In the final throes of the fiscal year 2025 budget cycle, Montgomery County Public Schools’ leadership and the county Board of Education have publicly stated that they may “reduce additional CollegeTracks counseling services at some high schools.” A cut will mean that hundreds of high school students who desperately need college access services next year will not get them.
CollegeTracks staff and volunteers help MCPS students who face severe disadvantages during the college application process. Most are among the first generation in their families to attend college or come from low-income and/or immigrant households. Though qualified to attend college, they are likely to miss out on the opportunities provided by higher education because they know no adults with the experience and time to help them through the extremely complex admissions and financial aid processes.
Given the economics and operational model of CollegeTracks’ College Access program, which removes barriers to higher education that MCPS cannot otherwise remove, a cut from the current fiscal year 2024 funding level would cause CollegeTracks to shut down its entire operations in one, two or three high schools of the five high schools it currently serves. One or more school communities—students, families, teachers, counselors and principals—would lose the program that helps hundreds of their students access higher education and come closer to attaining the futures they deserve.
CollegeTracks has served more than 10,000 MCPS students over the past 20 years. Ninety-nine percent of our high school graduates have been accepted into a postsecondary institution. CollegeTracks works hard to help our students identify and secure the financial aid they need to attend.
CollegeTracks’ success requires skilled, committed staff members, many trained volunteers and millions of dollars raised from foundation, individual, and corporate funders, as well as from CollegeTracks’ partnerships with MCPS and the county.
As taxpayers, we fund a school system that graduates most of its students but fails to give thousands the support they need to continue their education and be eligible for the vast majority of the county’s well-paying jobs. Instead of talking about equity in the abstract, MCPS needs to support the specific programs that change the trajectories of young people’s lives.
The co-founders of CollegeTracks dreamed that once we proved the program model worked, the county and MCPS would choose to expand it to ensure equitable opportunities for all of the county’s students who need it. Sadly, CollegeTracks is now fighting for resources just to continue serving students in five of the county’s 25 high schools.
A funding cut may help solve a temporary budget problem but it ignores the robust and measurable return on investment that CollegeTracks delivers to the county–thousands of MCPS graduates getting to higher education who otherwise would not be able to obtain jobs that support their families. The county’s employers need an educated workforce. Higher incomes generate more taxes, allow people to buy homes, and reduce the social services burden.
The need for college access services has increased dramatically since CollegeTracks began in 2003. Half of all MCPS students, more than 80,000, qualify now for Free and Reduced Meals or have qualified in the past. Most of those students come from families who lack college-going experience to help them obtain higher education.
Rather than reducing support, now is the time to double down on the investment in CollegeTracks–for the sake of the students, their families and our community.
Bethesda resident Nancy Leopold is the co-founder and former executive director of CollegeTracks.