The Brief

Borrowers have spent much of 2025 trying to keep up with dizzying changes to the federal student loan system.

The Trump administration and Congress are in the process of overhauling everything from how much Americans can borrow to how quickly they have to pay it back.

Here's what to know as we head into a new year:

President Biden's SAVE Plan is ending

The U.S. Department of Education announced in early December that it had reached a proposed settlement agreement to end the popular, yet controversial Biden-era student loan repayment plan known as SAVE.

The Saving on a Valuable Education Plan "was the most affordable, generous and flexible plan for millions of student loan borrowers," says Persis Yu of the liberal advocacy group Protect Borrowers.

But it was so affordable, generous and flexible — with its fast-tracked loan forgiveness and monthly payments as low as $0 for low-income borrowers — that Republican state attorneys general sued the Biden administration for exceeding its authority.

Legal challenges put SAVE borrowers in limbo for months, during which they were not required to make payments on their loans. Interest began accruing in August.

This new agreement, pending court approval, would end the long legal battle by ending SAVE itself.

"The law is clear: if you take out a loan, you must pay it back," Under Secretary of Education Nicholas Kent said in a statement announcing the proposed agreement. "American taxpayers can now rest assured they will no longer be forced to serve as collateral for illegal and irresponsible student loan policies."

Under the agreement, the Education Department would commit to moving the roughly 7 million borrowers still enrolled in SAVE into other repayment plans — though some of those plans are also in flux.

Whether you blame Biden or Republicans for SAVE's downfall, Betsy Mayotte, founder of the Institute of Student Loan Advisors (TISLA), says it puts borrowers in a real bind.

"People that made other financial decisions based on what they thought their payment was gonna be on the SAVE plan — they're in trouble," Mayotte says. "A payment plan has never been challenged in court and has never been pulled out from existing borrowers."

Now, Mayotte says, those roughly 7 million SAVE borrowers will have to change plans and find a way to afford what will likely be higher monthly payments.

Complications for borrowers working toward Public Service Loan Forgiveness

Liz Kilty, an oncology nurse in Portland, Ore., has been on the SAVE plan from the start.

"As soon as SAVE was an option, I signed up for it," says Kilty, who works in a public hospital and wanted to keep her monthly payments reasonably low on her way toward Public Service Loan Forgiveness (PSLF).

Since 2007, PSLF has offered a path for borrowers who work in public service — including teaching, nursing and policing — to have their loan balances erased after 10 years on the job.

Kilty has $36,000 in debt remaining, and 15 payments to go before she can qualify for loan forgiveness.

But SAVE's legal troubles have slowed her down: Since her payments were frozen, so too was any progress she could make toward forgiveness. "I was like, 'Are you kidding me?' Like, 'This is the year I'm going to be done, and this is the year that they're going to screw things up?' I've been waiting a decade [for forgiveness] and now things could go awry, and you're just helpless."

Earlier this month, Kilty applied for the PSLF Buyback, to make her remaining 15 payments in one lump sum and finally qualify to have the remainder forgiven.

One reason PSLF is still an option for Kilty and other borrowers is because it was created by Congress.

The Trump administration doesn't have the authority to stop PSLF — but it has worked to change the rules. Effective July 1, 2026, the department says it will deny loan forgiveness to workers whose government or nonprofit employers engage in activities with a "substantial illegal purpose." The job of defining "substantial illegal purpose" will fall not to the courts but to the education secretary.

In November, the cities of Boston, Chicago, San Francisco and Albuquerque, N.M., sued the Trump administration over those PSLF changes.

The complaint argued that a city or county government's resistance to the administration's immigration actions, for example, could lead the secretary to exclude that government's public workers — including a local nurse, like Kilty — from loan forgiveness.

Repayment plans are changing 

SAVE aside, trying to change repayment plans in 2026 is about to get weird.

