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

$51,000 in scholarships awarded and 20,000 families reached with college information, during The Sallie Mae Fund's spring 2007 “Paying for College” Bus Tour

West Coast leg of national tour comes to a close in Corpus Christi with the last of 112 "Paying for College" workshops

CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas—After visiting 35 communities across the West Coast and Southwest, The Sallie Mae Fund’s spring 2007 “Paying for College” Bus Tour motored to its final stop in Corpus Christi on Friday, April 13. The Tour, which kicked off in San Francisco on January 8, was designed to help increase college access for students—in particular Latinos—and deliver college financial aid resources to students and families.

For the spring 2007 component of the Tour, the “Paying for College” bus reached over 20,000 students and families with college-going information and provided $51,000 in scholarships to college-bound students.

In total, the “Paying for College” Bus Tour has reached nearly 100,000 families nationwide since 2004 and has awarded more than $330,000 in scholarships. The Sallie Mae Fund, a charitable organization sponsored by Sallie Mae, supports programs and initiatives that help open doors to higher education.

The Tour provided information on scholarships, grants, loans, and federal student aid through bilingual “Paying for College” workshops to help students and parents understand how to prepare and pay for a college education. Students also had the opportunity to board the “Paying for College” bus—a high-tech vehicle outfitted as a mobile college counseling center—to research colleges and to begin the federal financial aid application process at one of four, Web-enabled workstations. Also featured was National Tour spokesperson Lilyan Prado, a 27-year-old former Texas teacher who led workshops and Tour stop events. Lilyan, who emigrated from Guatemala at age 4, worked from a young age to help support her family and overcame many obstacles to stay in school and graduate from college.

This year’s Tour featured a partnership with MTV Tr3́s and its Voces (Voices) initiative, an online community created to empower Latinos to get the most out of their education, prepare for high school graduation, and explore higher education. Voces partners with Youth Venture, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and National Council of La Raza (NCLR) to highlight the education dreams and obstacles of Hispanic teens in their own words. Through contests at Bus Tour events around the country and online, MTV Tr3́s chose dozens of student videographers and provided them with video cameras so they can express their stories, ideas, inspirations and fears about high school. Select stories will be featured online at www.mtv3voces.com; some may also be featured on MTV Tr3́s.

One of the students who received a video camera was Felipe Paniagua, a senior at Skyline High School in Dallas. Felipe is well acquainted with the struggles facing many Hispanics today as they pursue higher education.

“There are so many [people] and others today who simply do not know their rights; not knowing who to contact or where to turn for the right information prevents them from having a better future,” Felipe said. Felipe hopes to attend Texas A&M University at College Station next spring, where he plans to study architecture.

In addition to MTV Tr3́s Voces, national Bus Tour partners included the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute (CHCI), the National Association for College Admission Counseling (NACAC), the National Council for Community and Education Partnerships (NCCEP), and the Hispanic Scholarship Fund (HSF). In each community, The Fund also partnered with community groups, high schools, colleges, universities, and local elected officials, including the offices of Rep. Jim Costa (D-CA), Rep. Grace Napolitano (D-CA), Rep. Henry Cuellar (D-TX) and Rep. Gene Green (D-TX).

The last leg of the spring Tour—a 15-city Bus Tour swing through Texas—coincided with the announcement of The Sallie Mae Fund’s $1 million commitment to college access efforts in the state. At a March 23 press conference in Houston, The Sallie Mae Fund announced an unprecedented partnership uniting representatives from Texas government, school districts, colleges and universities and local communities to address the college access gap in Texas—the state with the second-highest number of K-12 low-income and minority students in the nation. This funding commitment is among the largest ever for a Sallie Mae Fund single-state contribution. Partners include the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board, the Houston Independent School District (HISD), Texas A&M University, The University of Texas System Institute for Public School Initiatives, various Houston colleges and universities, the San Antonio Education Partnership, Communities Organized for Public Service (COPS), and the San Antonio Metro Alliance. More details about the $1 million Texas initiative are available on this website.

Through the “Paying for College” Bus Tour, The Sallie Mae Fund is responding to research indicating that Latinos are lagging behind in higher education degree attainment. A misperception that college is financially out of reach is preventing many college-age Latinos from capitalizing on their higher education dreams—more than half of Latino parents and 43 percent of Latino young adults could not name a single source of financial aid, according to a survey commissioned by The Sallie Mae Fund and conducted by the Tomás Rivera Policy Institute at the University of Southern California’s School of Policy, Planning and Development.

“Through the national 'Paying for College' Bus Tour, we’ve reached into communities of students from all backgrounds to help them overcome the financial aid awareness barrier preventing them from going on to college,” said Kathleen deLaski, president of The Sallie Mae Fund. “Too many people are surprised to learn that federal aid, state aid and scholarships are available to all families. Through our Bus Tour and other initiatives, The Sallie Mae Fund attempts to bridge the information gap for any student who dreams of college.”

A fourth, nationwide “Paying for College” Bus Tour will kick off in the Midwest in September 2007.

The Sallie Mae Fund, a charitable organization sponsored by Sallie Mae, achieves its mission—to increase access to a postsecondary 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.