• Education

  • Early Excellence
  • Denver Preschool Program
  • K-12 Education
  • The Charter Fund

• Economic Opportunity

  • Post-Secondary Education
  • Employment Skills
  • Asset Building

• Strengthening Communities

  • Support to Community Organizing
  • Social Networks

• Earned Income Tax Credit

  • American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009
  • Tax Sites
  • The Piton Foundation's Tax Credits for Working Families Campaign
  • Tax Help Colorado
  • Low Income Taxpayer Help
  • 2010 Tax Year Promotional Materials
  • Filing Options Available
  • The Earned Income Tax Credit in Colorado
  • Learn More about the Earned Income Tax Credit
  • Employers: Help Your Workers Get Their Tax Credits
  • More Tax Credits
  • Non-Profits: Help Your Clients Get Their Tax Credits
  • Still Another Tax Benefit for Families! The Child and Dependent Care Credit
  • The Child Tax Credit: Extra Credit for Many Working Families!
  • Education Tax Credits for Families: The Hope Credit
  • Education Tax Credits for Families: The Lifetime Learning Credit
  • Saver's Tax Credit: Workers Can Save for Retirement and Reduce Income Taxes

Post-Secondary Education

Historically, The Piton Foundation has focused its resources on the front-end of the educational pipeline. But as access to and quality of early childhood education improves, Piton is beginning to work at the other end of the pipeline -- improving low-income Denver residents' access to and success in post-secondary education. There are a number of reasons to focus on the back-end of the pipeline. Perhaps the most important is higher education's positive effect on income. In 2004, American adults earned, on average:

• $19,169 without a high school diploma
• $28,645 with a high school diploma
• $37,601 with an Associates degree
• $51,554 with a Bachelors degree

Another reason is the positive impact post-secondary education has on children. Numerous studies show a strong correlation between parents' education levels and their children's academic success. Finally, students from low- and moderate-income Colorado families will comprise more than 4 out of 10 public high school graduates by the year 2013. Without effective post-secondary education pathways for these students, a huge amount of human capital will be underdeveloped -- and Piton's work on the front end of the pipeline is potentially wasted. Broken education pathways will affect not only these individuals and their children's futures but also the Colorado companies seeking the highly skilled workers they need to compete, particularly as baby boomers retire. (1,2)

Improving success in metro Denver's post-secondary institutions can benefit thousands of low-income students annually since:

• Poorer students earn degrees at a far lower rate than students from higher-income families (3)
• Only 25% of white and 20% of Hispanic and African-American degree seeking students graduate from two-year public colleges within three years (2002, The Bell)
• Only 50% of students who enroll in college in Colorado within a year of graduating from high school graduate from four-year colleges within six years (2002, The Bell) (4)

To determine the best and most appropriate role that Piton might play in the post-secondary arena, staff is spending time:

• Learning more about the factors that influence students' access to and success in post-secondary education. Read more.
• Understanding what others are doing in Colorado to influence these factors.
• Determining the best ways to motivate and support these parties and others in pushing for necessary system changes.
• Researching ways to best frame the costs of low post-secondary success rates and the benefits to improving them.     

Learn More

Recent studies commissioned by The Piton Foundation include:

The Status of Minorities and Women in Colorado's Higher Education  Institutions

    This report was commissioned by The Piton Foundation to assess Colorado's higher education system in the areas of student enrollment and faculty hiring of minorities and women. (August 2008).  Executive Summary

¹ Post-secondary options also include vocational/technical schools and apprenticeship training programs.
² Professional, managerial and technical jobs requiring college-educated, highly skilled workers are among the fastest growing in the labor market. They are expected to account for 46 percent of all job growth between 2000 and 2014.
³ In 2003, the estimated rate for Colorado students to earn a bachelor's degree by age 24 was approximately 8.6% for students from families in the bottom quartile of family income, 13.2% from families in 2nd quartile, 27.7% in the third quartile, and 74.9% in the top income quartile (Spiros Protopsaltis, "Who Finishes in Colorado and Who Doesn't?" The Bell Policy Center, White Paper No. 3, August 2005.)
⁴ Note that only 40% of high school graduates in Colorado enroll in college