That's because, in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA), Republicans also decided to gradually shut down two other popular, more affordable plans: Income-Contingent Repayment (ICR) and Pay As You Earn (PAYE). Both base payments on a borrower's income, and both will end in mid-2028.

Current borrowers can still, technically, enroll in these plans – for now. Another income-adjusted plan to consider — one that's not going anywhere — is Income-Based Repayment (IBR).

You can find a handy list of all of these plans and compare your monthly payments on the Education Department's Loan Simulator.

Congress also used the OBBBA to create two new repayment plans, beginning on July 1, 2026, that, for new borrowers, will replace all of the current options.

1. The standard plan

Under this new standard plan, new borrowers would agree to a repayment window between 10 and 25 years, depending on the size of their debt, with what they owe being divided up, along with interest, into equal monthly payments, like a home mortgage.

Under this plan, borrowers with larger debts would qualify for a longer repayment period.

2. The Repayment Assistance Plan (RAP) 

For borrowers worried they don't earn enough to cover the standard plan's rigid monthly payments, Republicans created the RAP for future and current borrowers alike.

Payments would, for the most part, be based on borrowers' total adjusted gross income (AGI), and the department will waive any interest that is left after a borrower makes their monthly payment. The result: Borrowers in good standing will no longer see their loans grow.

In fact, Republicans want to make sure borrowers see their balances go down every month. For those whose monthly payments are less than $50, the government would match whatever they do pay and apply it toward the principal.

While other plans offer forgiveness of remaining debts after 20 or 25 years, the RAP would delay that to 30 years. That's a big difference, says Preston Cooper, who studies student loan policy at the conservative-leaning American Enterprise Institute (AEI).

Borrowers with typical levels of debt "and typical incomes for their degree level are almost always gonna pay off well before they hit that 30-year mark," Cooper says. "So if you're going into RAP, I wouldn't be thinking about forgiveness because you're probably gonna pay it off."

Beginning July 1, 2026, new loans will be subject to new borrowing limits

We've covered big changes to repayment, but there are also big changes to how much graduate students can borrow in the first place. (Undergraduates won't see any changes.)

New limits will make it harder for lower- and middle-income borrowers to attend pricier graduate schools. Republicans are shutting down the current grad PLUS program, which allows students to borrow up to the cost of their degree.

"Colleges could simply raise the price, pass the cost on to students, and the federal government would be required to write a check through the federal student loan program, " Cooper says. "That system was completely untenable, and I very much understand why Congress elected to end it." 

After July 1, grad students' borrowing will be capped at $20,500 a year. Ideally, Cooper says, this will push some schools to lower their prices.

Until they do, though, Persis Yu, with Protect Borrowers, says many students will face a serious funding gap between their federal loans and the actual cost of graduate school.

"Students are gonna have to make up that gap with some other type of funding," Yu says, "and many students are gonna have to turn to the private student loan market."

Mayotte, at TISLA, says she thinks some schools will abandon certain degree programs.

"I got a bad feeling in the pit of my stomach when this law went through because I don't think it's gonna lower the cost of education like members of Congress think that it might," Mayotte says.

Borrowers working toward a professional graduate degree (think medicine or law) will have their borrowing capped at $50,000 a year.

Parents and caregivers who use parent PLUS loans to help students pay for college will also see new loan limits. They will be capped at $65,000 per child.

"The precipice of a default cliff"

Amidst all this change, data shows that millions of borrowers are struggling to keep up with their payments.

Preston Cooper at AEI recently published an analysis of the latest federal student loan data, and the results were sobering: 5.5 million borrowers in default, another 3.7 million more than 270 days late on their payments and 2.7 million in the early stages of delinquency.

"We've got about 12 million borrowers right now who are either delinquent on their loans or in default," Cooper says.

That's more than 1 in 4 federal student loan borrowers – a crisis raising bipartisan alarm.

Persis Yu, of Protect Borrowers, warns America is at "the precipice of a default cliff."

Mayotte adds, "I really do think we're headed for historic default rates, for a while."

