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Happy New School Year!  We hope you all had a lovely summer, have enjoyed the first month of the new school year, and are ready for the season of changes! Speaking of changes, this will be our last Michigan newsletter. But don’t worry! We will continue to send you information through our federal and state update newsletters. We will also be working to create a community events calendar and resource toolkits (with links to news articles, research, and videos on topics important to you) and to update our interactive map.

The Final FY26 Budget

Unlike last year, the legislature did not pass a final budget before summer break. The deadline to pass a final budget to avoid a government shutdown is September 30; while Lansing policymakers didn’t meet this deadline, they passed a one-week budget as they finalized the budget deal to avoid a shutdown. The 2025–26 budget was signed by Governor Whitmer on October 7. It includes new money for roads, an increase in per-pupil funding for K-12 schools and continuation of the popular free school meals program, and largely sustains funding for higher education.

This year we had early wins ahead of the final budget in improved data reporting, marketing and outreach, and further improvement in streamlining state aid programs. These wins are the result of years of community uplift and advocacy, in addition to intentional investments in student support from the state.

To learn more about the budget, consider reviewing the following:

Budget Statements and Resources

Budget News Articles

What’s Next?

Despite just finishing up the 2025-26 budget season, it’s time to start preparing for the 2026-27 one.

  • Consider what barriers are impacting the students and families in your community. Make a list of these barriers; organize them by urgency and the amount of impact they have on students; and select the issues that you would like to prioritize this year.
  • Develop potential solutions to each of your issues. Be sure to think through what aspects of your solutions are “must haves” and which parts you’re willing to collaborate or negotiate on. Also try to consider how much these solutions might cost.
  • Circulate these priorities among your partners and other leaders in the field. Use this as an opportunity to learn more about their priorities, where you might be able to work together, and to get feedback on how your proposed solutions can be improved.
  • Develop short and easy to read resources that outline what your priorities are, why they are important, what these changes will cost, and how they will impact students and the state.

For reference, you can review TICAS’ policy priorities for the current year FY26 here and our response to the Governor’s budget here. If you have any questions about drafting resources, talking to legislators, or figuring out how to improve certain policies, please feel free to set up a meeting with Manon.

Federal Policy Updates

Given the passage of the federal government’s “one big, beautiful bill,” you may be wondering how it may impact our state budget. While many of the bill’s changes will not affect this or next year’s budget, they will have profound effects on future state budgets by increasing costs for states to provide programs like SNAP and by lowering tax revenues. We will be working closely with our federal team to provide recommendations on how to mitigate harm to students as states navigate these changes.

If you are interested in receiving our State Policy Digest going forward, please use this link to sign up. If you’d like to receive ALL of TICAS’ updates, including our federal higher education and basic needs advocacy, you can check the “All TICAS News” box on the form. You don’t need to do anything to continue receiving TICAS Michigan updates

Did You Know?

Michigan’s Black high school graduates are increasingly not pursuing a postsecondary education. The percentage of Michigan’s Black high school graduates enrolling in a postsecondary program within a year of high school graduates fell from 64% in 2012 to 44.6% in 2022. This decline has been even more acute for the state’s Black men. As recently as 2022, fewer than half of Black men in Michigan enrolled in college within a year of graduating from high school, limiting their access to life-changing credentials and opportunities. These trends will make it more difficult to address persistent gaps in career opportunities, earnings, poverty, and long-term access to education. If not better understood and disrupted, the effects will be felt for generations of Black Michiganders.

In August, we partnered with the Detroit College Access Network on a public community discussion to uplift these data (and others in our Black student fact sheet) and generate discussion on the barriers and challenges facing Black students. We also wanted to encourage folks who directly serve those students to participate in the policymaking process. We appreciate everyone who came to the event and who have used our fact sheet to help inform their work.

Read the Michigan Black Student Fact Sheet

Partner Updates

Please send any resources, events, or other materials that you would like us to share in our newsletters to Manon Steel at msteel@ticas.org. 

TICAS MI Team Update

As many of you may know, our Associate Vice President for Michigan and Community Outreach Onjila Odeneal has transitioned from the TICAS MI team to return to working in her hometown, Detroit, as the new CEO of the Detroit Promise. While we will greatly miss her contributions to our team, we are thrilled to see what this new chapter will bring for her and what her skills will bring to the students of Detroit. For the time being, TICAS Program Manager Manon Steel will be the primary point of contact for the Michigan team. If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to reach out to her at msteel@ticas.org.

Community Partner Highlight 

Youth Policy Lab, K-12 Education Governance in Michigan – This report presents the findings from a year-long study of K-12 educational governance in Michigan commissioned by the Michigan Department of Education (MDE). The study focuses on four areas: distribution of authority across state entities and between state and local actors, school district consolidation, school choice, and education finance.

MiLEAP & The Hope Center, Barriers to Bridges: Strengthening Michigan Communities by Addressing College Student Basic Needs – This report identifies challenges Michigan students face with meeting their basic needs and provides recommendations to improve policy and practice. They recommend the state and their partners prioritize enhancing access to and bolstering existing resources, establishing new resources, and strengthening impact via improved data.

MiLEAP & CEPI, Postsecondary State-Funded Student Aid Award Recipients – This new dashboard connects postsecondary state scholarship and enrollment data, allowing them to share demographic and community breakdowns. The most recent data include records from the 2023–2024 academic year (the first year the Michigan Achievement Scholarship was awarded!

Lapeer County Community Foundation Awarded $100,000 Grant – Lapeer County Community Foundation was awarded a $100,000 grant to fund a program that incentivizes family health through college savings, linking long-term health and economic outcomes. Students will earn deposits into their savings accounts from participating in wellness focused activities. The Executive Director of LCCF stated “[This] initiative reflects a bold vision to treat health and education as interconnected foundations for a stronger, more equitable rural economy.”

TICAS Michigan Resources

Federal Shifts & State Impact Webinar: Wednesday, October 29th

Join TICAS for a webinar on recent federal policy changes impacting college affordability, student support, and accountability. We’ll break down key provisions from the “One Big Beautiful Bill,” share insights from the Negotiated Rulemaking process to implement those changes, and highlight how states can respond through legislation and other actions.

Register for the webinar here.

Call to Uplift Student Stories!

We are working to shift the public conversation around higher education by grounding it in the lived experiences of students and borrowers. As part of this effort, we are launching a project to collect first-person stories that will inform communications, policy, and press efforts in the months ahead. The project, called Class Dismissed, is designed to surface the experiences of people navigating a system that increasingly asks more while offering less in return.

Share Your Story.

Student Fellows Update

In July, our 2024 – 2025 Student Advocacy Fellows completed their fellowship. During their time as fellows, they surveyed 215 students and practitioners across the state of Michigan to better understand how students and practitioners learn about and access state and institutional resources. They also wanted to learn how the state could better support access to these resources. They interviewed an additional 31 students and practitioners on the same topic. The survey and interview results provide important insights into the nuances of increasing access to state and institutional resources. Those findings are included in their final policy report and key findings summary.

Partner Events and Resources

We’re Looking for New Partners

Partnership is a great opportunity not only for collaboration; it also allows our team at TICAS to learn how we can best advocate for the needs of Michigan students and families by learning from community partners to create better policies. We are rolling ahead in our efforts to find ways to uplift community and student voice across the great state of Michigan, especially communities, leaders, and students in spaces that often go unheard. If you know someone who might want to connect with us, please have them complete the form below!

Get Connected with TICAS MI!