The Ron Brown Scholars program is among those rare entities that boasts a 100 percent graduation rate.
Many of the scholarship winners chosen in the highly competitive program grew up in abject poverty. Yet, not a single one has failed or dropped out because the program gave them the support they needed to succeed. During its 13-year history, more than half of the scholars have matriculated at Ivy League institutions. Another 21 percent have enrolled at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Stanford and Duke universities.
Given that a majority of its candidates are on their way to elite universities before receiving their scholarships, program executive director Michael Mallory is often asked why the Ron Brown Scholars program focuses its efforts on students who are on a solid trajectory, rather than those struggling at community colleges or small historically Black institutions.
“First, our average family income is only $23,000 a year, which is close to poverty, and we feel that it is fitting to reward people who have often overcome extraordinary barriers to become outstanding students,” he says. “Some people grow up in crack houses and become addicts. Others study their way out. Many of our students have amazing abilities for isolating and insulating themselves from the bad things around them and we encourage that talent as a way to survive.”
Established in 1996 to honor the memory of Ron Brown, the first Black Secretary of Commerce who died in a 1996 military plane crash in Croatia while on a trade mission to Europe, the program each year awards $40,000 grants over four years for select African-American students to attend college.
The Ron Brown Scholars program received nearly 6,000 scholarship applications this year, but just 12 students were accepted. These students of color have outstanding academic records, stellar test scores and have demonstrated leadership potential and a commitment to community.
With its graduation rate, the program, which seeks to groom the next generation of Black leaders by providing financial, mentoring and networking support needed to compete at selective institutions, could well be America’s most successful educational initiative for Black students.
