As an eighth grader in Grand Island, Neb., Abel Covarrubias dreamed of attending the University of Nebraska’s flagship campus, in Lincoln. It was only about 100 miles away, but he had no sense of how to get there.
His family had immigrated from Mexico, where his parents hadn’t finished high school. His older brother, Julio, had planned to go to college but died in a car accident a week before his high-school graduation. Applying to college seemed like a daunting, convoluted process, one Mr. Covarrubias felt alone in navigating.
“I had no one to talk to about college,” he says, “or how to go about getting there.”
But a school counselor noticed his potential and offered him a spot in the Nebraska College Preparatory Academy, a partnership between the university and two high schools, including his.
Many colleges have designed programs and devoted staff members to support first-generation students, but at two campuses of the University of Nebraska, that help starts early—and comes with a financial guarantee. The campuses at Lincoln and Kearney form partnerships with local high schools to accept promising students as early as ninth grade to intensive college-preparatory programs each year. Participants have to keep a high grade-point average (3.0 for Lincoln, 2.85 for Kearney). If they get into either Lincoln or Kearney, the universities will meet without loans any financial need not covered by federal Pell Grants and outside scholarships.
Lincoln’s program, which started in 2006 at Mr. Covarrubias’s Grand Island High School and later expanded to Omaha North High School, offers counseling, tutoring, peer mentoring, summer courses, and science camps over four years.
“We are providing as many facets of support as we can,” says Amber Hunter, director of the program. She believes that students “need to be fully prepared all around before going to college.”
About a third of the university’s current students self-identify as first-generation, or children of parents who didn’t go to college. And projected increases in minority high-school students in Nebraska probably mean more prospective first-generation college students, Ms. Hunter says. “It is imperative UNL be a key player to increase the Nebraska college-going rate,” she says.
Over the past six years, the college-prep program has admitted about 300 students. Fifty-five of 64 high-school graduates have made it to the university, where the furthest along are now sophomores, including Mr. Covarrubias.
At Kearney, where nearly 40 percent of students are first-generation, the program draws from four high schools: Kearney Catholic, Kearney High, Lexington, and North Platte. Called Kearney Bound, the program offers tutoring, advising, and other support similar to Lincoln’s. A counselor at each school is assigned to the participants, answering questions about private scholarships and offering personal support, such as help dealing with friends and family.
“High school can be a difficult phase,” says Michelle Westerbeck, the program’s director. “We understand success has as much to do with academics as it has to do with outside factors.”
Kearney also selected its first group of scholars in 2006, and the program has accepted 198 students so far. Almost all of the students who have graduated from high school chose to attend Kearney—36 out of 37. Thirty-one are still at the university: 18 sophomores and 13 freshmen. About 47 seniors scheduled to graduate from high school in May have been admitted for the fall semester.
‘Athletic Model of Retention’
Karina Magana is a sophomore at Kearney. She arrived in Nebraska from Mexico at age 8 to join her parents, who were working at a meat-packing plant. They had never finished high school, she says, and they expected their four children to strive for more.
In Ms. Magana’s freshman year of high school, her guidance counselor suggested that she apply for Kearney Bound. She met the requirements: not only residing in the state and having a valid Social Security number, but also showing academic promise and a strong motivation to participate.
“My parents always told me to do well in school,” Ms. Magana says, “so I always knew I was going to college.” Knowing how to pay for it was another story.
“I had no idea where to start, how to get scholarships or fill out the Fafsa,” she says, now familiar with the Free Application for Federal Student Aid. She found Kearney Bound’s guidance on that front especially helpful.
The program’s counselors guide students through all the necessary steps, like applying for Pell Grants and seeking outside scholarships, beyond which Kearney, like Lincoln, meets any additional need through grants, financed by the university and private donations.
Thanks to several visits during high school, the students have become familiar with the campus, and once they enroll, the guidance continues. At Lincoln, program participants join an Institute of Excellence in their freshman year. It’s an “athletic model of retention,” Ms. Hunter says, a system of hand-holding to ensure that students keep a 2.5 GPA. If they don’t show up for class, counselors are known to escort them. The counselors also meet with students once a week and run regular progress checks.
“It keeps you focused,” Mr. Covarrubias says. “They go through a lot to make sure you’re on track and get what you need to do well.”
The focus on academics is needed because some students struggle to meet the program’s GPA requirement. From the first college class, only 58 percent qualified to get scholarships for a second year. Still, 88 percent remain enrolled at Lincoln.
“A lot of this is experimental,” Ms. Hunter says. “We’re trying different things to retain as many students as we can.”
The Bigger Picture
Being part of the institute also means community-service requirements and mandatory enrollment in campus organizations. Mr. Covarrubias has volunteered as a mentor and panel speaker for high-school students in the program. In a few months, he will start coaching soccer at the local YMCA.
Kearney’s approach post-enrollment is less intensive but still hands-on. Its program provides an orientation, regular meetings with counselors, and career-planning workshops. In the students’ first year of college, they are required to take a special course to get them accustomed to college life. It covers such topics as how to talk with your professor, how to study, and how to take notes.
“For first-generation students, there is no natural support,” says Douglas A. Kristensen, Kearney’s chancellor. “It leads to lack of confidence and taking fewer chances.”
Kearney Bound has an overall high-school and college retention rate of 87 percent. Among the first college class, 87 percent of the students received scholarships for the next year,
Ms. Magana has transitioned well into campus life, She has maintained a high GPA and joined the Black Student Association and Asian-American Student Association, to meet new people. “There’s a Hispanic group, but I already know all of them,” she says with a laugh.
At Lincoln, Mr. Covarrubias is almost halfway to graduation. He is majoring in finance and aspires to be a personal financial adviser. He has kept his grades high, sometimes with the help of additional tutoring, he says, especially in philosophy.
For the most part, he is focused on doing well in college, graduating, and finding a job. To develop leadership and networking skills, he says, he joined the campus’s Students of Color Career Advisory Committee and the Big Red Investment Club. He is also known to put index cards scrawled with goals on his dorm-room door. One card is scribbled with the words, “Getting through school.”
“The purpose behind that is to give my family hope,” Mr. Covarrubias says. “I want to be a model for them, for my younger brothers and sisters.”
