Executive Director Pittsburgh Promise
In what supporters said was an effort to extend the life of the scholarship program, The Pittsburgh Promise has lowered the top amount it will award for college scholarships and will no longer pay for books, or room and board.
Joined at a July 14 press conference by Pittsburgh Foundation President and CEO Maxwell King, Promise Executive Director Saleem Ghubril said the changes are not the first, and are intended to reach the maximum number of students for the longest time.
“We want to ensure students who are in kindergarten today will have a scholarship when they graduate high school,” he said.
Beginning in 2017, the maximum annual scholarship award—for students attending Pittsburgh Public Schools from kindergarten on—will drop from $10,000 to $7,500, for a total of $30,000 over four years. When first announced in 2008, the top annual award was $5,000.
The other major changes include:
•Eliminating the $1,000 annual award to students who already have full funding;
•Only paying for tuition and fees, not for room and board or books; and
•Awarding funds for four years only beginning immediately after graduation, students deferring a year lose a year of funding.
Additionally, the residency/attendance eligibility scale will be adjusted, with students enrolling in grades 1-5 earning 90 percent, in grades 6-8 earning 70 percent, and in 9th grade earning 50 percent.
The changes are needed because The Promise has not reached its $250 million funding goal. UPMC’s donated $100 million over 10 years, but The Promise and its supporters have raised only $74 million of the remainder in corporate, foundation and individual donations.
With the Pittsburgh Foundation acting as The Promise’s fiduciary agent, King said it is important for the city’s corporate community to step up its contributions. If the goal is reached, the changes announced will allow The Promise to distribute scholarships through 2028. But King was optimistic that it would continue beyond that.
“I think there’s hope that we can have a continuous fundraising capability in this community to keep the Promise going forever,” he said.
Though Ghubril said it cannot claim complete credit, The Promise’s latest annual report noted that through 2014, the school district’s graduation rate has risen from 65 percent to 71 percent since 2009, for Black students the rate has increased from 57 percent to 65 percent.
However, The Promise has been criticized for not reaching enough of the district’s most at-risk demographic—Black males.
Overall, African American students have received just 38 percent of the scholarships. And even though Black students make up 68 percent of an extension program created to get borderline students above the 2.0 GPA eligibility mark, Black males account for only 9 percent of Promise graduates.
This has led to calls for even more changes, including making the promise available to students with any passing grade. Ghubril said that would not happen.
“Scholarships by themselves, regardless of amount, will not make students ready for post-secondary success. Only academic readiness will,” he said.
“The factors that seem to hinder some Black males from meeting our minimum eligibility criteria are many, they are complex, and they are a national struggle. Some factors are school-based, while others are social, emotional, familial, economic, or health-related. The solution requires our entire community locking its elbows around our children and working tirelessly on rebuilding the foundational assets that all children must have in order to succeed.”
In addition to the extension program—which will continue to pay for a year at Community College of Allegheny County, and for three more years at any in-state college, university, or trade school for those who succeed—Ghubril said regional leaders are working with him on a “more collaborative support system for our most vulnerable students.”
“We want to see more of them become Promise-eligible,” he said. “We will be able to share more details later in the year.”
(Send comments to cmorrow@newpittsburghcourier.com.)
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