Pipeline Into Partnerships offers minority students a chance

For much of high school, Jaelyn Marshall, a 17-year-old from Harlem, was an indifferent student. She worked hard in her senior year, but it wasn't enough to make up for three years of bad grades.

"Every college I applied to said, 'Sorry, we don't want you,'" Marshall said.


She's going to college this September after all, thanks to a partnership between KIPP charter schools and Southern Vermont College, a small four-year school here.  Under the program, called Pipelines Into Partnerships, the college's admissions office outsourced much of the responsibility for choosing 17 members of its incoming freshman class to KIPP, the largest charter chain in the country, as well as to a high school in Brooklyn and the Boys and Girls Club of Schenectady, N.Y.

It's a rare setup. Although colleges often have close relationships with high schools, very few cede control over admissions decisions. The partners believe their model — which focuses on unconventional measures of success, such as grit and academic improvement instead of just overall grades and scores — will give a chance at college to minority students who might otherwise be overlooked.