Cairo, Egypt's capital, is one of the largest cities in Africa and one of the best known
in the world.
For more than 1,000 years, it has stood on the banks of the Nile River, the longest in
the world.
The Pyramids of Giza sit close to the city's southwestern edge.
Among the city's tall structures are over 400 historic buildings from the times of the
Roman, Arab and Ottoman empires.
The city's center was named a UNESCO World Heritage site in 1979.
The city's Tahrir Square later became known as the birthplace of the Arab Spring movement.
Across Cairo, there are large signs telling its 20 million people of new homes being built
in the desert 45 kilometers away.
Often, the signs are in Cairo's overcrowded neighborhoods, with poorly built homes and
dirt roads filled with untreated human waste.
The signs are ways to suggest that government employees, foreign embassies and rich people
will soon leave Cairo for a new capital city in the desert.
The New Administrative Capital, which still does not have an official name, is the idea
of former army general President Abdel-Fattah al-Sissi.
It is the biggest of several huge projects.
Others include new roads, housing projects and the expansion of the Suez Canal.
Egyptian officials often compare the projects built under al-Sissi to monuments like the
Giza Pyramids.
Prime Minister Mustafa Madbouly said, "History will do justice to this generation of Egyptians
and our grandsons will remember its achievement."
But critics call the new capital a vanity project for al-Sissi.
They say the money could have been used to help the economy and to rebuild Cairo.
Hassan Nafaa teaches political science at Cairo University.
He said, "Maybe al-Sissi wants to go down in history as the leader who built the new
capital, but if Egyptians don't see an improvement in their living conditions and services, he
will be remembered as the president who destroyed what is left of the middle class."
The government argues that Cairo is too crowded and will grow to 40 million people by 2050.
The new city is being built on 69,000 hectares, about two times the size of Cairo, at a cost
of $45 billion.
The project began in 2016.
The first of the expected 6.5 million residents are to move there next year.
The city will hold the offices of the president, the Cabinet, parliament and the ministries.
City planners promise to build public parks, an airport, an opera house, sports structures
and 20 skyscrapers, including Africa's highest, at 345 meters.
Madbouly denied that the new capital will only bring wealthy people.
However, the smallest apartment, about 120 square meters, in the new city, is expected
to cost about $73,000.
That price is out of reach for a mid-level government official who makes about $4,800
a year.
No one knows how the new capital will affect Cairo.
Many government buildings in the city are large homes taken by the socialist governments
in the 1950s and 60s.
Some fear that the empty buildings will fall into disrepair or be torn down.
Sameh Abdallah Alayli is an urban planning expert.
He said the building of the new capital should be halted.
He wrote in the Al-Shorouk newspaper, "Historical Cairo must remain the political capital of
Egypt."
I'm Mario Ritter Jr.
Indonesia's National Safety Commission says airplane equipment and carrier safety failures
are to blame for the deadly Lion Air crash last month.
The government report suggests the airplane should have been removed from service because
of earlier reports about problems.
The passenger plane crashed into the Java Sea October 28, just a few minutes after leaving
Jakarta.
All 189 people on the plane were killed.
The plane had been traveling to nearby Banka-Belitung island.
The Commission's chief said investigators are trying to understand why engineers had
judged the plane to be airworthy.
"We need to compare the statements of the engineers with the required procedures,"
he said.
Information from the recovered black box showed that the pilots struggled with a safety system
that was broken.
The system forced the front of the plane to turn down as the pilots fought to keep it
up.
Also, the report says the pilots seemed unable to correct several other equipment failures
that happened at the same time.
A crash investigator said that pilots seemed unsure about which problem to deal with first.
The plane's voice recorder is missing.
The report said pilots need to be informed of reports of equipment problems and be better
trained for emergencies.
The plane that crashed is the newest type of Boeing's popular 737 jetliner.
One safety system pushes the nose of the plane down if it senses the nose is pointed too
high and the plane is in danger.
Problems were noted with that system on reports of earlier flights of the plane that crashed.
Pilots who flew the plane the day before the crash told investigators that the system failed.
They said they were able to shut it off and land safely.
The plane experienced technical problems in four earlier flights.
"We need to find out what happened and why the pilots took different actions.
That why we really want to have the cockpit voice recorder," the investigator said.
Boeing said in a statement after the crash that the new model is as safe as any airplane
in the sky.
