Federal grant allows RIC to keep Upward Bound

PROVIDENCE – Rhode Island College has received a four-year grant from the U.S. Department of Education to continue its Upward Bound program, which RIC has run for 41 years, helping low-income students graduate from high school and go on to college.
The program had been targeted for cuts in Congress, but RIC’s funding ultimately survived. The grant will provide $592,382 for the first year and will fund 150 students.
“I speak for all of Rhode Island College’s past, present and future participants of Upward Bound in saying that we are most grateful to the U.S. Department of Education for extending the funds for the program for an additional four years.” said RIC president John Nazarian in a news release. “We are so pleased that this legacy of success will continue in Rhode Island.”
Since 1966, more than 2,000 students from Rhode Island high schools with some of the highest dropout rates in the state – Providence’s Central, Hope and Mount Pleasant high schools, Charles E. Shea High School in Pawtucket, and Central Falls and East Providence high schools – have completed the program and gone on to get earn degrees.
“I am certain that the program will continue to be successful in its work with students who otherwise would have little or no hope of pursuing an education beyond the secondary level,” said Mariam Z. Boyajian, director of RIC’s Upward Bound program, in the news release.