Mychal Wynn, this system’s co-founder, explaining the kind of 4-year highschool schedule that opens pathways into high schools and full scholarships
Nationwide — Educator, creator, and school planning activist, Mychal Wynn, based the Georgia-based Foundation for Ensuring Access and Equity College Planning Cohort program in 2006 to broaden school, profession, and scholarship alternatives for college students from under-resourced backgrounds and marginalized communities.
Wynn recounts, “In 2006, when my spouse and I had been appointed as Schooling Ministry Leaders of the Turner Chapel AME Church in Marietta, Georgia, our mission was to implement a research-responsive program to extend Okay-12 pupil achievement and broaden the postsecondary pathways for Black college students, who, by each statistical measure, had been the bottom performing college students in Okay-12 colleges and the least prone to attend school, and once they did, had been the most certainly to make use of pupil loans to pay for faculty. For years, we had been offering coaching for lecturers and faculty counselors, who, for a wide range of causes, had been failing to implement the methods outlined in our coaching and revealed in our books.”
Acknowledged by the AME Church as Transformational Leaders, Wynn and his spouse, Nina, achieved such extraordinary success of their church, they obtained nationwide media protection in 2012 and shaped partnerships with Guilford County Faculties in North Carolina, Florence Faculty District 3 in South Carolina, and Pinellas County Faculties in Florida to work hands-on with college students. When every of those faculty districts started funding the Wynns’ Faculty Cohort Program, had been they ready for the success? Fairly than merely getting extra college students of colour into school, the Wynns’ program was guiding college students into full scholarships at such high PWIs as Harvard, Yale, Princeton, MIT, Caltech, Amherst, Williams, Bowdoin, Swarthmore, Vassar, Northeastern, College of Richmond, College of Chicago, and Georgia Tech. Their college students obtained full scholarships to such HBCUs as Spelman, Tuskegee, Xavier College of Louisiana, FAMU, NC A&T, and NC Central. Their college students grew to become the primary college students in lots of excessive colleges to be provided full scholarships to such colleges. It appeared that not solely had been they exceeding expectations, however they had been additionally too profitable!
Partially because of the Trump Administration’s minimize in federal funding, and the uncomfortable place of Title I Administrators and faculty directors compelled to clarify how an out of doors program might obtain such historic success with pupil populations whom they consider incapable of reaching past group school or state universities. Whereas conventional colleges had been introducing college students to conversations about school and scholarships as highschool juniors and seniors, the Wynns weren’t solely introducing college students to such conversations as rising sixth graders, however partaking college students in deliberate planning by means of a school planning system of books, on-line curricula, month-to-month digital conferences wherein college students with comparable aspirations from various backgrounds and communities interact in conversations about their plans and share their targets, and offering 1-on-1 steering by means of the ultimate part of making use of to varsity and for scholarships.
With out funding from faculty districts, the $899.95 annual price to take part in this system is unaffordable for the scholars most in want. The Wynns are helping college students in reaching out to relations, native companies, mentoring applications, and even colleges of upper training to sponsor their registration in this system. Not like applications which might be solely centered on college students who’re top-performing highschool juniors and seniors, Wynn notes, “The one standards to affix our program is {that a} pupil demonstrates grit, a progress mindset, and a willingness to do the work. A pupil have to be invested in their very own success. For instance, Black college students take calculus in highschool at a price of simply 6 %. In some faculty districts, a pupil can’t attain calculus by twelfth grade with out taking algebra 1 in center faculty. So why wait till eleventh grade to start the dialog about school? Moreover, most selective schools—those that provide to fulfill every admitted pupil’s full monetary want—require that college students take calculus, if accessible of their faculty or faculty district. Whereas we are able to information a pupil in growing a 7-year middle-through-high faculty plan, together with their 4-year highschool schedule, the coed should have the willingness to comply with the plan and do the work.”
Sponsors will pay for the registration of a pupil of their selecting, or this system can suggest college students in want of sponsorship. Every sponsored pupil agrees to share their school planning journey with their sponsor as appreciation of their sponsor’s funding of their future. At the moment, this system is just accepting highschool college students. As sponsorship expands, this system will settle for college students as early because the sixth grade for steering in growing 7-year center school-through-high faculty college-bound plans.
Josiah Walker, a Black male pupil who can be a 2025 graduate of Boca Ciega Excessive Faculty in Gulfport, Florida, was provided full scholarships to Boston College, Macalester Faculty, Washington & Lee College, and Williams Faculty. Walker, who joined this system whereas attending Thurgood Marshall Elementary Center Faculty in St. Petersburg, Florida, famous that as a highschool senior, “My dad and I had been evicted from our condo within the midst of making use of to high schools and writing essays. In consequence, I couldn’t present all the required paperwork for Northeastern College, the primary faculty to which I used to be provided admission, so I by no means obtained a monetary support award letter. I actually couldn’t have made it by means of this course of with out the help of Mr. and Mrs. Wynn. Not solely did they help me each step of the way in which, however their son, Mychal-David, reviewed and edited all of my essays, in addition to guided my communication with admissions and monetary support officers at every of my colleges. Once I had an issue with a few of my mother and father’ paperwork, they even reached out to Williams Faculty on my behalf to make sure that I obtained my monetary support award letter. Whereas I’m overjoyed to be heading off to Williams Faculty on a full scholarship, together with an all-expenses-paid summer season program, I’m saddened for different college students in our college district who will now not have the help of the Wynns since our district stopped funding this system.”
The 2025-26 Faculty Cohort Program kicks off on June 1, 2025, and runs by means of Might 1, 2026 (school enrollment choice day). college students or sponsors might register on-line at: www.accessandequity.org/product/2025-26-cohort-registration/
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