Boeing noted that the investigators' report said pilots' actions led to the crash.
The statement also spoke of repair work and procedures that had failed to fix the airplane's
problems.
Peter Lemme is a former Boeing engineer who wrote a piece about the crash.
He told the Associated Press that the plane's nose went down and pilots pulled it back up
26 times during its 11 minutes in the air.
Lemme said it appears that the pilots failed to understand the problem or the method for
dealing with it.
Lemme said he was troubled that the pilots of the plane were not warned about the problems
of earlier flights.
He also expressed concern that the plane had not been repaired after those flights.
"Had they fixed the airplane, we would not have had the accident," he said.
The report advised that Lion Air ensure it follows proper operating procedures to improve
its "safety culture and to enable the pilot to make proper decisions."
It also advised the airline keep full documentation about technical problems on flights.
I'm Susan Shand.
Engineers say they have carried out the first-ever flight of an electric airplane with no moving
parts.
Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, or MIT, recently shared video
of the successful test flight.
They also reported their results in the scientific journal Nature.
An airplane usually requires fast-turning turbines to create the necessary thrust and
power to lift the plane off the ground and stay in the air.
But MIT researchers say they have created a new air vehicle that powers itself without
this kind of engine.
In fact, the plane was designed to have no moving parts at all.
Engineers say that developing and expanding such technology could greatly change the future
of flying.
It could lead to the creation of planes that are safer, quieter and easier to take care
of.
Such planes would also not produce emissions that harm the environment.
Steven Barrett is a professor of aeronautics at MIT.
He helped lead the plane's development.
He said the successful tests have opened up "new and unexplored possibilities" for
future aircraft.
Barrett says he first got the idea for planes without moving parts from watching "Star
Trek."
He told MIT News he imagined that futuristic air vehicles such as the ones created for
"Star Trek" could one day fly in the real world.
Such vehicles had simple designs.
They moved smoothly and silently.
The new technology is based on experiments that date back to at least the 1920s.
Those early experiments dealt with a system used to create thrust called "ionic wind."
Ionic wind describes a wind, or thrust, that can be produced when electrical current is
passed between a thin and thick electrode.
If enough electricity is created, the air between the two electrodes can produce enough
thrust to power a small aircraft.
MIT's experimental plane weighs about 2.5 kilograms.
It was made to look similar to traditional aircraft.
But instead of having engines attached under the wings, it contains a series of electrodes.
The electrodes in the front are made of thin wire.
In the back, they take the form of thicker airfoils.
The wires in front and airfoils in the back both carry high electricity – up to 20,000
volts each.
The two create an electrical field of opposing forces that produce wind behind the plane
to make it fly.
Barrett said his team dealt with several failed attempts during early test flights of the
plane.
But the team was finally able to complete a successful flight in which the aircraft
traveled about 60 meters in 10 seconds.
He added that the plane likely could have flown farther if the test had been carried
out in a larger building.
Barrett says the experiment demonstrated the first continuous flight of a plane that is
heavier than air, but has no moving parts.
"This was the simplest possible plane we could design that could prove the concept
that an ion plane could fly," he said.
Although the reported results could mark the beginning of major changes in the field of
flight, Barrett said the current technology has shown limitations.
"It's still some way away from an aircraft that could perform a useful mission," he
said.
"It needs to be more efficient, fly for longer, and fly outside."
One possible issue will be creating a battery that is powerful enough to operate much larger
versions of such aircraft, without being too heavy to fly on the plane.
Barrett says the current limitations make it more likely the technology will first be
used to create smaller air vehicles.
One possibility would be a drone.
Drone use, especially in large cities, is expected to greatly increase around the world
in coming years.
The MIT team says it believes drone designs without moving parts would create vehicles
that are nearly silent and less polluting than current models.
I'm Bryan Lynn.
Suicides and drug overdoses were two reasons for an increase in the number of deaths in
the United States last year.
They also were partly to blame for a continuing decrease in how long Americans are expected
to live.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports that there were more than 2.8 million
deaths nationwide in 2017.
That is nearly 70,000 more than in 2016.
It was the most deaths in a single year since the U.S. government began counting more than
a century ago.
The Associated Press says the increase is partly a result of the nation's growing,
aging population.
But it is deaths in younger age groups — especially middle-aged people — that have had the biggest
effect on life expectancy, experts said.
