Gates-Sponsored Foundation Claims Success at High School and College Graduation

WASHINGTON - Tommesha Scott is not the kind of kid most people expect to be a success in college. When she was three years old, her father murdered her mother. Scott was raised by her grandmother until she became ill. Scott then went to an aunt who had a crack habit. Her aunt was later murdered.

Eventually Scott was put under the control of D.C.'s foster care system. She rebelled. A D.C. judge offered her a deal: stay in the system and the judge would help find financing for college. The teenager took the deal and became a client of the College Success Foundation, underwritten largely with a huge donation from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

Currently, Scott is a full-time student at Trinity University in the District. Mentors from the foundation constantly check on her progress.

"If I don't go to class, I will be getting a phone call,” explained the 19-year-old Scott. “Or some voice mails. Or some emails. So, they are on your back."

Many of the 14,000 college, high school or middle school students overseen by the program are from broken families. Some are in the foster care system.

"We take the parents' place," explained Herbert Tillery, the executive director of the D.C. office of the College Success Foundation . "We have to treat these kids as if they were our own."

The foundation has been in existence for ten years, and has now released a report with figures that are startlingly successful.

The program's mentored students graduate from high school at the rate of 97 percent. That is far higher than the national average for all students, and particularly impressive given the fact that the mentees tend to come from at-risk communities.

The college graduation rate is also high: 68 percent of those who initially enroll at a four-year postsecondary institution graduate. Again, that is a higher number than the national average for all students at four-year schools.

Scott will be a junior at Trinity University in the fall. Asked what she wants to do upon graduation, Scott answers quite directly, “Oh, I will be a lawyer and work with kids."

LINK:

College Success Foundation