PRESQUE ISLE – A U.S. Department of Education grant that will bring more than $1.27 million in grant funding to Northern Maine Community College over the next five years will benefit low income and first-generation students, as well as students with disabilities, attending the campus.
NMCC was recently notified that its TRIO/Student Support Services grant application to the Federal Department of Education has been approved in the amount of $255,504 for the period from Sept. 1, 2010 through Aug. 31, 2011. The money is renewable each year through Aug. 31, 2015, depending on the college’s performance in the previous year.
“Almost 60 percent of NMCC students are ‘first-generation’ college students, meaning neither parent has earned a four-year college degree. First-generation students do not enjoy the benefit of having had a parent navigate the maze of higher education, leaving them at a distinct disadvantage and much more prone to failing out or stopping out of school before they reach their goal of graduation,” said Tammy Nelson, director of counseling, who, along with her staff, authored the successful grant application.
The purpose of the TRIO/Student Support Services Program (SSS) is to provide academic and other support services to low-income, first-generation or disabled college students to increase students’ retention and graduate rates, facilitate their transfer from two-year to four-year colleges and foster an institutional climate supportive of the success of low-income and first-generation college students and individuals with disabilities.
“The TRIO/Student Support Services grant will allow NMCC to provide greatly needed services including academic advising, financial aid counseling, transfer counseling and career planning and placement,” said Shelli Cronkhite, counselor in the NMCC counseling office. “Hallmarks of the TRIO/Student Support Services Program at NMCC include: multiple meetings with students over the course of the semester, advocacy and on-going tracking of student performance by program staff, and referrals for student issues beyond the scope of the program.”
Students eligible for the SSS program must be enrolled or accepted for enrollment in a program of postsecondary education at an institution of higher education. In addition, low-income students who are first-generation college students and students with disabilities must have been determined to have academic need.
