Beginning in 2006, rather than providing continuous one-on-one support to students who were going to any college, we decided to focus our efforts on providing support to students choosing to attend a select group of "Target" schools.

This transition came after 10 years of experience and the realization that our ability to support students was dramatically enhanced when there was a cluster of students at a given school, and we were able to increase our on-campus presence at each school. Approximately 40% of the 2006 and 2007 HS senior classes have elected to attend these schools, so this focus has allowed us to support a significantly increased number of students.

Our "Target" schools were chosen with a variety of criteria which are revisited each year, but include:

• Does a significant portion of our student population get accepted and choose to attend these schools?
• Are they geographically located where we can interact with those students/schools?
• Do the students attending these schools need our support in order to graduate?

Our current "Target" schools include:

• Boston College
• Boston University
• Bentley College
• Bridgewater State College
• Clark University
• College of the Holy Cross
• Northeastern University
• Salem State College
• Smith College
• Simmons College
• Suffolk University
• UMass Amherst
• UMass Boston
• UMass Dartmouth
• Worcester Polytechnic Institute

What must the school provide?
Nothing is required. Our goal is to help our students survive these campuses to the best of their ability without any special treatment from the university.

However, the more a school becomes engaged with our staff and our mission, the more likely the students will be successful.

Our requests are fairly simple:

• To ensure our students have access to tutoring resources
• To ensure our student access high quality on-campus academic advising
• Help us utilize work study to provide support for our incoming first-years
• Provide meeting space when our advisors come to campus
• A relationship with admissions staff to provide feedback about applicants

How does a College become a Target school?
Colleges have been added to the list if larger numbers of our Access students are choosing to go to that school or if the school approaches us to ask that we help support their students.

How do I learn more?
For more information on our Target School program contact our office directly at 617-524-8833.