And so, heading into 2026, the big question hanging over the Trump administration and Congressional Republicans is: Can all the changes they've made help bring these borrowers back into good standing? Or will the default numbers snowball into an avalanche?

Copyright 2025 NPR

The LAist newsroom rose to challenge after challenge throughout 2025:’

• When devastating fires hit Southern California in January, our reporters worked around-the-clock to bring life-saving news to people on our website and airwaves — even as colleagues lost homes and our headquarters was inundated by ash and smoke.
• As people took to the streets to protest ICE raids in L.A., our reporters were there again — to explain what we did and didn’t know.
• Over the course of this year, LAist delivered more accountability investigations than ever before and we invested in stories that explored L.A. and Orange County, to bring you a break from what has felt like a relentless news cycle.

As we look back on another year, I asked editors, reporters, producers and hosts to share the stories that stood out to them — and why. I hope you spot some stories that stuck with you, and have the time to explore others you missed.

I’m enormously proud of my team and their dedication to serving Southern Californians. And for readers who already support our independent nonprofit newsroom with financial contributions: Thank you. None of this would be possible without you.

— Megan Garvey | SVP of News, Editor-in-Chief

The fires and their aftermath

Jan. 9, 2025
This was one of the first stories we published that was off the breaking news, and it was successful for weeks because it was so helpful. Jill Replogle updated this relentlessly. To me, this is a prime LAist story — timely, newsy, helpful, inspiring and connected readers to the community.
— Rene Lynch, editor

Jan. 11, 2025
I was able to get a real estate agent on the record saying she encouraged her client to put her second home up for rent at an elevated price days after the fires because "people are desperate."
— David Wagner

Jan. 21, 2025
This segment gave listeners a more clear and concrete vision for what the next year would like for those who survived the fires and were on track to rebuild. It provided some hope amongst the chaos that rebuilding was possible.
— Payton Seda

Feb. 7, 2025
When I heard the story of how Cupcake, the class pet, survived the Eaton Fire at Pasadena's Don Benito Elementary School, I needed to know how. The answer is a reflection of how a tight-knit community has weathered one of the region's worst natural disasters and what support students will need as they continue to recover.
— Mariana Dale

Feb. 26, 2025
For months, I have been fascinated by the landslide in my own backyard, watching as some homes literally split in two. This story let me go back in time to understand how development and policies of the past are affecting people's lives today and what that means for the future of some of SoCal's prime real estate.
— Yusra Farzan

Feb. 26, 2025
This was a good get, coupled with Frank Stoltze's skill at explaining complex/esoteric topics in ways that are accessible to a broad audience.
— Dana Littlefield, editor

April 3, 2025
California firefighting agencies regularly drop more fire retardant than water when fighting fires throughout the state. However, Cal Fire, the US Forest Service and Perimeter Solutions all refused to tell LAist whether that retardant also contained heavy metals. So, we went out, gathered some on our own and had it tested by researchers at USC. The results may point to one of the reasons why we so often see elevated levels of heavy metals in runoff when rains fall on a recently burned area.
— Jacob Margolis

May 6, 2025
This was a long booking process, but we got the CEO of Edison on AirTalk right when the company was beginning to align with the likelihood the Eaton Fire was their doing.
— Nic Perez

July 14, 2025
I obtained 911 calls via a records request from the home of two victims of the Eaton Fire to better understand how people with disabilities were left behind. The story has been cited by a state commission and used in trainings for emergency managers since.
— Erin Stone

Oct. 20, 2025
I loved the empathetic portrait of an uninsured family determined to rebuild their lives. And Erin Stone took an excellent photo that we used in the lead and really helped the story travel. The radio feature leaned into the main subject's interesting voice. All around great work.
— Matt Ballinger, editor

Oct. 23, 2025
I did a deep dive into what's changed 10 years after the Aliso Canyon gas leak. My story amplified unreported findings that the facility has continued to leak in recent years and highlighted the voices of survivors who continue to work about the aftermath.
— Erin Stone