The "statistics are a wake-up call that we are losing too many Americans, too early
and too often, to conditions that are preventable," said CDC Director Robert Redfield.
The report, called "Suicide Mortality in the United States, 1999-2017," was based
on government records.
It found that the suicide death rate last year was the highest in at least 50 years.
There were more than 47,000 suicides, up from a little less than 45,000 the year before.
In addition to suicide, the United States is experiencing a drug abuse crisis, with
more than 70,000 overdose deaths last year.
The CDC report, "Drug Overdose Deaths in the United States, 1999-2017," said overdose
deaths rose 10 percent last year.
It blamed the increase largely on the illegal use of synthetic opioids, drugs that are designed
to ease pain.
For a long time, U.S. life expectancy rates were increasing, rising a few months nearly
every year.
Now, life expectancy is decreasing.
It fell in 2015, stayed the same in 2016, and decreased again last year, the CDC said.
A baby born in the United States last year is expected to live about 78 years and 7 months.
An American born in 2015 or 2016 was expected to live about a month longer, and one born
in 2014 about two months longer than that.
The nation is in the longest period of decreasing life expectancy since the early 1900s, when
World War I and influenza combined killed nearly 1 million Americans.
In 1918, average life expectancy was 39 years.
Barring the unusual experience of the early 20th century, "we've never really seen
anything like this," said Robert Anderson, a CDC official.
Among the nation's 10 leading causes of death, only the cancer death rate fell in
2017, while 7 other causes increased.
They include suicide, drug overdose, diabetes and Alzheimer's disease.
Heart disease remains the number one killer, and the death rate from heart disease has
stopped falling.
In years past, reductions in heart disease deaths were enough to serve as a counterbalance
to other causes of death, but that is no longer true, Anderson said.
CDC officials did not try to explain the cause of decreasing life expectancy, but a disease
prevention expert thinks the cause is hopelessness.
William Dietz is with George Washington University in Washington, D.C.
He suggested that financial struggles, inequality and divisive politics are all depressing many
Americans.
"I really do believe that people are increasingly hopeless, and that that leads to drug use,
it leads…to suicide," he said.
But the increase in drug overdose deaths has started to slow.
From 2015 to 2016, the rate of increase was 26 percent, but from 2016 to 2017, it was
10 percent.
That's not quite cause for celebration, said John Rowe, a professor of health policy
at Columbia University in New York.
"Maybe it's starting to slow down, but it hasn't turned around yet," Rowe said.
"I think it will take several years."
I'm Susan Shand.
Ukraine is asking the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, or NATO, for help after Russia
seized three Ukrainian naval ships and their crews.
Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko urged NATO countries to send naval ships to the
Sea of Azov.
His comments were reported in the German newspaper Bild.
Poroshenko said Ukraine's NATO allies were needed "to provide security" after Russian
forces seized the ships and their crews on Sunday.
He told the newspaper the seizures showed that Russian President Vladimir Putin "wants
nothing less than to occupy the sea."
The Ukrainian government has said Russia is blocking shipping activity to and from Ukrainian
ports near the Sea of Azov and the Kerch Strait.
The Kerch Strait connects the Sea of Azov with the Black Sea.
Russia denies it is restricting shipping in the area.
It has said the Ukrainians were violating Russian waters and that Ukraine did not inform
Russian officials of its naval movements.
Ukraine denies this.
Poroshenko said sending NATO ships would send a clear message to Putin.
"The only language he understands is the unity of the Western world," he said.
Earlier this week, NATO released a statement condemning Russia's "use of military force
against Ukraine."
The alliance called on Russia to provide unrestricted access to Ukrainian ports and permit "freedom
of navigation."
The United States and other countries have also criticized the Russian actions in the
Kerch Strait.
On Thursday, U.S. President Donald Trump announced that he was canceling planned talks with Putin
over the issue.
The two leaders were to meet at the G-20 summit in Argentina this weekend.
On Twitter, Trump said that his decision was "based on the fact that the ships and sailors
have not been returned to Ukraine from Russia."
He added that he looks forward to a future meeting with Putin "as soon as this situation
is resolved."
German Chancellor Angela Merkel said she does plan to meet with Putin at the G-20 meetings.
She said she will urge him to order the release of the Ukrainians and their ships.
Following the Russian seizures, Poroshenko declared martial law in parts of Ukraine.
Putin has accused the Ukrainian president of provoking the naval incident and using
it so that he could declare martial law.
