The Problem

In America today, a college degree means choice, opportunity, and power.

• Non-college graduates will earn, on average, less than $25,000 annually, a household income that the federal government qualifies as low-income.
• Non-college graduates are more likely than their college graduate peers to spend time in jail, be denied healthcare coverage, use illegal drugs, and are less likely to be civically engaged.

Educational inequity too often mirrors socioeconomic status.

• Students from low-income communities are 7 times less likely to graduate from college than their high-income peers.
• African-American and Latino students are 3 times more likely to grow up in low-income areas and, therefore, suffer extreme economic-based injustice.

In large urban districts like Chicago Public Schools (CPS), these disparities abound.

• In CPS, only 18% of incoming ninth graders enroll in four-year universities after high school.
• Only 7% of all CPS students are expected to graduate by age 25.
• The average ACT score for CPS students is 7 points lower than that of their west-side suburban peers at Oak Park and River Forest High School, and 10 points lower than that of their north-side suburban peers at New Trier Township High School.

The crisis in urban education is clear. US Empowered works to reverse educational inequity by providing low-income students with the resources and support they need and deserve.