NACAC secures grant money to design new Center for Reimagining College Access

Arlington, VA (December 4, 2023) – With support from Lumina Foundation, NACAC is building the framework for a new Center for Reimagining College Access that will make postsecondary education more equitable and accessible than ever before.

The vision for the center includes research, practice, and technology integrating to create a new landscape of college admission, including prototyping new assessment and evaluation initiatives. The center also will have workforce development programs that will cultivate the next generation of admission and counseling professionals. The aim is for this initiative to be at the center of research and practice.

Lumina has awarded NACAC a grant in support of this vision. With this investment, NACAC will work with strategic partners to design the center, refine its scope of work, and develop its infrastructure. This grant also will support Elevate Equity 2024, an annual convening of higher education leaders that began in 2023 to develop a new framework of college admission and financial aid that has equity at its core. NACAC will seek input from Elevate Equity 2024 participants about the framework of the center.

“We are grateful to have the support of Lumina as we create the Center for Reimagining College Access, one of NACAC’s largest initiatives in years,” said Angel B. Pérez, CEO of NACAC. “The best way to predict the future is to create it. We will not let the challenges of today prevent us from realizing our vision that the transformative power of postsecondary education must be accessible to all.”

NACAC’s vision for the Center for Reimagining College Access was announced at NACAC Conference 2023 in September in Baltimore, Maryland, during Pérez’s State of the Association address. The grant from Lumina builds on the founding gift made by Alexander Clark, a philanthropist and CEO of Technolutions.

The vision for the center is rooted in NACAC’s mission to pursue equity in college access through research, innovation, and best-practice communication. At its onset, admission to college was not designed with equity in mind. With this new center, the college admission counseling profession can envision and pursue a future state of college admission that is intentionally designed with equity as a primary outcome.

The framework of the center is expected by December 2024.