Two programs at Cabrillo College are at risk after the federal government announced major funding shifts away from schools that serve minority students.
When U.S. Secretary of Education Linda McMahon on Sept. 10 announced that the Department of Education is ending discretionary funding to Hispanic-serving institutions (HSI), she pointed to a decision by the Office of the Solicitor General that such programs violate the equal protection clause of the U.S. Constitution.
“Discrimination based upon race or ethnicity has no place in the United States,” McMahon wrote in a statement. “To further our commitment to ending discrimination in all forms across federally supported programs, the Department will no longer award Minority-Serving Institution grants that discriminate by restricting eligibility to institutions that meet government-mandated racial quotas.”
Under the HSI program, which Cabrillo has been enrolled in since 2006, colleges foster a sense of belonging and cultural validation for LatinX students.
But McMahon in her statement said the Trump administration is taking some $350 million in discretionary funding for programs nationwide that serve a wide variety of minority student groups such as Hispanic, native and Black.
Locally, the policy shift severs two key programs at Cabrillo College in the middle of a five-year grant cycle, said college President Matt Wetstein.
Camino al Exito, which provides assistance during the first year, and Abriendo el Camino, which offers dual enrollment to high school students, were part of an effort to retain students and grow its numbers, Wetstein said.
He pointed out that the HSI grant program was created by Congress and supported by U.S. presidents on both sides of the aisle.
McMahon in her letter also argues that the program calls for unconstitutional “quotas,” an assertion that Wetstein rejects.
“I don’t agree with that argument,” he said. “I don’t know of any ruling from any court, particularly from the Supreme Court, where that’s ever been articulated.”
Wetstein added that Cabrillo is an open-access college.
“We don’t discriminate in any manner in our admission process,” he said.
Wetstein said the college plans to apply for extensions to the existing grants, and braid that funding with other sources to keep staff doing the work through June 2026.
He is also considering legal challenges to McMahon’s decision.
“We’re going to take every opportunity we can through our legal channels to file for a reconsideration with this Department of Education,” he said.
If the programs end, Wetstein said it will mean that plans to grow the college’s dual enrollment program—allowing high school students to take classes at Cabrillo—will be harder.
“If the money goes away in the way this cancellation order suggests, our ability to scale out begins to disappear,” he said.
In addition, the college will be unable to pay student mentors to help first-year students, he added.
The announcement, he said, is part of a growing pattern with the Trump administration.
“I think this is part of a pattern,” he said. “It is another arm in the attack and assault on higher education institutions from this administration. It is an effort to undermine confidence in colleges and universities in trying to argue that they’re doing something illegal and unconstitutional.”
