LaGuardia Community College Receives College Completion Innovation Fund Award to Support Adult Learner Evening Hub

LONG ISLAND CITY, NY (February 2, 2026) — LaGuardia Community College/CUNY was recently awarded with a $94,342 grant from the College Completion Innovation Fund (CCIF) to support the creation of the Adult Learner Evening Hub.

Since 2015, the College Completion Innovation Fund (CCIF) has helped drive student persistence and graduation in New York City by investing nearly $8 million in 34 innovative pilot projects across colleges and community-based organizations. These projects have produced transformative outcomes, and each initiative reflects CCIF’s commitment to bold, student-centered innovation that responds to real challenges and helps shape systems that better serve learners.

Dr. Marsha Oropeza, Director of Adult Learner Success and Credit for Prior Learning in Academic Affairs, says the Adult Learner Evening Hub will provide resources, access, and a dedicated space for adult learners.

“While this initiative is focused on adult learners enrolled in degree programs, the concept for the Adult Learner Evening Hub emerged directly from the CPL Office’s work with adult students across both degree and workforce pathways,” said Dr. Oropeza, who is the principal investigator for the initiative. “Through this work, we have consistently heard from adult learners, especially those transitioning from workforce training and certificate programs, that once they enter degree programs, they struggle to access critical services because most supports are not available in the evening.

Dr. Oropeza said LaGuardia is experiencing a significant demographic shift, with adult learners increasingly becoming the new majority of our student population.

“This shift, coupled with the implementation of the New York State Opportunity Promise (NYSOP), creates both an opportunity for the college to respond differently and immediately,” she said. “Students must be supported in ways that reflect their lived realities.”

The Adult Learner Evening Hub is designed to meet that need in real time by reducing structural barriers that often lead adult learners to “stop out.”

“By intentionally aligning evening academic and student support services with adult learners’ schedules, the Hub will strengthen enrollment, improve persistence, and reinforce LaGuardia’s role as a college built for working adults not just in principle, but in practice,” she said.

Dr. Oropeza says the Adult Learner Evening Hub is a centralized space for wraparound supports for degree-seeking adult learners, particularly those attending evening classes.

“Services we hope to include in the work through this planning grant will include academic advising, Credit for Prior Learning (CPL), tutoring, faculty office hours, career counseling, basic needs support, and rotating access to student services such as the registrar, bursar, and financial aid,” she said.

While the Hub is intentionally focused on adult learners in credit-bearing degree programs, Dr. Oropeza says it is deeply informed by LaGuardia’s workforce-to-credit pathways.

“Many adult students begin at the college through ACE workforce training and certificate programs and later transition into degree programs through our articulation to credit agreements,” she said. “The CPL Office has recognized that these students require continued, holistic support once they cross into the credit side, and the Hub is designed to ensure that continuity.”

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LaGuardia Community College (LAGCC), a Hispanic-Serving Institution, located in Long Island City, Queens offers more than 50 associate degrees and academic certificates, and more than 65 continuing education programs to prepare New Yorkers for transfer to senior colleges and rewarding jobs and careers. An institution of the City University of New York (CUNY), the College reflects the legacy of our namesake, Fiorello H. LaGuardia, the former NYC mayor beloved for his advocacy of the underserved. Since 1971, LaGuardia’s academic programs and support services have advanced the socioeconomic mobility of students from Queens, NYC and beyond.

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