As we celebrate the Back-to-School spirit, we are reminded of the power of education.
This summer we celebrated 440 students who graduated from more than 70 colleges! And we awarded 4,400 students over $9.6 million in scholarships to attend college this fall!!
We also hosted three impactful 10,000 Degrees College Summits at California State University, East Bay to help prepare rising seniors for the college and financial aid application process. These Summits are transformative, immersive experiences designed to empower rising high school seniors—especially first-generation and underrepresented students—to see higher education as a real and accessible option.
This experience offered a vital glimpse into college life and offered students the chance to explore a college campus for the first time. Students took hands-on workshops led by recent college graduates who shared real-world insights and advice. Through interactive activities that demystified the often-intimidating college application and financial aid processes, students explored post-secondary pathways and discovered how college can be affordable, even on a limited budget. A resource fair further connected them with essential campus support services—a comprehensive network ready to assist them. Students left with newfound confidence, practical action plans, and an exciting glimpse into what their future could look like after high school.
The impact of events like The Summit illustrates precisely why investing in education is so important. As one student noted, “Before today, I did not know this school existed and what it has to offer someone like me.” This simple statement underscores a powerful truth: for many of the students we serve, opportunities to step outside their immediate community are rare. 10,000 Degrees bridges this divide, making these crucial connections possible for this student and countless others like them.
In these times, with impending shifts in federal funding currently threatening Pre-K through 12 education and critical college access programs, every opportunity and connection to higher education resources is absolutely essential. Even despite the current day rhetoric of the worthiness of college – college is the single most important pathway for students from low-income backgrounds to move into the middle-income bracket. College breaks the cycle of intergenerational poverty and creates economic mobility and independence for our families and communities to thrive, and a healthy democracy for all.
Education is imperative. It is our greatest source of power. And we simply cannot miss the opportunity to give as many students as possible the chance to realize their full potential and live happy, healthy and productive lives.
10,000 Degrees’ mission is living proof.
Thank you for all you do to invest in our students and the power of education.
In community,
Kim Mazzuca
President & CEO
Learn More:
Is College Worth It? Public Policy Institute of California
Center on Education and the Workforce Georgetown University McCourt School of Public Policy