UTPA, TSTC awarded grants to help low-income students
McALLEN -- The University of Texas-Pan American and Texas State Technical College will receive nearly $1 million combined in federal grants to draw students from low-income families into higher education.
The U.S. Department of Education’s Talent Search program will grant $415,652 and $230,000 to UTPA and TSTC, respectively, to fund postsecondary counseling and opportunities for disadvantaged students from local high schools.
“These programs have been successful in helping students from low-income families, who would not even have considered higher education, enter and stay in colleges and universities,” said U.S. Rep. Rubén Hinojosa, D–Mercedes, in a statement announcing the grant awards.
“I commend all of the educators, and staff, involved in helping students in their communities enroll and stay in college,” he said. “I want to congratulate these fine education institutions for receiving these very important federal grants.”
Congress first established the Educational Talent Search program in 1964, as part of the Economic Opportunity Act and in response to President Lyndon Johnson’s anti-poverty efforts.
The program helps thousands of impoverished students nationwide, but UTPA will serve any high school student who meets financial eligibility at La Joya, Palmview, Juarez-Lincoln, Mission and Edcouch-Elsa High Schools.
TSTC will run a College Assistance for Student Talent project to benefit sixth- through 12th-graders in the San Benito, Santa Maria and Mercedes school districts.
Local school officials were not available for comment due to two-week central office closures for summer break.
But the project director for Educational Talent Search, Jose Schuenemann, said the program proved invaluable at schools in Alice, which have very similar student populations to the Rio Grande Valley.
“Most of our students are first-generation high school graduates who have never even been to a college campus,” she said. “In our first year, we had 80 percent of our students in enroll in college.
“They were so excited and enthusiastic about achieving their dreams of earning a college degree,” Schuenemann said.
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Neal Morton covers education and general assignments for The Monitor. He can be reached at (956)683-4472.
