News

Students at a Paying for College Bus Tour stop, Reading PA

The Sallie Mae Fund Delivers $500,000 to Help Los Angeles Students Attain College Degrees

GRAMMY® Award Winner Jon Secada and MTV® News Correspondent Sway Calloway to Kick-Off “College is Possible” Workshops at Los Angeles Schools

Los Angeles, Calif., April 4, 2006—The Sallie Mae Fund, a charitable organization sponsored by Sallie Mae, announced today that Los Angeles will play a pivotal role in its $1 million California access campaign to knock down barriers to college for low income and minority students. Programs in the Los Angeles area will account for half of The Fund's financial commitment.

GRAMMY award–winning singer Jon Secada, MTV News Correspondent Sway Calloway and Los Angeles City Councilmember Jose Huizar, joined representatives from The Sallie Mae Fund at North Hollywood Senior High School to make the announcement this morning.

The Fund's support for initiatives in Los Angeles is designed to help address education trends reported in recent studies. A Harvard University/Urban Institute Study revealed that the Los Angeles Unified School District had a graduation rate of just 45.3 percent. For Latinos, this rate drops to 39 percent. A survey commissioned by The Sallie Mae Fund, and conducted by the Tomás Rivera Policy Institute reported that three out of four Latinos not in college cited a lack of financial aid as a reason for not attending college. The same study showed that less than 20 percent of Latinos have an accurate perception of the costs of attending a University of California or California State University campus.

A key component of the college access campaign is The Sallie Mae Fund's Paying for College Bus Tour which will visit 10 cities in California to bring desperately needed financial aid information and resources to communities with high need. Each stop involves a bilingual, “Paying for College” workshop to provide hands–on assistance with college preparation. Students can also come on board the high–tech bus to search for scholarships or begin the federal financial aid process at one of four, web–enabled workstations. Scholarships are awarded at each workshop.

The Sallie Mae Fund is also supporting an early awareness partnership program between the Tomás Rivera Policy institute at the University of Southern California and the California State University's Chancellor's Office to adopt middle schools and implement a 6–session curriculum for up to 3,000 6th graders each year. This highly successful program—Kids2College—has a proven record of fostering college aspirations for students in Washington, D.C. and Boston.

“The Kids2College program enhances our ability to reach middle school students from groups underrepresented in higher education to put them in track for college,” said California State University’s Chancellor Charles B. Reed. “If California is to maintain a highly educated workforce during the next 20 years, we must make certain that more students from immigrant and low income populations are eligible to the CSU.”

Recognizing the unique challenges of California's large immigrant population, The Fund is providing financial support to help the Los Angeles-based Parent Institute for Quality Education (PIQE) train an additional 2,000 parents around the state. PIQE is nationally recognized as the leading organization training immigrant parents how to advocate toward their dreams of higher education for their children.

“We've found that an insufficient understanding of the college financial aid process continues to be an all–too–real barrier to entry for California's minority students,” said Kathleen deLaski, president of The Sallie Mae Fund. “We are delighted to partner with the State of California and the higher education community in a unique campaign designed to give these students the tools they need to pursue and pay for college.”

The University of Southern California's (USC) “SummerTIME” program will also receive The Fund's support. This program brings California minority students, newly accepted to the nation's top universities, to the University of Southern California's campus for a summer writing boot camp. The Fund's grant will help USC expand the program next summer and develop best practices.

Students can find information and resources to help with planning and paying for college at www.salliemaefund.org and at www.think.mtv.com (click on “education”).

The Sallie Mae Fund, a charitable organization sponsored by Sallie Mae, achieves its mission—to increase access to a post–secondary education for America's students—by supporting programs and initiatives that help open doors to higher education, prepare families for their investment, and bridge the gap when no one else can. For more information visit www.salliemaefund.org.