Maine’s free community college program is popular, but its continuation remains in question

Editor’s note: The cost of college is cited as a top reason that prospective students do not pursue a degree and currently enrolled students consider stopping out. In recent years, many states have created free community college programs to address this challenge.

In North Carolina, the Next NC Scholarship provides financial aid to students from households making less than $80,000 a year, fully covering tuition and fees at any community college. This article takes a closer look at Maine’s free community college program, which may hold lessons for leaders in North Carolina working on postsecondary access and attainment.

---

In 2022, as Mainers continued to combat the impacts of the pandemic, Gov. Janet Mills delivered an in-person State of the State to a joint session of the legislature. In this address, Mills mentioned a new idea that would aim to both uplift students affected by the pandemic and further develop the state’s workforce.

The $20 million plan would grant free tuition for up to two years of community college at any of Maine’s seven community colleges for in-state students in high school graduating classes from 2020-2023.

The program, called the Maine Free College Scholarship, was ultimately approved by the legislature, and has been extended to include students who graduated from high school through 2025. It has been popular, leading to significantly increased enrollment in the state’s community colleges and boosting transfers to the University of Maine System. 

But in June 2025, state lawmakers declined to continue funding the program in the state budget, which Mills then signed into law.

“It’s dispiriting to have such a successful program benefitting so many people — students, their families, Maine employers — come to an end,” David Daigler, president of the Maine Community College System (MCCS), said in a press release at the time. “We’ll continue our mission to provide affordable, relevant education and training that prepares people for good jobs in Maine — but it will be harder to reach all the deserving, motivated, and hard-working students who came to the colleges because of the Free College Scholarship.” 

And in yet another turn, in her recent (and final) State of the State address on Jan. 27, Mills proposed that the free community college program be reinstated.

Maine’s free college program

The Maine Free College Scholarship was designed to be straightforward — graduate from high school, apply to the Maine community college you’d like to attend, and the college would reach out to you to award the scholarship. There is no separate scholarship application for the Free College program.

According to a 2023 report on the program, “The Free College scholarship onboarding process requires students to enroll in a specific one-year certificate or two-year associate degree program, meet with an advisor, and map out a clear academic pathway. Students cannot get the scholarship if they are ‘undeclared.’ This ensures students benefit from up-front advice from trained advisors, know what student support is available to them, and maximizes their chances of success.” 

As a last-dollar program, Free College Scholarship funds don’t kick in until federal and state grant aid have been applied. That’s supposed to help maximize the state’s investment, according to the 2023 report:

Intentionally making the scholarship a so-called “last dollar” scholarship is intended to stretch the state’s investment over the longest period. By tapping into state and federal grant aid first, many Free College Scholarship students do not need any funds from the $20 million Free College Scholarship allocation because the $3,700 annual cost of tuition and mandatory fees is covered by grant aid.

Other free community college efforts

More than 30 states have some form of tuition coverage for community colleges, and new efforts have been appearing nearly every year. 

Recently, Michigan launched the Michigan Achievement Scholarship, which lowers (or covers) tuition costs at community colleges for most recent high school graduates in the state. Michigan also expanded its Reconnect program, which launched in 2021 and covers tuition for adults age 25 and older with no postsecondary credential. The Reconnect program has seen success — the share of adults in Michigan with postsecondary degrees increased from 45% in 2019 to 51% in the fall of 2024.

Tennessee was the first state to begin fully covering the cost of community college tuition and fees for high school graduates in 2015. The accessibility of that program has led to more students in the state continuing their education — between 2016 and 2022, the share of those ages 25 and older in Tennessee who had at least a bachelor’s degree increased from 26% to 31%. 

Tennessee, California, and New Mexico have all established permanent funding for their free community college programs, while most states, Maine included, require annual legislative approval and appropriation for their programs.

North Carolina’s Next NC Scholarship is targeted toward students from households making $80,000 or less. Those students receive at least $3,000 per year to attend any of the state’s 58 community colleges, which covers tuition and fees. If the student attends any of the state’s 16 public universities, they receive at least $5,000 per year.

That money does not have to be repaid and can be used for expenses beyond tuition, including housing, fees, books, or food. But that funding is a streamlined combination of the federal Pell Grant and the state’s financial aid program, rather than a last-dollar program. It was created by the North Carolina Community College System, the North Carolina State Education Assistance Authority, and the University of North Carolina System. It is funded in part from the state’s Education Lottery.

Maine is the only state that seems to have launched a free community college program and then decided to not continue it, despite seemingly positive impacts on the state’s workforce and economy.

The impact

Since fall 2022, nearly 18,000 Free College Scholarship-eligible students have enrolled in Maine community colleges. In fall 2024, about 42% of the state’s total community college enrollment were Free College Scholarship-eligible students. In January 2025, those students made up 61% of all the states’ community college degree-seekers.

In October, Southern Maine Community College, Maine’s largest and oldest community college, reported a nearly 6% rise in enrollment, which it attributed in part to the Free College Scholarship. System-wide, MCCS has reported three straight years of record fall enrollment.

The added skills and abilities of students who attend community colleges play a crucial role in boosting the economy. One study found that former community college students contributed $806.4 billion in added income to the national economy. It also showed that investments in community college are financially wise — students will receive about $4.80 in additional future income for every $1 paid for their community college education. 

And those impacts ripple out. As Maine grapples with a dire housing shortage, the need to build housing has become urgent — yet a shortage of construction workers has stalled the process. 

MCCS built out expanded degree, training, and certificate programs to help target that need. In a 2023 report, electrician was the top one-year certificate program Free College Scholarship students pursued. Welding and plumbing were third and fourth, respectively.

