CCC offers future scholarships to local sixth graders

CCC offers future scholarships to local sixth graders

The entire sixth grade class at Community Elementary in Coffeyville, Kan. pose with their new Red Raven t-shirts. The students received their “ticket to the future” with their sixth grade certificates.

Every 29 seconds another student gives up on school, with more than one million students in the U.S. leaving school before graduation each year. According to John Tyler and Magnus Lofstrum in a 2009 article about finishing high school, the costs to the student is high with a loss in earning potential of over $1 million in a lifetime, a shorter life span, and a less comfortable and secure lifestyle. Less than half of students who drop out of school are able to find work of any kind.  High school dropouts are nine times more likely to become single mothers and, according to the Bureau of Justice statistics, 68 percent of the nation’s state prison inmates are dropouts.  According to Tyler and Lofstrum, the average high school dropout will cost taxpayers almost $300,000 in lower tax revenues and higher health care and welfare costs. Most students who drop out will leave between their ninth and tenth grade.

Coffeyville Community College (CCC) would like to see all of the sixth graders in the College's district succeed not only in secondary school, but continue on and earn a college degree. To help motivate these students and provide resources to families, the College offered to make a deal with sixth grade students at Caney, Tyro, and Coffeyville.  If the students committed to staying in school and graduated from a high school in Montgomery County with a 2.5 grade point average, they were invited to attend CCC for two years, tuition free.  In addition to receiving a personalized “ticket to their future” the students were also provided with a t-shirt which read “Future Red Raven 2017.”  Students must save their laminated tickets and present them to CCC upon registering for classes in 2017. The scholarship provided to sixth graders is estimated to be valued at $1,800 today and with inflation, will be worth more than $2,200 when they graduate high school in 2017.  This is a low cost investment compared to the cost to the student, family and county if that student were to drop out of school.