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Upward Bound Gives a Crucial Boost

PROVIDENCE, RI — High school students from low-income families reported a significant boost to their college motivation and readiness after participating in support programs run by Upward Bound in eight states, the analysis of an online student forum conducted in summer 2008 shows. In a two-day “College Jam” facilitated by What Kids Can Do (WKCD) and Knowledge in the Public Interest (KPI), 120 participants in the Upward Bound programs testified to the effects of spending several weeks on a college campus with the focused academic and personal supports the program provides. Students wrote in the forum about the hurdles they faced in preparing for college: family hardships, financial stresses, language difficulties, academic struggles, peer pressures, and particularly the strain of maintaining their focus on college in the midst of these. The Upward Bound experience, they said, increased their competence, confidence, sense of belonging, and identity as aspiring college students. It also helped them do better in their high school courses. “When I first heard about Upward Bound, I had assumed it was a single year of tutoring and a small taste of the college life,” commented Kristin Zupko, a student in the UB program at Wilkes University in Pennsylvania. “I have never been so wrong in my life.” WKCD sponsored the online College Jam as part of its “First in the Family” initiative, supported by Lumina Foundation for Education. In its books, mixed-media slideshows, and web materials for use in high schools and colleges, the nonprofit organization features first-generation students describing their path to the college degree and advising those who follow. Read the full news release:http://www.firstinthefamily.org/UB_NewsRelease.pdf Download the 48-page report:http://www.firstinthefamily.org/UB_FinalReport.pdf See www.firstinthefamily.org

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