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College of Education

Alpha Scholars Program
The Anne Arundel Scholars Program continues in its third year of implementation. On October 18th, the Annual "Kick-Off" took place. The program is designed to help students in the transition from high school to college and has been extended to two additional high school sites this school year, 2006-2007, in Anne Arundel County. In specific, the program helps high school students to meet the application deadline, helps them application essay writing, and their resume.

Alice Bartely, graduate assistant for the project, coordinates the Alpha Scholars program in Anne Arundel County.

A Brief History of the Project:

In 2004, Dr. Eric Smith, Superintendent of Schools in Anne Arundel expressed this concern at a meeting with representatives of the College of Education Maryland Institute for Minority Achievement and Urban Education. We explored ways that a collaboration might help to respond to this problem of wasted time in the senior year of high school – and that exploration was the foundation for a pilot program beginning Feburary 2005: The UMCP – AACPS Scholars Program.

This program is a partnership that provides a transition experience for Anne Arundel seniors who are either set on going to college or thinking about going to college. The program is a spin-off of the successful University Honors 100 program, in which experienced student leaders teach a course for incoming freshmen students and help the new students expand their thinking about education and their own transition to a new type of learning environment.

In this pilot program for Anne Arundel seniors, some of the best Honors 100 seminar leaders worked with the visiting students and engaged them in a variety of discussions on transition from college, current events and controversial issues, shared readings, and student-initiated topics. In addition, several outstanding university teachers held sessions with the students on topics in their disciplines.