As pandemic relief funds run out — which helped many students connect to the internet to keep up with their studies — there’s a danger that the “homework gap” could suddenly widen, argues Nicol Turner Lee, director of the Brookings Institution’s Center for Technology Innovation, in a new book.

The high cost of college is changing how high schoolers think about whether or not to go. A new book, “Rethinking College,” argues for changing the narrative around higher education to be more welcoming to gap years, apprenticeships and other alternatives to college at a time where a degree is so...