Connecting Higher Education and Economic Self-Sufficiency

College degrees help break the cycle of poverty

According to Columbia University’s National Center for Children in Poverty, 55% of children who are low-income have parents with a high-school degree but no college-level education. In the last two decades, the percent of children in low-income families increased from 36% to 44% if parents had a high school degree, but no college. (“Parents’ Low Education Leads to Low Income, Despite Full-Time Employment.” Fact Sheet, National Center for Children in Poverty. November, 2005.)

How are we doing locally?

Charlene Vega- A Voices Youth participant from 1999 through 2004- graduated December 2006 from Northern Arizona University. She’s the first in her family to earn a college degree. PREPARATION. According to recent Arizona Board of Regents studies, minority students have consistently lower rates (compared to White and Asian American students) of enrolling in core high school courses that determine university eligibility. (“Minority Student Report 2005: A Snapshot of Arizona’s Educational Achievement” by AMEPAC—Arizona Minority Education Policy Analysis Center.) We are also failing to help our minority youth build skills in the area that is key to college success: writing. In 2004, for example, only 33% of Arizona’s Hispanic 12th graders met or exceeded the AIMS test standards in the area of writing. (ibid.)

PARTICIPATION. 69% of students enrolled in Arizona’s postsecondary institutions (2-year and 4-year; public and private) are White. 3% are foreign. Only 28% are minority even though 51.9% of Arizona’s K-12 students are students of color. (ibid.)

How is VOICES helping?

Through our flagship 110^o After School Magazine Project, we are preparing the minority, low-income local youth we serve for success at the community and four-year college level through:

• improving their skills in the key college-success area of writing;
• helping them to become Pima Community College students and get (3) degree-applicable credits through our groundbreaking partnership with PCC/Downtown Campus; and
• our “college-knowledge” workshops that we run in partnership with Pima Community College and the University of Arizona so that the 110^o youth we serve and their parents better understand the “how to” of enrolling in core college-prep high school classes and applying for financial aid.