Oct. 31, 2025
A great example of pre-planning the social as the story was being reported. Joshua Letona was able to go with Aaron Schrank to film these and have a complementary video package ready to publish the same day as the in-depth story.
— Dana Littlefield, editor

Oct. 16, 2025
A state lawmaker told me her new law, clarifying that landlords must address post-fire smoke damage, was in part driven by my reporting on renters struggling to get their homes cleaned.
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Holding officials to account

March 19, 2025
LAist was the first to report details on how a confidential investigation found a high-ranking OC elected official harassed and retaliated against an employee over her disability. Impact from this story: One of the women he allegedly discriminated against only realized the investigation substantiated her complaints after our reporting! She filed an EEOC complaint and the county is now looking to settle with her.
— Yusra Farzan and Nick Gerda

March 28, 2025
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— Kavish Harjai, Brandon Killman

May 6, 2025
LAist pressed for weeks to get officials to reverse their position on disclosing whistleblower complaints. It worked. The records showed alleged financial mismanagement and hiring of unqualified friends. LAist's unearthing of the documents triggered a county investigation.
— Nick Gerda

May 22, 2025
This story demonstrates how combining several reporting methods, including building strong relationships, searching open records and retrieving court documents, come together to form a strong accountability narrative.
— Kavish Harjai

May 25, 2025
An investigation by LAist revealed that hundreds of thousands of tons of construction and demolition debris were illegally dumped at multiple sites. The practice creates significant environmental hazards, and regulatory gaps allowed those responsible to avoid accountability.
— Jacob Margolis

June 9, 2025
LAist's investigative work unearthed one of Orange County's biggest corruption scandals in decades. In requesting the maximum sentence, prosecutors cited Do's attacks on LAist's reporting as showing he was trying to suppress the truth.
— Nick Gerda

Sept. 2, 2025
This story uncovered behind-the-scenes decisions at Santa Ana City Hall happening without notice to the City Council. As a result, working-class families missed out on a much-needed nearly $7M child-care program.
— Destiny Torres

Sept. 10, 2025
This story is quintessential watchdog reporting. We covered protests against federal immigration action as they happened, then stepped back to provide deep reporting context. Our analysis highlighted key gaps in California's laws regarding police use of force.
— Jared Bennett, editor on work by Kahani Malhotra

Sept. 17, 2025
A strong example of watchdog reporting with a close eye for details. Jordan Rynning spotted this item in a public meeting and followed through. The story had immediate impact: Mayor Karen Bass agreed to convene the relevant departments to work towards a solution.
— Jared Bennett, editor

Nov. 6, 2025
This story lays out the city's unlimited financial exposure as host city for the 2028 Olympic Games and runs through the risks, which are being downplayed by L.A.'s city officials.
— Libby Rainey

Nov. 19, 2025
Sometimes government agencies don't answer questions adequately or outright ignore journalists' requests. This story shows how sometimes the information you're after is hiding in plain sight.
— Kavish Harjai

Dec. 9, 2025
Aaron Schrank's thorough reporting allowed him to tell the tale of what happened step by step. He reviewed about 70 emergency plans from residential care facilities so he could accurately explain where the deficiencies were.
— Dana Littlefield, editor

Navigating life in Southern California

April 1, 2025
Larry Mantle is a legend in L.A. journalism for good reason. For the entire 40 years that he’s had a daily radio show in the nation’s second largest market, his approach has been steadfast. While much of the industry moved to a style where the loudest voice in the room wins the day, Larry has continued to make space for context, nuance and civility on topics ranging from intractable world problems to memories of lost music venues in Southern California.
— Megan Garvey, editor

April 9, 2025
Neighborhood council elections don't have great participation in general, but we were the only local news outlet that seemed to have noticed the steep and continuous 10-year decline in voter participation across these elections.
— Brianna Lee

