Jackson State University in Mississippi has announced that foster care youth from outside the state of Mississippi can now enroll at the university and pay substantially lower in-state tuition. Actress Vanessa Bell Calloway has established an endowed fund at Jackson State to help these students pay for college.
Many students from the foster care system have great difficulty paying for college because once they reach the age of 18, they lose government benefits from the foster care program. Jackson State President Carolyn Meyers stated, “We want to remove as many barriers as possible so that students from all walks of life get the opportunity to succeed.”
In-state tuition for certain population groups outside of Mississippi was made possible by a new state law enacted last year. In addition to the new program for foster youth, Jackson State offers in-state tuition packages to high achieving students from urban schools outside of Mississippi, STEM majors, children of military families, and children of alumni donors.
HI my name is sidney, me and my little sister aged from foster care with no resources what so ever. I am concerned that we were failed our rights. I do ton of internet searches and all of the related programs that we need only provide to their state. Is there anyway you could help me find resources for us in our state Florida?. we have been homeless ever since we left foster care and have became victims of human trafficking and all sorts of tragic situations. Right now we are living in a abandon house and is not sure where our lives are headed in the next couple of weeks. We our doing our best not to indulged in criminal activities in order to survive. Having a job and going to school is very hard for us while being unstable. we spend our whole lives in Foster Care and Lack the importance of life skills, our Knowledge of the REAL WORLD is very low.Before we left foster care they promised us a lot of things that they didn’t follow through with. I strongly feel that we deserve those resources. Im using the computer at school find us help. I try to spend as much time here as possible to prevent the being homeless all day. We really need some help.
IF THERE IS ANYTHING YOU CAN DO TO LEAD US IN THE PATH OF HELP PLEASE DO SO.
THANKS SIDNEY