He said he thinks Poroshenko took the action to build up his popularity before planned
presidential elections in March.
The shipping incident is the latest dispute between the two countries since Russian forces
took the Crimean peninsula from Ukraine in 2014.
At the time, the Russian government said Crimea's ethnic Russian majority was under threat.
Pro-Russian forces have also been fighting Ukrainian forces in eastern Ukraine, although
tensions have recently eased.
I'm Bryan Lynn.
If you can write or speak even just a little English, you have surely used prepositions
-- words like "to," "in," "on," "at" and "by."
A preposition is a word or group of words that shows direction, location or time.
Today on Ask a Teacher, we have a question about one such word.
Hi, I'm Frank John from Tanzania.
I don't how know to use "by" in a sentence.
–Frank John, Tanzania Hello Frank!
It sounds like you know the meaning of "by" but are unsure of how to use it with other
words.
Let me try to help!
"By" is usually a preposition but sometimes acts as an adverb.
It can be used in many ways, but today we will talk about four uses as a preposition
and show you where it is placed in a sentence.
Let's start with using "by" to show place or location.
When we use "by" this way, it means "close to" "next to" or "beside."
Here are two examples.
Note that "by" comes before the place.
Meet me at the show!
I'll be seated by the door.
The university is by the sea.
Now for the second use.
When "by" is placed after motion-related verbs -- like "run," "drive," and "walk" -- it
often shows movement past a place.
Let's listen: I walked by the river on Sunday.
It was a beautiful day!
Did you drive by my building today?
I thought I saw you.
Another way we use "by" is to talk about time on a clock.
When we use it this way, it means "not later than."
The word "by" comes before the time.
Have a listen: Your appointment is at 1:00.
Please arrive by 12:45.
We should leave by 7:00 to beat the crowds.
The last use we will consider today is about doing something alone or without any help.
We make this meaning with "by" followed with a reflexive pronoun, such as "myself"
or "yourself."
Here are two examples: He moved the heavy table all by himself.
I'm sorry, I couldn't go.
Did you go by yourself?
And that's Ask a Teacher.
I'm Alice Bryant.
The U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration, or NASA, has announced that private companies
will make America's next moon landing.
NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine said Thursday that nine American companies will compete
to carry experiments to the surface of the moon.
"(The) announcement marks tangible progress in America's return to the Moon's surface
to stay," Bridenstine said.
The space agency said in a statement the goal is to bring many science and technology experiments
to the moon as soon as possible.
The first such flight could come as early as next year.
In 2019, NASA and people across the United States will mark the 50th anniversary of the
first manned landing on the moon.
The last time humans visited the moon was in 1972, during NASA's Apollo 17 mission.
NASA officials say the goal of the planned spaceflight is to transport equipment for
performing experiments and collecting information about the moon.
Some of the companies are expected to develop small launch vehicles or robotic rovers to
explore its surface.
The research is meant to help get astronauts back to the moon more quickly and keep them
safer once they arrive.
Thomas Zurbuchen is head of NASA's science mission directorate, which leads the new flight
efforts.
"We're going at high speed," he said.
The space agency says it will award a total of $2.6 billion to private businesses for
the moon effort over the next 10 years.
Bridenstine said that NASA wants a lot of companies involved to strengthen competition.
He also said he expects to have people regularly working on the moon within 10 years.
The new partnership is modeled after another NASA program that uses private companies to
transport supplies to the International Space Station, or ISS.
SpaceX and Northrop Grumman have made ISS shipments since 2012.
SpaceX and Boeing are planning to start transporting astronauts to the space station sometime next
year.
NASA has said it expects work on a new space station laboratory to start as soon as 2022.
The new space station would orbit the moon.
But it is also expected to serve as a launching point for missions to other parts of the solar
system, including the planet Mars.
The announcement on future moon flights came just three days after NASA successfully landed
its InSight spacecraft on Mars.
The InSight lander was built by Lockheed Martin, a private U.S. company.
The lander is designed to explore under the surface, studying the geology of the planet
and seeking signs of Martian earthquakes.
I'm Bryan Lynn.
The ruling party in Singapore has named a likely replacement to Prime Minister Lee Hsien
Loong.
Lee is 66 years old and has said he will step down at age 70.
He is the son of Singapore's founder, Lee Kuan Yew.