April 28, 2025
This story was an example of the city's short-sightedness and the challenges working parents face in Los Angeles. It also laid bare the city's priorities when child care centers were cut in the new budget.
— Libby Rainey

April 30, 2025
Parents say the process to choose a public school is bewildering. School Game Plan addresses families' top questions in a series of guides. We forged a new partnership with the LA Public Library to distribute 7,000 print editions.
— Mariana Dale

June 27, 2025
This was an in-depth look at a really intriguing and promising idea for involving residents in solving community problems. It offers readers a glimpse of what a different kind of civic participation can look like.
— Brianna Lee

June 27, 2025
Co-reported with CalMatters, this story coupled public records analysis with shoe-leather reporting to explore enforcement in the wake of the Supreme Court’s Grant’s Pass decision. We reported LAPD made 68% more camping arrests in the second half of 2024 than the first.
— Aaron Schrank

Nov. 11, 2025 The education team spent quality time in the field to reveal what goes on inside TK classrooms, leading to a series of insightful stories and a delightful pinwheel radio feature.
— Julia Barajas, Mariana Dale, Elly Yu

Nov. 24, 2025
City and county officials celebrated homelessness declining overall, but that hasn't been the case for families. After the story aired, several LAist listeners reached out to donate to the family, allowing them to move out of state.
— Elly Yu

Immigration

June 10, 2025
This story really shows the power of collaboration. We partnered with the California Newsroom and NPR to produce a powerful narrative showing the human impacts of federal immigration enforcement action.
— Mark Betancourt, Julia Barajas

June 13, 2025
This summer, families risked racial profiling and separation to attend high school graduations. At Maywood High, the salutatorian said marching in protest of the raids was one of her proudest moments.
— Julia Barajas & Mariana Dale

July 23, 2025
This story features an AI-generated version of a corrido (ballad) and draws parallels between the mass deportation of Mexican descent people in the 1930s and what's happening now.
— Julia Barajas

Aug. 5, 2025
Luis Valentan, founder of a nationally known day laborer radio show, moves back to Mexico with his U.S.-born family. Valentan described the difficult decision-making that led to them leaving their longtime home.
— Adolfo Guzman-Lopez

Oct. 3, 2025
We jumped on a tip about an upcoming DHS operation and were one of the first outlets in the nation to verify rumors that the federal government was targeting children in its custody.
— Jordan Rynning

Oct. 9, 2025
It took months to develop sources in order to tell this story. It has since sparked a new policy at county hospitals designed to protect immigrant patients' rights.
— Jill Replogle

Exploring L.A. and beyond

March 13, 2025
Coverage of Ramadan tends to focus on the spiritual aspect. But for a different take, I got to do a fun piece looking at how Muslims come together during the nights to socialize and shop.
— Yusra Farzan

March 21, 2025
It became one of my most meaningful stories of the year. What made it special was the rare chance to write about a home-cooked meal where hospitality and heritage mattered most.
— Gab Chabrán and Yusra Farzan

March 28, 2025
When one of Jackie and Shadow’s chicks died, I wanted to explore how fans were handling the loss. I loved being able to connect with teachers across the country while taking home life lessons about grief.
— Makenna Sievertson

May 18, 2025
One of the first stories where I was able to spend the entire day out in the field on my own. It was a nice road trip and an honor to catch the "lilac legend" Gary Parton at the end of his second career.
— Dañiel Martinez

May 27, 2025
It was a major moment for me, but more importantly, many people told me that it made them appreciate their US citizenship more, something they'd taken for granted before.
— Suzanne Levy

July 24, 2025
Everyone we talked to for this story was so fun and interesting. They are serious about their hobby, and we got some great responses, including a reader who offered "kudos and hurrahs."
— Monica Bushman and Antonia Cereijido

Aug. 30, 2025
I was drawn to telling the mural's story because its message of identity based on working-class solidarity with people of other races and ethnicities is just as relevant now as when it was newly painted.
— Adolfo Guzman-Lopez

