AUGUSTA, Maine — Maine TRIO and GearUp programs work with students across the state to prepare them for college.
On Tuesday, program representatives were in the Maine State House in Augusta, fighting to protect their funding.
According to the Maine Educational Opportunity Association, just 25 percent of Maine adults have bachelor degrees, and in some rural parts of the state, only 15 percent of the adults have four-year degrees.
Federally funded programs like TRIO and GearUp are helping students with their applications and through-out their college years. Some of them provide help during their middle and high school years too.
To qualify, you have to be a first-generation college student, a veteran, come from a family with low-income or have a mental or physical disability.
"We are very aware that in the state of Maine, one of our biggest exports is talented youth...we are trying to create opportunities for citizens to not only be educated here in Maine but to stay and work and live their lives here," said Rusty Brown, the Academic Coordinator for the programs at the University of Maine.
Among the programs' goals is to remove barriers these students might face and encourage them to go to college and earn their degrees.
"We'll go out into the more rural areas and meet the students where they are and encourage them to find a way to go to college that works for them," said Steve Visco, the President of the Maine Educational Opportunity Association.
Nearly every public college in Maine has these programs on-campus. To help students get in and get out of college.
"Both my parents never went to college, they never did any post-secondary education," said David Ballard, a student at the University of Maine in Farmington.
"I'm an immigrant, and I didn't know anything about college I did not have any education," said Shukri Abdiraham, another student from UMF.
This day's agenda in Augusta to bring attention to the programs and to their value. Currently, they are helping 16,000 students throughout the state of Maine.
"I think it's really important that we come to the statehouse so that the representatives around the state understand that the federal dollars that are given to the TRIO and GearUp program really are coming back to their home schools to help support the education of the students and their constituents," said Karen Kei, the Director of the Maine Educational Opportunities Center at the University of Maine.
Skip to page 12 for the complete list of schools where these educational programs are available.
Keim and others believe these college access programs help break the cycle of poverty in the state, by helping remove the barriers some students face.
To find more information about the programs and some success stories about Mainers who have succeeded after their guidance and support check out their main website.