Late last week, Singapore's 57-year-old finance minister, Heng Swee Keat, was given
an important position in the party's leading decision-making group.
That group of 16 ministers, known as the fourth generation, or 4G, declared Heng "first
among equals."
His new position is expected to lead to the prime ministership.
Lee Hsien Loong has been Singapore's prime minister since 2004.
He is widely expected to step down after elections in early 2021.
Lee also heads the People's Action Party, or PAP, which has ruled since Singapore separated
from Malaysia in 1965.
The island, which today is home to about 5.6 million people, has been a model of stableeconomic
growth since that time.
Party leaders want to protect that stability and the PAP's control.
In May, they watched as Malaysia's longtime ruling party suffered defeat in elections.
Lee said after the Malaysian vote, "The ruling party, the PAP, does not have a monopoly
of power."
Lee is Singapore's third prime minister after Lee Kwan Yew and Goh Chok Tong.
Both men continued to influence the governance of the country after leaving office.
It is unclear if the same will be true of Lee.
Heng is a former central banker.
Observers say he is considered a "safe pair of hands."
In 2016, he suffered a stroke and collapsed during a cabinet meeting.
Singapore's mainly pro-government media have reported that the PAP supports Heng.
However, Zakir Hussain of the Straits Times said, "Leadership transitions in political
parties are generally never smooth."
People are increasingly criticizing the Singaporean government on social media.
Singapore calls many such posts "fake news."
Lawmakers have called for legislation to deal with what they call "online falsehoods."
The government has blocked a foreign based website.
It has criticized Facebook for not taking down a post.
And, it has seized equipment belonging to a local blog called The Online Citizen, or
TOC.
Terry Xu is chief editor of TOC.
He told Reuters that the government is reacting more strongly than before.
The site is being investigated for possibly spreading false statements about government
officials.
Rights groups have criticized Singapore for its control over the media.
The group Human Rights Watch said it is concerned that the situation will get worse as the ruling
PAP considers possible elections in as early as 2019.
The group Reporters Without Borders ranks Singapore below Russia and Myanmar for freedom
of the press.
The group said it was concerned about stronger control of the media as elections near.
A spokeswoman for Singapore's communications ministry said in an emailed statement that
the TOC investigation "is in no way related to elections."
She said discussions including criticism of the government take place every day on many
sites.
But, she added, that does not mean the government will permit "public institutions to be impugned
under the cover of free speech."
I'm Mario Ritter Jr.
Dominique Crenn has become the first woman in the United States to receive Michelin Guide's
highest honor of three stars.
The French-born chef was recognized Thursday when Michelin published its yearly rating
of top restaurants in the San Francisco area.
Her restaurant, Atelier Crenn, has been praised for its creative and artistic offerings since
it opened in 2011.
A year ago, Michelin gave Atelier Crenn a two-star rating.
Its rise to three stars was unanimous among the travel guide's food critics.
They praised the restaurant for its "top-quality experience," noted Gwendal Poullennec, Michelin
Guide's international director.
Crenn's food, he said, shows a "wonderful balance of…artistry, technical ability and
taste."
Crenn is a small eatery with only eight tables.
It offers a tasting menu for $335.
Dominque Crenn is the fifth female chef in the world to head a Michelin three-star restaurant.
The other chefs are Carme Ruscalleda in Spain, Anne-Sophie Pic in France, Nadia Santini in
Italy and Clare Smyth in Britain.
Atelier Crenn and Single Thread are the only three-star restaurants in the San Francisco
Bay area.
They join six other businesses on the guidebook's list of top Bay-area restaurants for 2019.
Their food is "worth a special journey," Michelin said.
The latest San Francisco guidebook will go on sale on December 4.
For the second time in two years, San Francisco and the nearby wine-producing areas of Napa
and Sonoma have more three-star restaurants than New York City, which has five.
New York still has a lot of top restaurants, said Poullennec.
She added there are more restaurants there with one, two or three Michelin stars than
in San Francisco.
Michelin Guide awarded stars to 76 New York restaurants earlier this month, compared with
57 in the San Francisco area.
The identity of Michelin's food critics is always kept secret.
A restaurant must be visited by several critics before it is recognized with any stars.
The Michelin Guide began in France in the early 20th century for drivers who needed
places to stop.
I'm Susan Shand.
Redding, California, is a city with few choices for students interested in higher education.