Nov. 1, 2025
Came out from a callout where people shared memories of their loved ones. The feedback was people thanking us for creating the space for them to do that.
— David Rodriguez and Gillian Morán Pérez

Nov. 14, 2025
It was fun & challenging to write. I wanted to juxtapose my experience first tasting this snack with the (re)discovery of it in the SGV. I think I landed it.
— Fiona Ng

Dec. 4, 2025
In L.A., it can feel like music venues are closing more than they're opening. Sid the Cat's new venue bucks that trend and features lots of nuggets of music and local history.
— Kevin Tidmarsh

More than 1.6 million immigrants have lost their legal status in the first 11 months of President Trump's presidency. The staggering number includes people who applied for and were accepted to come to the country on a wide variety of immigration parole, visa, asylum and temporary protected status programs. That number exceeds Philadelphia's entire population.

This is the largest effort to take away deportation protections for migrants who are in the country legally. Immigration advocates say it's very likely an undercount.

"These were legal pathways. People did the thing the government asked them to do, and this government went and preemptively revoked that status," said Todd Schulte, president of FWD.us, an immigration advocacy organization that has been tracking the efforts to delegalize immigrants.

"There's nothing close to this. Like there's no president of either party who has said, 'Central to my effort is revoking the work authorization and legal status for millions of people.'"

Many of the immigrants who lost legal status have been in the country for years. Now, they fear what could happen should their immigration cases not process quickly enough. The administration has encouraged immigrants to leave the country as it gets rid of their legal authorization.

"The American taxpayer will no longer bear the financial burden of unlawfully present aliens," U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services spokesperson Matthew Tragesser said, in response to a request for comment about concerns that the administration is making more people deportable.

In another effort to eliminate existing legal pathways, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem announced last week that the Trump administration would be pausing the diversity visa lottery program. In a post on X, she said the man accused of carrying out a deadly shooting at Brown University — and of killing an MIT professor — came to the U.S. through the program in 2017 and was granted a green card. While the cancellation doesn't impact those already in the country, the lottery program faces an uncertain future going forward.

The White House says scrapping prior legal pathways and protections is part of its goal.

"The Trump administration has done more to limit migration, both illegal and legal, than any administration in history," Karoline Leavitt, the White House press secretary, said during a press conference this fall. She touted all the ways the administration has cut off these avenues, including by pausing and revoking visas.

"Having a visa in the United States is not a right. It is a privilege and the secretary of state — if you are deemed contrary to our country's foreign national interests — has the right to revoke that privilege."

A look at canceled programs and permissions

Hours after being inaugurated, Trump signed an executive order slashing a program created by the Biden administration to temporarily allow the entrance of 530,000 migrants from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and Venezuela. The decision to end the program was later upheld by the Supreme Court — paving the way for individuals to be eligible for deportation.

Most of the people who entered the U.S. under this humanitarian parole hail from Haiti. Migrants under the program have pushed against the narrative that they are abusing the system.

Temporary protected status, or TPS, provides deportation protection and grants work permits to people from specific countries affected by war, natural disasters, political instability, or any other condition that makes the country unsafe for its nationals to return to. Each country's designation can last six to 18 months at the discretion of the secretary of homeland security.

Since January, the Homeland Security Department has ended TPS for 10 countries. Here is the breakdown, according to DHS, of how many people were affected:

The agency moved forward with ending TPS for about 3,800 Syrians, though that effort is currently stalled in court. Lawsuits have also impacted the termination of Venezuela's TPS designation. While the program has been terminated, certain beneficiaries will keep their TPS through October 2026.

The Trump administration argues that parole programs like TPS are meant to be only temporary. But immigration advocates said that while the government can, and has, ended country-specific designations in the past, it typically must prove that conditions in the country have improved.

Schulte, from FWD.us, points to recent comments from Trump denigrating the situation in countries like Afghanistan and Haiti, and actions against Venezuela, as evidence that the U.S. does not consider these countries particularly improved or stable.

