City of Phoenix Opens College Planning Center
by Jonathan Rogers
Phoenix Mayor Phil Gordon, city councilmembers, school board members and local funding partners recently celebrated the opening of a new, full-service college planning center at the Burton Barr Central Library in downtown Phoenix.Developed through a partnership between the city’s Youth and Education Programs Office and three higher education institutions, College Depot will provide access to a range of free services to help high school students prepare for postsecondary education. These outreach, resource and referral services are aimed at improving access to information for college planning, financial aid and admission, and will include:
• One-on-one assistance with the college application process; • Workshops for students and parents on college readiness, financial aid and scholarships, applications, personal statements and test preparation;• College planning software to match students with the right colleges, scholarships and internships; and • College fairs and appointments with bilingual university and community college counselors.
The library’s College Depot is expected to serve at least 2,500 students and parents within six months of opening.
“College Depot is a one-stop shop where high school students can learn everything they want to know about college and the application process,” said Mayor Gordon. “If you have a college-bound son or daughter, this is where you’ll want to be.”
The city used Community Development Block Grant funding to build College Depot within the library, as well as philanthropic support from the Virginia G. Piper Charitable Trust, Helios Education Foundation and other foundation and corporate partners to sustain ongoing operations.
Members of the partnership are sharing resources in order to make the College Depot a success, with staff from various organizations co-located to provide personal assistance to students on site. Stakeholders plan to continue collaborating on funding strategies.
Deborah Dillon, education director in the office of the city manager, described the city’s role in developing College Depot.
“It grew out of the need for college planning services beyond the high schools,” said Dillon. “The city played the role of convener with a small planning group that developed a plan and then started fundraising. It took three years to make it happen.”
According to 2007 U.S. Census estimates, only 15 percent, or 137,000 people, have a bachelor’s degree out of the 886,000 Phoenix residents who are at least 25 years of age. Yet 78 percent have at least graduated from high school.
One of the greatest challenges standing in the way of higher rates of college attendance and completion is limited access to information about the postsecondary education planning and application process. Low-income students and those who will be the first in their family to apply for college are particularly affected by this lack of information.
Although Phoenix has 144 public, private and charter high schools spread across 30 school districts, the College Depot will serve as a free source of information to all secondary school students in the city. The city hopes both the concept of College Depot and the model of its supporting partnership can be replicated to serve students in other cities across Arizona.
Details: To learn more about College Depot, visit www.phoenix.gov/collegedepot. To learn about other city education initiatives, visit www.nlc.org/iyef or contact Jonathan Rogers at (202) 626-3009 or rogers@nlc.org.
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