For generations, the local economy has been mostly based on sales of natural resources,
such as minerals and wood from the forests of northern California.
Jobs in these industries traditionally did not require a college education, and they
long offered enough pay to support a family, says Buffy Tanner.
Tanner is the director of several programs at Shasta College, a local two-year college.
She describes Shasta as the only public higher education institution serving the surrounding
the area.
"We don't really have a college-going culture in our area," Tanner tells VOA.
"Even with the shift in our economic base, there's still lots of families that don't
quite understand, you know, 'Why would you go to college?
Why wouldn't you just go to work directly out of high school?'"
Over the past 30 years, many local businesses dealing with natural resources have closed,
says Tanner.
Now, most of the local job openings are in fields like healthcare and education, which
do require some kind of college degree.
The issue is that, because people in Redding have failed to see the value of higher education,
few of them have a degree.
In fact, three years ago, Shasta found that about 31 percent of area adults over age 25
had attended college without completing their study programs.
So, Tanner says, Shasta College decided it needed to do more to help former students
return to college and finally earn a degree.
In 2016, Shasta launched two programs, which she now leads.
They are called Accelerated College Education, or ACE, and the Bachelor's through Online
and Local Degrees, also known as BOLD.
The school designed each program with the needs of returning college students in mind,
Tanner says.
Such students are usually older than other students and have full-time jobs.
And they are often earning money to support families, meaning they have lots of responsibilities
in addition to work and school.
That is why the ACE program offers a path to an associate's degree through night school
as well as internet-based classes.
This program's study periods can be completed in just eight weeks, instead of the normal
three- to four-month college term.
As there are no nearby public four-year institutions, BOLD partners Shasta's returning students
with public colleges and universities in other areas.
It helps them earn a bachelor's degree through classes in Redding and online at a reduced
cost.
ACE also places returning students in groups that work together as they progress through
the program.
And BOLD offers special classes with Shasta that help students progress through the higher
education system and find jobs after completion.
So, the students have better support than they might have had in the past, Tanner adds.
All of these efforts brought attention to Shasta College, leading it to join a larger
movement to help students earn degrees.
In February, the Lumina Foundation research group reported on the rates of people earning
college degrees in the United States.
It found that almost 16 percent of Americans between the ages of 25 and 64 had attended
college without ever earning a degree.
So Lumina and several other groups teamed up with the Institute for Higher Education
Policy, or IHEP, to launch a program called "Degrees when Due."
Julie Ajinkya is the vice president of applied research at IHEP.
She says her organization has created computer software that collects information on college
students who have yet to earn a degree.
Through the Degrees when Due Program, IHEP has shared those software programs with Shasta
College as well as other schools.
Ajinkya says her organization plans to spend the next three years helping these institutions
understand the data its software gathers.
It will then show them how to identify and best serve the special needs of students who
want to return.
IHEP wants to share its resources with as many schools as possible, Ajinkya says.
But first, like Shasta, the schools must recognize the reasons why students leave college and
the barriers they face to returning.
She says many leave because of a personal issue, like a health problem or family crisis.
The main reason they have difficulty in continuing or returning to college is the rising cost
of higher education.
And these are circumstances that are often out of their control.
"I think it's really … all of our responsibility to support students in eventually completing,"
Ajinkya says, "because we know that increasingly our job force is going to need more and more
individuals who have some sort of post-secondary training.
And so as a nation, we will miss a key opportunity if we don't.
Colleges and universities across the country seem interested in this initiative.
Dawn Medley is a student affairs official at Wayne State University, a public four-year
institution in Detroit, Michigan.
She says the Lumina Foundation reached out to the school about setting an example for
how schools could help improve student graduation rates earlier this year.
Together, they began examining student data and found that Wayne State had 13,000 students
drop out of college without earning a degree.
So, Wayne State launched a program called "Warrior Way Back."
When students leave college before earning a degree, they still have to pay back their
loans, Medley notes.
Schools will not release the academic record of any student with unpaid debt.
And a student often cannot attend another college without those records.
This is a big problem for returning students who left because of financial reasons in the
first place, she says.
"Warrior Way Back" lets former students with some debt return to Wayne State.
For every term a returning student completes, the program reduces their old debt by a third.
And if they choose not to earn a bachelor's degree, they can move to a community college
to use their past work toward earning an associate's degree.
I'm ¬Pete Musto.
And I'm Dorothy Gundy.
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