“I do not want to become another African American/Black stereotype. Most of us men are labeled as thugs, because of our long hair, dreads, dark clothing and the music we listen to. If we are driving a luxurious car most people assume that we either bought it with illegal money or we stole. … I don’t want to be added to someone’s death statistic.”

This is the opening of an essay written by Antoine Tate, 16, who is going into his senior year at a large, predominantly black and low-income high school just outside D.C. in Prince George’s County, Md. This summer Tate participated in the College Summit program, a four-day workshop at Howard University about applying to college.

Today’s New York Times has a nice piece on College Summit, a phenomenal program which partners with both high schools and colleges to help low-income students navigate the admissions process and the difficult transition from twelfth grade to freshman year. In addition to bringing students to four-day workshops at college campuses, the program helps high schools in low-income areas spread awareness about college opportunities and create a “college-going culture.”

I became a big fan of College Summit when I heard about the program from its founder and CEO, J.B. Schramm, who came to Yale last fall for A Seat at the Table, a conference on socioeconomic diversity in higher education sponsored by the Roosevelt Institution. I was pleased to learn several months later that Yale would partner with College Summit and host one of the program’s training sessions for guidance counselors and students this summer.

It seems we almost take it for granted that students from the lowest income quartile who get A's on standardized tests go to college at the same rate as their higher income peers who get D's on the same tests, so it’s nice both to see the issue get some publicity and for a great program working to fight the problem make the front of the Times.