Pell Grants for Workforce Training Have Significant Support

A sizable majority of respondents support extending the Pell Grant federal college student financial aid program to cover short-term workforce education and training, according to a recent survey.

The National Institute for Civil Discourse poll found significant approval across political, racial and socioeconomic lines for allowing students to apply for Pell Grants for short-term workforce training. The real-time survey has over 2,100 responses.

“There is widespread agreement that workforce Pell is an appropriate way to increase support for those who would benefit most from workforce education programs,” said Keith Allred, executive director of the National Institute for Civil Discourse, based in Washington, D.C.

Pell Grants are need-based education grants for low-income and working students. Currently students can only use Pell Grants for expenses at two- and four-year colleges or universities. Advocates for expanding Pell Grant eligibility to shorter training programs say doing so would help close the nation’s skills gap and give low-income and working students the opportunity to learn new skills quickly.

In December 2023, the House Education and the Workforce Committee passed the Bipartisan Workforce Pell Act, which helps low-income students participate in short-term programs and creates a quality assurance system for Workforce Pell Grant programs—allowing any institution that provides training to participate as long as they meet all the requirements.

The legislation would expand Pell Grant eligibility to workforce programs between eight and 15 weeks in length. Under current law, only students enrolled in programs that run at least 16 weeks are eligible.

“The survey data is welcome news and shows the environment is ripe for transformative changes to skills-based learning,” said Rep. Virginia Foxx, R-N.C., chairwoman of the committee. “With 10 million unfilled jobs, employers across all industries are eager to find qualified workers. Job creators find that skills-based credentials can effectively prepare workers. But many of these short-term programs are out of reach for low-income students.”

Committee Ranking Member Robert C. “Bobby” Scott, D-Va., agreed that expanding Pell Grants to high-quality, short-term training programs will help students afford necessary training, provide workers with more opportunities to find good-paying jobs, and enlarge talent pools for in-demand jobs with higher quality candidates.

SHRM Chief of Staff and Head of Public Affairs Emily M. Dickens said that “SHRM has consistently advocated that Pell Grants expand to cover quality short-term programs. In the modern economy, expanding opportunities to deliver high-quality training that benefits workers and employers alike is critical.”

“The issue has never been more important,” said Katie Spiker, managing director of government affairs at the National Skills Coalition in Washington, D.C. “Due to federal investments over the past few years in infrastructure, manufacturing and energy, there will be 3 million jobs created over the next decade—on top of the openings that we already have.”

Proponents of expanding Pell eligibility to short-term training programs point to the growing acceptance of short-term credentials that help people move quickly into in-demand occupations and would enable more upskilling or retraining to address skills mismatches.

“Right now, our higher education policies do not always support access to the types of training that businesses need people to have access to,” Spiker said. “The National Skills Coalition has for years been working with state governments to help define what a quality nondegree credential looks like, a credential that helps a worker get a job or upskill to get a better job with higher pay.”

She said that states are ahead of the federal government in identifying where investment should be made in short-term training programs that lead to good outcomes and help people get on a career pathway. 

Survey respondents agree that it’s crucial to ensure Pell Grants only support programs that are cost-effective and place them in higher paying jobs. “Overall, we see ringing endorsement for a good range of quality requirements for programs,” Allred said. “Strong majorities support outcome performance requirements, administrative approval criteria, and requiring that career-connected learning programs can count for additional credentialing in the future.”

Eighty-seven percent of respondents believe performance outcomes are an appropriate measure of short-term program quality, and 64 percent support earnings requirements.

Sixty-five percent of respondents oppose excluding for-profit institutions if there are quality requirements and outcomes metrics in place, such as are included in the Bipartisan Workforce Pell Act. Similarly, 64 percent of respondents oppose excluding online education programs if they have quality requirements in place.

“Disaggregated data at the program level is what we need to see to track program retention and completion, and job placement,” said Kayla Elliott, director of workforce policy at the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies in Washington, D.C. Program requirements are important, she said, because in particular “Black students have historically been scammed by for-profit colleges.” Critics say that for-profit schools can have poor-quality programs and low graduation rates, leaving students with staggering student loan debt and few job prospects.

“We absolutely agree that program outcomes data needs to be made available,” said Alison Dembeck, vice president of education and labor advocacy at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce in Washington, D.C. “We think for-profit schools are important and should be included as long as quality results are provided. There must also be more collaboration between the people doing the hiring and the people doing the training so programmatic changes can be made to coursework that graduates people with the skills employers need.”