Preparing Students to Succeed in the New Economy

Expanding Equitable Access to Higher Education

Ensuring that academic success is available to all our students remains a challenge for our region. Locally, students experience unacceptable disparities in access to educational opportunity whether during school or after. This is especially true among young men within African American and Latino/Hispanic communities. By Preparing Students to Succeed in the New Economy, we are taking a thoughtful, intentional approach in addressing this issue to provide equitable access to a quality education for all.

Through this initiative's Capital Area Promise Scholars program, we work with highly effective nonprofits to  increase the number of local young people attending – and graduating from – four-year colleges.

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Key areas of focus can make a huge difference in outcomes for local students: building social and emotional learning programs, identifying challenges and creating interventions as early as third and no later than fifth grades, and creating access to college and other vocational education while ensuring completion of this education are examples. These efforts offer the greatest chance for our youth to graduate from high school, to enter and complete college or other career learning pathways, and attain the skills required in the new economy to be fully employed and find fulfillment and enjoy a flourishing life. 

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Our Effort: Capital Area Promise Scholars

Research has demonstrated that most local students are not college-ready when they graduate high school, and that the majority of local students are from backgrounds the traditionally face the greatest systemic barriers to college completion. 

To address those realities, our Capital Area Scholars Program aims to prepare area youth from backgrounds that are historically underrepresented in college for higher education. We partner with local nonprofits to provide important college-readiness training and improve each Scholar's access to federal and state financial aid and scholarships. Additionally, we grant strategic, need-based scholarships that comprehensively support college success to our Scholars — all part of our effort to improve educational outcomes for underserved students.

At our annual Summer Institute for Capital Area Promise Scholars, local high school students develop skills to get to – and through – college.

Learn more about the program