros want to encourage more middle-class families to make full out the FAFSA because it's the gateway to all financial aid and we at present accept a program that's geared for them. And some lower-income families don't know how much financial aid they are entitled to and so they are more often than not concerned about raising expectations they won't be able to meet, and not being able to afford higher. The undocumented may be concerned about giving out personal information. We work very hard to reassure them that that information in the California Dream Act awarding does not get anywhere but for the purposes of figuring out financial aid.

The Middle Class Scholarship got off to a actually slow starting time ii years agone. It seemed embarrassing that a lot of allocated money is still unspoken for and left on the table. Some legislators even talked about killing the program. How do you think information technology's going this year?

Information technology really wasn't embarrassing. It was actually more telling. So many heart-form applicants already were receiving and so much assist (from other sources like UC and Cal State) that they were ineligible. Nonetheless, we also desire middle-class families to know it is worth their while to employ by the March 2 deadline; just apply.

AB 1721 is a electric current neb in the state Legislature that among other things would extend the Cal Grant eligibility age from the current 28 to 31 for students who transfer from customs colleges to four-year schools. Why is that important?

We saw in the last recession that hundreds of thousands of adults practical for our grants to return to school. We don't have the same demographics anymore of people getting out of high school and going direct to higher. Nosotros have a lot of students working part fourth dimension and total time, who take families and are the heads of their households. So we need to modify these historic period limits if we are going to train them for loftier-skills, high-wage, and high-need jobs necessary for powering California'south economy.

Over the years, there has been talk about eliminating or reducing the Cal Grants for students at private schools in California, fifty-fifty nonprofits like USC, Santa Clara University or Mills College. Some people say that subsidizes private schools with taxpayer money. What do y'all think?

I think it would be a step backwards to try to limit or cancel any help to private schools. It's most choices, the student's choices. When a student works really hard in high school and meets the eligibility for a private school, and then he or she should have the pick and the fiscal ability to go to USC or Stanford. Some students might exist more successful in a individual, more than personalized environs and I wouldn't want to limit them from that opportunity…. And if the privates didn't be, we wouldn't have room for all the students eligible to attend CSU and UC. We don't currently have the room to offer a place for every single student who is eligible.

The California Dream Human activity provides assistance to undocumented students. How do you think that is working?

We are three years into the California Dream Act and it'southward going pretty well. Other states accept contacted us for guidance. They are conspicuously looking at what California is doing. But the commission is very concerned that only 67 percent of the grants awarded last year were used. We are working with higher education institutions and students to find out why that is and how to ensure that the students who are awarded the grants enroll and take reward of them. Undocumented students are not eligible for federal loans or Pell grants. And so it may be that (fifty-fifty with California Dream Deed grants) they don't accept enough to cover their college costs and living expenses.

Your calculator system to announce and distribute awards is pretty antiquated. Is that hurting students?

During the peak season, the system will not be as responsive; it volition slow down and you may not exist able to go into the system until the side by side mean solar day. Our system is a little antiquated but we are making information technology work. We obviously are concerned virtually capacity and would like to modernize the organisation to meet the needs of 21st-century students. We recently received an $800,000 country appropriation to begin studying how to best update the system. Nosotros don't know how much it will toll to fully modernize it, but nosotros believe it's an essential infrastructure investment for California.

How will demographic changes in California put pressure on Cal Grants and college education?

Demographically, the bulk of K-12 students in California are students of color, many of them offset generation (to attend college) and low-income. So the demographics are unlike than in the past. These shifts are going to require more than financial aid counseling and increases in Cal Grant funding. Many of these students need to work while they are in college. So institutions must run into students where they are by offering more classes in summer school, winter breaks and online to help more of them graduate on time.

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