Federal cuts to college prep programs are leaving rural California students without a critical bridge to higher education, and local advisers say the damage is already being felt from the redwood forests of Del Norte County to campuses across the state.
The U.S. Department of Education last fall canceled more than $40 million in funding for over 100 TRIO programs nationwide, affecting nearly 45,000 students. TRIO — not an acronym, but a name referencing its original three programs: Upward Bound, Talent Search and Student Support Services — has for decades helped low-income, first-generation students navigate the path to college, offering everything from application assistance to campus tours and financial aid guidance.
Among those hit hardest were programs at Cal Poly Humboldt and Cal Poly Pomona, both of which lost their TRIO Talent Search grants after federal officials determined that certain program goals ran afoul of the administration’s equal-treatment policies. In Humboldt’s case, the objection centered on training aimed at helping students recognize microaggressions and systemic racism. Cal Poly Pomona’s grant was flagged over language calling for a balanced mix of grades, genders and students with disabilities in its program cohorts.
For Julie Aicher, a former Cal Poly Humboldt adviser who spent years helping more than 500 middle and high school students across the North Coast dream bigger about their futures, the news landed hard.
“It was really heartbreaking when we found out,” Aicher said. “I definitely cried when we told our students.”
The cuts have proven especially damaging in isolated areas like Del Norte County, nearly a two-hour drive from the nearest community college, where chronic absenteeism is common and bachelor’s degree attainment lags far behind state averages. Advocates say TRIO often served as the only structured pipeline connecting rural students to higher education.
“They are oftentimes in communities where the college-going culture isn’t really a thing,” said Rama Rawal, director of Cal Poly Humboldt’s TRIO program. “They are in a remote place where, without TRIO, the access is gone for that exposure.”
A federal court order has since forced the administration to restore funding to more than 30 of the terminated programs, though it stopped short of requiring reinstatement. Dozens more remain in limbo, according to the Council for Opportunity in Education, the nonprofit that filed the lawsuits leading to that ruling. California, which historically receives more TRIO funding than any other state, lost more than $6 million in grants spread across 13 colleges and universities, cutting off services to roughly 7,000 students statewide.
Cal Poly Pomona has submitted three separate appeals to reclaim its Talent Search funding — all denied, according to Mary Claire Gager, the university’s associate executive director of TRIO Pre-College Programs. Both Pomona and Humboldt have since applied for new grants this spring in hopes of relaunching their programs, which serve middle and high schoolers from low-income backgrounds with college application help, financial aid workshops and campus visits.
Sofia Santos-Arriola, a former Talent Search adviser at Cal Poly Humboldt, said the abrupt funding cutoff — which hit mid-cycle — left many students without warning or a safety net.
“This does seem like it was so directly targeted against poor people, against first-generation immigrants, against first-generation college [students],” Santos-Arriola said.
Local school districts have tried to fill the gap, but staff say it’s an uneven trade. After losing their TRIO positions, both Aicher and Santos-Arriola were hired as college-career advisers by the Del Norte County Office of Education — only to see their caseloads triple overnight.
“Our TRIO students are the ones hurting — they are not getting the same attention and prioritization,” Santos-Arriola said. “I’m starting to forget my TRIO students’ names, and it’s heartbreaking, because they were our kids for so long.”
Rawal estimates the region lost close to $2 million in student support resources that cannot easily be replaced.
“That can’t just appear,” she said.
At Cal Poly Pomona, a separate TRIO initiative called Upward Bound remains intact, currently serving about 85 local high schoolers who are already committed to attending college. But that program pales in scale next to Talent Search, which had reached roughly 500 students at a broader range of ages and readiness levels.
“Without that added support, fewer students will complete [their applications] on time, or they’ll do them inaccurately, or they just will take the easy way out [and not apply],” Gager said.
The uncertainty may only be beginning. The Trump administration’s proposed fiscal year 2027 budget calls for eliminating all $1.2 billion in federal TRIO funding nationwide, describing the program as redundant or ineffective as part of a broader effort to shift education policy decisions to the states. Lawmakers have pushed back with data defending TRIO’s track record, but Education Secretary Linda McMahon told a Senate subcommittee in April that the program needs to be reoriented — shifting emphasis away from four-year college enrollment toward broader postsecondary and workforce training options.
“There might be alternatives to higher education other than college, given that we do have a lack of a skilled workforce in the country,” McMahon told lawmakers.
Adding to the uncertainty, the Department of Labor was given oversight of TRIO grants earlier this year as part of a broader restructuring, and recent funding cycles have emphasized apprenticeships and trade skills over traditional college pathways.
Gager and other program leaders argue that shift misunderstands what TRIO was built to do.
“TRIO grants were never designed or intended to be just job training. It was always about accessing higher education in some form,” Gager said. “We build a better society, and we build better students and better people, by expanding their horizons beyond just getting a job.”
Original source: CalMatters
