High school career centers aren’t just offering brochures and SAT testing anymore.
At Denver Public Schools, the resources for college-bound students are growing, helping their graduates get into and stay in college.
Monday, officials announced an ambitious expansion of the career counseling center at Denver’s West High, designed to strengthen the ties between the school and surrounding neighborhood and partly funded by one of the nation’s largest financial services companies.
The collaborative effort puts together the school district, the Denver Scholarship Foundation and JPMorgan Chase as part of the bigger initiative to revitalize the Lincoln/La Alma neighborhood.
“We targeted Lincoln/La Alma and then identified organizations that share our priorities of education, community development and access to the arts,” said Todd Munson, president of Chase in Colorado.
Chase is donating a total of $500,000 to area community groups, including programs for neighborhood revitalization such as Enterprise Community Partners and the Front Range Economic Strategy Center, which helps advocate for job training and creation. The company will also help fund programs through Teach for America to recruit and place bilingual teachers.
“Its proximity to downtown creates tremendous long-term potential,” Munson said. “But its poverty, low educational attainment and low homeownership rates challenge its stability.”
Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper said the city also will have a role in jump-starting the area with economic development and housing.
“There are (areas) of all low-income houses,” Hickenlooper said, adding the neighborhood will benefit from new housing.
Hickenlooper said mentoring and good early childhood education will also stimulate Lincoln/La Alma.
A centerpiece of the effort will be the expansion of West’s “Future Center” where a full-time financial-aid adviser will be added by the Denver Scholarship Foundation with a goal of encouraging more students to pursue college.
“DPS counselors have a lot on their plates, only a portion of which is college counseling,” said Myles Mendoza, development director for the foundation. “Our advisers only work with college counseling.”
The adviser will help students apply for scholarships, direct programming — which includes guest speakers and field trips to local universities — and work with universities with 10 or more DPS alumni to keep an eye on retention.
“Their skill set is more than advising, it’s cheerleading,” Mendoza said. “It’s a movement, changing the culture for DPS students in higher education.”
Jason Clark is the adviser at West High. He said he sees 20 to 30 students each day and has worked with the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs as part of college retention.
“The students get together, they have pizza, we check in with them,” Clark said. “It’s a neat part of the Future Center.”
The program started three years ago at South, Lincoln and Montbello high schools and has shown measurable success.
At Montbello High, the percentage of students applying for college has jumped from 40 to 90 since the Future Center opened. AT&T has also recently signed on as a corporate sponsor for Lincoln High’s program.
“We are not just interested in incremental change anymore,” said DPS Superintendent Michael Bennet.
Sally S. Ho: 303-954-1638 or sho@denverpost.com
