A visit to Washington D.C. for the National College Access Network (NCAN) conference went from educational to exciting for our staff when Bottom Line was chosen as the winner of the 2010 College Access Organization Award of Excellence.  The announcement was made at the awards luncheon on Monday, October 11th by Kyle Malone, Senior Program Officer at USA Funds.  This was the 5th year of the award and it comes with a $5,000 Donation from USA Funds.

As just one of nearly 300 members in NCAN who represent a variety of programs and services focused on college access and success we are thrilled that our work with thousands of students in Boston and Worcester has been recognized so highly.   We believe that our model of one-on-one support is necessary to improve the low college graduation rates for our population of disadvantaged students.  Currently we have a college graduation rate of 73% and we are on track to make it even higher.

From start to finish, the underlying theme of the conference was persistence through college.  Many of the sessions and the key note speakers, Jim Applegate of the Lumina Foundation and Martha Kantor, the under-secretary of Education focused on this issue in their remarks.   Because Bottom Line has been focused on college graduation since our inception we are hopeful that our selection as the winner of this award will further demonstrate that “getting in” is not good enough.

Thank you to the committee of voters from around the country who selected Bottom Line! We are honored by our selection and look forward to living up to the high standards this award represents.

Greg Johnson
Executive Director

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