New Haven Register (New Haven, CT)
Fewer apply for city ‘Promise’ scholarships
NEW HAVEN — The last two weeks have been a marathon for the staff of New Haven Promise, a college scholarship program for the city’s high school graduates. This year, the 10th anniversary since it was launched, the program is expected to disburse about $4.3 million in financial aid to qualified New Haven students who are enrolled in a Connecticut college after graduating from high school.
Executive Director Patricia Melton said the program has served about 2,000 students since it was first announced in 2010 by former Mayor John
DeStefano, growing in size and scale annually.
Last year, about 580 students applied for the scholarship, which covers instate tuition, so long as students reside in New Haven for at least four years of high school and maintain a 3.0 grade point average during that time with a positive disciplinary record and attendance record, among other requirements.
In an example of the growth the program has seen, 2018, a total of $3.7 million was disbursed to Promise scholars, whereas in 2011 $78,000 followed the scholars to college. The funding comes from Yale University and with additional support from other organizations,
However, Melton and her staff have been on the phones for hours this week, calling students and families from the Class of 2021 in a last-ditch effort to get them to apply before the application deadline, which was on Wednesday, though officials will try to be flexible about it.
“We think we’re about 30 percent down in applications,” Melton said. “We’re looking to push for 500 applications. We think that would be, not a success, but that would be a reasonable place to be.”
Melton said that, anecdotally, she believes that planning and preparedness for college has been a victim to the pandemic.
“I definitely know that families are really assessing what’s happening. Families are in crisis: a percentage have lost their jobs, a percentage are food insecure,” she said.
Melton said she has discovered from speaking to families that they have confusion about how the pandemic might impact college in the fall. They wonder if it will be affordable and if it will take place in-person, she said. Although Melton assures parents that the Promise is a safe financial bet to advance their students’ economic prospects, her challenge is persuading them to fill out a “10-minute application.”
“We are going to be flexible as much as we can, but there are other deadlines that come,” she said. “We have to do the analysis to say who is likely to get the scholarship. We’re just not arbitrarily setting the deadline.”
One solution Melton has considered is making Promise applications an “opt-out” scenario instead of opting in.
The mad dash to increase applications has interfered with what would ordinarily be an exciting milestone for the program: Its 10-year anniversary.
“When we started in
2010, the dropout rate from high school was something like 40 percent and the graduation rate was only 60 percent, and that has flipped in 10 years,” Melton said.
In 2010, DeStefano cited the high school dropout rate at 38 percent — and as of 2019 about 80 percent of students graduate in four years, according to state data.
Melton said the program has grown in many ways since 2010 — several state universities now offer additional financial incentives to Promise scholars.
“At heart, Promise is an economic development program,” Melton said. “We really see things taking off. More and more scholars are buying homes.”
One Promise scholar from an early cohort recent
ly bought a three-family home in Fair Haven, Melton said. She knows because he rents one of the apartments to Jorgieliz Casanova, a program assistant for the Promise and a former Promise scholar herself.
“I was going through the entire college process almost on my own, being the first of seven to go to college. I didn’t know how I was going to pay for college, but I knew I was on my own,” Casanova said.
She said Promise staff helped her to navigate the process, and she eventually completed a four-year degree at Albertus Magnus College while working for Promise throughout college.
Casanova said she feels like the program has changed her life for the better — the fact that she rents her apartment from a fellow scholar is evidence of the program’s impact on the city, she said.
As Casanova calls seniors and their families alongside Melton, she said she is finding that many students and families were stressed by the number of urgent emails they’re receiving from multiple institutions.
“They’re really overwhelmed, and some of them just need somebody to talk to and guide them,” she said.
Melton said that, although the deadline to apply was Wednesday, Promise staff are able to be somewhat flexible. However, she said they must have conversations with university partners about financial aid packages, so they will not be able to wait much longer.
Melton said that despite the midnight Wednesday deadline, the online portal will stay open for a few days.
“We have to give a grace period,” she said.
The scholarship program has a rolling aspect so that students who did not attend all their school years in the city can still qualify for some money, “based on uninterrupted enrollment since ninth grade at the latest,” according to the program.