Waukegan to College, a GFF grantee, was featured in a Chicago Tribune Lake County News-Sun article, Former Waukegan High School students are developing a texting service to help families navigate the path to college. Waukegan to College and its interns, who are recent graduates of Waukegan High School, are developing the texting service to provide a “roadmap” that will help guide families through the high school to college process.
“The move builds on Waukegan to College’s efforts to expand beyond the families directly enrolled in its programming to the broader community, Danckers said. The first effort in this area was the Parents Educating Parents program rolled out last year, where parent mentors lead workshops teaching other parents.”
“The texting program also allowed Waukegan to College to create internship opportunities for Waukegan High School graduates, which can be hard to come by in Waukegan or difficult to access beyond its borders because of transportation,” Dancker said.
Waukegan to College aims to create brighter futures for Waukegan students, families and the community by helping students prepare to enroll in and graduate from college. W2C provides year-round college readiness services that guide students toward academic success and tracks their performance based on a college-readiness curriculum. Since 2010, all W2C students have graduated from high school and have gone to college. More than forty-five W2C students have graduated from college since the organization began.