Elite Schools Recruiting from Community Colleges

Parents Forum
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<p>"Eight elite schools look to recruit from community colleges</p>

<p>Aim aid to diversify wealthy student body
By Justin Pope, Associated Press | March 6, 2006</p>

<p>NEW YORK -- The signs are everywhere, from the BMWs parked on campus, to the students' designer cellphones, to the number of families paying full price even as tuition and fees climb past $40,000. The most prestigious colleges are overwhelmingly attended by the wealthy.</p>

<p>It's a problem colleges have tried to address with more financial aid, but with mixed success. At the most selective schools, a 2003 study found, 3 percent of students came from the poorest quarter of families, while 74 percent came from the richest.</p>

<p>Now, a small group of selective colleges is turning its attention to what may be an untapped reservoir of able, low-income students: the 6.5 million people who attend community colleges.</p>

<p>Five well-known private colleges and three highly selective public schools were to announce plans today to accommodate about 1,100 more community college transfer students from low- to moderate-income families over the next four years.</p>

<p>The Jack Kent Cooke Foundation will contribute about $7 million for support programs, while the colleges will spend more than $20 million of their own money on support programs and financial aid.</p>

<p>The private colleges participating are Amherst, Mount Holyoke, Bucknell, Cornell, and the University of Southern California. The public colleges are the flagship campuses of the Universities of Michigan, California, and North Carolina......."</p>

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<p>I followed the link and there are scholarships available.</p>

<p><a href="http://www.jackkentcookefoundation.org%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.jackkentcookefoundation.org&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

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<p>This is a program which supports many talented students. In our case, our high school age kid got this support. Without the help of the Young JKC scholar, we could not send the kid to prep school. The people who run this program are really very supporting people. Mr. Cooke has lead by example to educate the poor but bright kids by supporting them financially.</p>

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<p>My sincere most gratitude to people like him who have been a saint to provide help those who need it most.</p>

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<p>John Kent Cooke was hardly a saint. He defined the word curmudgeon. His sex life also made for some interesting stories, which greatly entertained the DC Metro area. On the other hand, he was a great owner of the Redskins, and in the days before the salary cap, he paid what ever was needed to give DC a winning football team. The JKC foundation is based on the money his estate got from selling the football team to Daniel Synder.</p>

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<p>Tsdad:</p>

<p>I do not care for MR. Cooke’s personal life. But at least we must him give credit for starting a program that is fabulous. Not too many people who are in his position even take this kind of imitative and donate $500 million of their hard earned money for such a program.</p>

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<p>My kid was also a Jack Kent Cooke scholar (even though we are homeschoolers), and they were extraordindarily helpful. My d.'s college already has a program and endowed scholarships for community college transfers, as well as for older students (ages 24-65) returning to school; I know Penn used to, because I used to help 2-3 Community College of Philadelphia students per year transfer in.</p>

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<p>Give the Squire cedit, but not sainthood. Too profane, ornery, and sometimes mean-spirited for that, ask his son, John who had expected to inherit the Redskins. Nevertheless, a very entertaining individual, who made for great newspaper copy. His death was a great loss for the DC area although the loss led to his wonderful foundation.</p>