For decades, colleges and universities have measured success through enrollment, retention, and completion. While these metrics remain important, a growing national conversation is challenging higher education leaders to consider a deeper question:
What happens after graduation?
For many learners, education is not simply about earning a credential. It is about creating a pathway to economic mobility, family stability, and a better future.
In a recent episode of Discovering Your Mission, Dr. Mordecai Brownlee sat down with Jee Hang Lee, President and CEO of the Association of Community College Trustees (ACCT), to discuss the evolving role of community colleges in advancing workforce development and economic opportunity.
During the conversation, Lee emphasized the importance of ensuring that educational pathways remain closely aligned with workforce needs and lead to careers that provide family-sustaining wages. As the nation enters the Workforce Pell era and policymakers increasingly focus on employment and earnings outcomes, community colleges find themselves at the center of one of the most consequential discussions in higher education.
The conversation serves as an important reminder that access alone is not enough. Institutions must also be committed to helping learners achieve meaningful outcomes that improve their quality of life and strengthen their communities.
Brownlee has long argued that community colleges represent some of the most powerful engines of economic mobility in America. Through workforce-aligned education, employer partnerships, apprenticeships, and innovative credential pathways, colleges have an opportunity—and a responsibility—to help learners translate education into opportunity.
The featured clip from this episode offers a timely perspective on the future of higher education and the critical role institutions play in preparing learners not only for graduation, but for long-term success.
Discovering Your Mission is sponsored by The EDU Ledger and features conversations with national leaders, innovators, and changemakers who are helping shape the future of education, workforce development, leadership, and economic opportunity.*
Stay tuned for a brand-new episode of premiering this Wednesday.