With each cancellation, DHS has offered monetary incentives and a 60 days' notice to leave the country. DHS did not respond to questions about how many people have taken them up on the offer of a $1,000 cash payment.

There are several pending lawsuits challenging the terminations of their TPS, and some people may be able to apply for other avenues for protection against deportation.

Eliminating CBP One, others

Another program that the Trump administration ended earlier this year is CBP One, a mobile app that allowed migrants to make appointments to seek asylum from inside the U.S.

From 2023 to January 2025, more than 936,000 people were allowed in the country. It's unknown exactly how many people entered the U.S. through the app and were still waiting on legal permissions when it was canceled.

In the spring, thousands of migrants who had entered the U.S. through the app and awaited asylum appointments received messages to leave. Many who entered with the app ended up getting detained in courthouses or in their neighborhoods.

Grebi Suárez, a Venezuelan barber who entered the U.S. through CBP One in January right before Trump was inaugurated, told NPR that last week he finally received his work permit and Social Security number.

"But I'm anxious and scared because some of my friends have received emails from the government telling them to self-deport," said Suárez, who was featured on an NPR story last year about his attempts to get to the U.S.

The State Department has also assisted the administration's goals of canceling permissions to be in the U.S. This year, 85,000 visas of all categories, including more than 8,000 student visas, have been revoked, according to a State Department official. That is more than double the number the year before.

DUIs, assaults and theft are some of the top reasons why visas were revoked, together accounting for almost half of the revocations in the past year, the official said in a statement.

"These are people who pose a direct threat to our communities' safety, and we do not want to have them in our country," the official said.

Earlier this month, the administration also moved forward with canceling the Family Reunification Parole of 14,000 people, mostly Central and South Americans. The program sought to make it easier for people with family-based petitions to be permitted to be in the U.S. while their immigration processes played out.

Migrants brace for more cancellations in 2026

Several thousand more migrants are at risk of their programs ending next year.

Other TPS permissions that expire next year are for El Salvador, Lebanon, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen. If their programs, along with Ukraine's, get canceled, the U.S. may have no one residing under such a temporary status for the first time since the program was created in 1990.

Ukrainians who came under the Uniting for Ukraine parole program have been concerned their program could be next in line for cancellation. TPS for Ukrainians, which allowed about 100,000 people to enter the U.S., also is set to expire next year unless the administration renews it.

The Trump administration earlier this year paused the Uniting for Ukraine program and later resumed it. The pause affected thousands of Ukrainians, including Viktoriia Panova.

Her work permit expired in February, adding to the anxiety and uncertainty she's felt since the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

"Ukrainians, we cannot create any plans for our lives because of this situation," Panova told NPR earlier this year. "We cannot live a full life."

Copyright 2025 NPR

Los Angeles Unified is expanding its winter break school program to a full week with the goal of drawing more than 70,000 students back into the classroom the week before school starts.

The 2026 Winter Academy will start on Jan. 5, at the tail end of winter break, instead of following the end of the fall semester as in past years.

“By students returning to school earlier, it'll get 'em into the routine and the rhythm [of school],” said LAUSD Chief Academic Officer Frances Baez. “Once the spring semester begins, it shouldn't be too difficult.”

The free program, which started in response to pandemic learning loss, is now an annual offering during the district’s winter and spring breaks.

While some parents and educators have questioned its effectiveness, district leaders say student outcomes — and interests — have shaped the program’s evolution.

“We're seeing that it's working because our students are improving,” Baez said.

What is Winter Academy?

Winter Academy runs the hours of a regular school day with the option of afterschool care.

Teachers and parents who participated in the program told LAist class sizes are generally smaller and there’s flexibility to adapt the curriculum the district provides to the students in their class.

“We want to offer programs that are gonna be aligned to student interests and at the same time, continue with that opportunity for them to grow academically and thrive,” said Executive Director of Secondary Instruction John Vladovic.