Maine’s health care system also remains strained, in part due to a lack of workers. Many rural hospitals have been relying on traveling nurses, an expensive option, though often the only one. But MCCS enrolled a record high 3,570 health care students in fall 2025 — up from 2,000 pre-pandemic. Those students are enrolled in over 60 health care-related degree and/or certificate programs.

One student told the Maine Morning Star that she “didn’t think she’d be able to pursue a degree until she discovered that through the state program she could attend Eastern Maine Community College for free.”

Where things stand

When drafting the state budget in early 2025, Maine lawmakers were coping with a deficit. In doing so, the legislature’s appropriations committee rejected Mills’ proposal to fund the free tuition program on an ongoing basis, allotting only money for 2025 graduates.

Yet the chairs of the joint committee — Sen. Margaret Rotundo, D-Androscoggin, and Rep. Drew Gattine, D-Westbrook — expressed some hesitation about that decision. In a July 2025 letter to Daigler, the MCCS president, Rotundo and Gattine wrote:

As you know, the Committee elected to amend the Governor’s proposal to provide a reduced amount for the current biennium only and to remove the related proposed language part. The Committee votes did not reflect a final decision on the value of the program so much as a desire for additional information and study of the relative costs and benefits of the program to the state and to the participants.

With that, the chairs requested information from MCCS by mid-December 2025, “so that it may be considered in the context of any related Supplemental Budget proposals either by the Governor or by a member of the Appropriations and Financial Affairs or Education and Cultural Affairs Committee.”

MCCS responded on Dec. 15, 2025 and provided the information requested from the joint appropriations committee, which you can read excerpts of below. You can read the letter in full here.

• Estimated program costs over current and following biennia if the parameters of the program do not change.
  • “The program costs have not changed since last session. Last year, Governor Mills proposed funding the Maine Free College scholarship at a level of $12,500,000 in FY 2026 and $12,500,000 in FY2027 and to continue this funding as part of the MCCS baseline budget so we could assure Maine’s parents that their children will have access to tuition-free community college — a total value of $4,156 for a one-year certificate and $8,312 for a two-year degree … Now that the COVID ‘bubble’ that offered Maine Free College scholarships to three graduating high school classes in one year is over, we estimate that the annual cost of the program, if structured as an ongoing program, will continue to be $12.5 million each year.”
• As a subset of the total costs requested above, the estimated costs of providing the benefits to students who did not graduate from a Maine High School or who were not a resident of Maine at the time they received their GED.
  • “The cost of providing the free college scholarship to students who did not graduate from a Maine high school or who were not a resident of Maine at the time they received their GED but moved to Maine to enroll in college would be approximately $500,000 a year … Of the 17,151 [Maine Free College] college students that had participated at that time, 96% or 16,487 were from Maine. Only 664 Maine Free College-eligible students moved to Maine at time of enrollment. As a point of reference, Lewiston High School alone sent 524 students.”
• Any data you may have on graduation rates or progress toward graduation among program participants.
  • “Free College students are as academically successful as other community college students. Fall-to-spring retention rates were higher for recent high school graduates — the MFC cohort (75%) than for our degree-seeking population as a whole (73%).”
• Any data you may have on the number of program participants who remain in Maine upon completion of their studies.
  • “We know that community college students tend to remain in the communities where they went to school at a higher rate than those who go to their four-year counterparts. We would welcome an opportunity to partner with the Maine Department of Labor to track outcomes.”
• Does the Free Community College Program result in an economy of scale that helps address operational expenses for the overall community college system in a way that could achieve savings and that could reduce the state’s allocation?
  • “Using our audited financial statements as a guide, in 2022, when the program started, the cost of instruction, academic support, student services, institutional support, and maintenance per full-time equivalent student was $13,925. This was down from the pandemic high of approximately $15,000 per student due to decreased enrollment and our commitment to maintain all faculty and staff positions. Throughout the pandemic, positions were maintained (using emergency federal COVID relief funds) even if underutilized. As enrollment grew, efficiency increased to the amount of $13,925 in 2022. Now, in 2025 inflation alone would have pushed that cost to $16,489. Yet the cost per full-time equivalent student for the students enrolling in fall 2025 is $13,034…The only way to truly see savings would be to reduce student support and increase class sizes – which will have a negative impact on student success and add workload to our employees.”

What’s next?

Maine’s legislature reconvened on Jan. 7. In laying out priorities for the session, leaders of neither party highlighted the free community college program — though that was prior to Mills’ State of the State. The costs of health care and energy, immigration issues, and efforts to return more sovereignty to the Wabanaki Nations are expected to dominate the session. 

The state House has 151 members, and Democrats currently hold three more seats than Republicans. In the state Senate, Democrats hold 20 seats and Republicans hold 15. The state’s primary election in June and general election in November are expected to be a major presence in Augusta this session, as Mainers will go to the polls to elect a governor, U.S. Senator, two U.S. House members, and all 186 members of the state legislature. 

Over the next two years, the state is expected to take in more than $250 million more than it had previously anticipated. In the coming weeks, Mills will release her supplemental budget proposal, which is expected to include funding for the Free College Scholarship program. The appropriations committee will review that proposal, hold public hearings, and then submit a budget bill to the entire legislature for consideration.

If funding for the Free College Scholarship program is to be reinstated, it would have to happen during this budget process. This is currently the second year of a two-year session, which means lawmakers in Augusta only have until mid-April to complete their work.

Reflecting on the impact of the program, Daigler shared in the December letter to the legislature:

I see lives changed. I see Maine’s young adults on the pathway to economic success. I see parents inspired by their kids and joining them in class. I see hard work from students, faculty and staff pulling together to ensure our students are well prepared for their next steps. This is why I am not surprised by the overwhelming public support — from Mainers of all political persuasions.

– David Daigler, president of the Maine Community College System