UMaine Support Program for Disadvantaged Students Funded
Contact: Alan Parks, 581-2320
ORONO — The University of Maine’s TRIO-Student Support Services program, helping Maine’s first-generation, low-income and students with disabilities achieve bachelor’s degrees, has received renewed funding — almost $3 million from the U.S. Department of Education.
Program Director Alan Parks estimates the five-year grant will assist 400 students in each of the five years. The Education Department’s Office of Postsecondary Programs is providing $579,180 each year to the TRIO-SSS program at UMaine, enabling an array of services that increase retention and graduation rates for socio-economically disadvantaged students. In addition to the federal funding, the program also receives about $25,000 annually from university resources.
Since 1970, more than 10,000 UMaine students have received academic skills-building services, financial aid counseling and financial literacy workshops, financial aid grants, individualized academic and career planning and peer mentoring services designed to help assure success at the University of Maine.
Student populations served by the program are characteristically at the highest risk for not completing a bachelor’s degree. Only 27 percent of Maine adults have a bachelor’s degree, according to Parks. A recent state report on jobs and educational qualifications in Maine’s current workforce indicated that Maine residents need to be better educated to qualify for many available jobs.
“We’re helping to address the needs of the state of Maine with college educations for more at-risk students,” Parks says. “The Department of Education de-funded 120 current programs nationally, so it was pretty exciting that we got it. The competition was fierce.”