There are also several “camps” focused on specific activities like science, arts, math and gaming.

The program offers some relief to working families who struggle to cobble together child care during the district’s three-week winter break (prior attempts to reduce the break failed).

Catskill Elementary School fifth-grader Chloe Campbell has participated in several of the district’s winter and summer programs.

“I love doing work and seeing different people and making new friends and learning different things,” she told LAist in 2023.

In an interview this year, her mom Christal Campbell said her daughter particularly enjoyed the math lessons and the art activities like papier-mâché.

“They did basic academics, but made the projects more fun and learnable for them,” Campbell said.

The evolution of ‘acceleration days’

Winter Academy started in 2022 as "acceleration days,” meant to help students make up for lost learning time during the COVID-19 pandemic using winter and spring breaks.

“This is a homegrown program,” Baez said. “That means our educators and our leaders developed this program for our students.”

Changes this year include offering transportation, piloting a more camp-like experience focused on specific activities like art and math, and extending the program to five days.

Winter Academy enrollment has represented less than 20% of the district’s student body:

• 2022: 71,458 students
• 2023: 74,414 students
• 2024: 73,946 students

Average attendance is 55-60%, according to a statement provided to LAist by a district spokesperson.

The district said in a statement that the demographics of the participants mirror the district’s overall makeup.

However, some educators say the students in their classrooms during the winter program are not those that have fallen behind or are struggling academically.

Charnock Road Elementary third grade teacher Jason Buchalter has worked for LAUSD for almost three decades and taught summer school in addition to Winter Academy.

“These are the parents whose kids are doing well, who are keeping up with the homework, who are providing a really supportive educational environment,” Buchalter said. “So, of course they sign up for more school.”

Buchalter said his school, in Palms, calls and sends messages to the families of children who are struggling to tell them about the program, but it’s not clear why they don't sign up.

“They have trouble getting the kids to school,” Buchalter said. “Some of these families don't see the benefit even a few days can have.”

What do we know about student outcomes?

In 2023, the district started testing students at the beginning and end of Winter Academy to measure growth in reading, writing and math. The district provided some of this information in a statement to LAist.

In December 2023:

• Scores in transitional kindergarten through fifth grade increased 9.8% in English language arts and 8.8% in math. 
• There were “smaller improvements” in grades six through eight. 

In December 2024:

• TK through fifth grade English language arts scores “continued to show gains.” 
• In grades six through eight, there were “math gains,” with “mixed’ English language arts scores in grades seven through eight. 

“Every bit helps,” said Buchalter, the Palms teacher. “If at the end of the day we provide some kids with a fun, safe, structured, friendly day with three hot meals… it's a good investment.”

Buchalter said he’s looking forward to the additional days of Winter Academy in 2026.

“When kids work together for a whole week, they make friends, they build community,” Buchalter said.

Some high school students can increase grades from the previous semester by completing specific work assigned by their teacher through an Academic Course Extension (ACE) contract. Increasing a student’s below-C grade can improve college prospects and options for post-graduation financial aid.

More than 17,000 letter grades improved after the December 2024 Winter Academy. That’s more than double the number of letter grades improved the previous year.

Some teachers, including Sadia Aziz, say the work of a semester cannot be made up with just a handful of assignments completed over the course of Winter Academy.

“It becomes a little tricky because the students now expect their grade to be increased because they showed up and they did the work,” said Aziz, who teaches at Daniel Pearl Magnet High School.

How much does Winter Academy cost the district?

In a statement to LAist, a district spokesperson said the programs cost approximately $24 million to offer and that the money goes primarily to educator salaries.

The money comes largely from a state program called Expanded Learning Opportunities or ELOP that’s pumped about $18 billion a year into schools for afterschool and enrichment programs over the last five years. LAUSD’s share of the funding is about $612.3 million in the 2025-26 budget.

Previously, LAUSD leaders said federal COVID-19 relief money funded the program, before it expired in September 2024.