Giving Compass' Take:

• The Goddard Riverside Community Center in New York City helps to address gaps in access to postsecondary education among black and Latino students through support services that help with applying to and staying in college. 

• High-quality college advising is not accessible to all students. How can places like Goddard Riverside Community Center create partnerships with schools and utilize collective power to provide these services? 

• Read about a holistic approach to helping Latino students in college. 

Imagine you could speak with all the ninth-graders in New York City’s public schools about their future education and career prospects—64,000 bright, creative, passionate teenagers. Once the excitement passed, a cold reality might set in. Some of these teens will have the opportunity, resources, and support to achieve their dreams, but others will have their dreams deferred.

Communities across the United States should consider how to better prepare adults to help young people access and succeed in postsecondary education.

The Research Alliance for New York City Schools recently found that while about 48 percent of Asian students, 43 percent of White students, and 38 percent of high-income ninth graders earn a college degree in a decade, only 20 percent of Black and Latino students, and 16 percent of ninth graders from neighborhoods in the bottom income quartile do.

At Goddard Riverside Community Center, located in New York City, and at many nonprofits and community-based organizations across the country, the first response to these gaps in educational attainment has been to create programs to help individuals overcome obstacles, such as providing emergency funds for food or textbooks, on their paths to and through postsecondary education. Goddard Riverside opened the Options Center in 1985 to provide one-on-one support to youth and adults on their road to college, and in 2011 we committed to supporting college students through graduation.

For close to 1,000 young people annually, the Options Center offers individual and group educational counseling, college trips, college recruiter visits, connection to academic support, help with financial aid and planning, and scholarships.

Read the full article on equity along the paths to and through college by Judith Lorimer and LaKisha N. Williams at Stanford Social Innovation Review