ROWAN COUNTY, Ky. (LEX News) — Morehead State University's Upward Bound program has spent 60 years helping students from Eastern Kentucky find their way to higher education. For many participants, it opens doors they never knew existed.
"We have students that have never left their county," Gabrielle Johnson, associate director of Upward Bound Math and Science, said.
For those students, stepping onto a college campus for the first time can be overwhelming.
"Regular kids stress a lot about going to their dorms, classes, and meal money," Morgan County Senior Braylon Basford said.
The six-week summer program serves more than 300 students from 20 high schools across 18 counties in Eastern Kentucky. Students live in dorms, take college courses, receive tutoring, search for scholarships, and build a personalized success plan for the college of their choice.
Brooklyn Thornsbury, a future Morehead State student, said the program helps ease that transition.
"It bridge the gap for high school and college," Thornsbury said.
For many participants, the program represents an opportunity they would not otherwise have.
"A program like Upward Bound creates more opportunities for students get better prepare college to help find scholarship, learn what they need to know, and find study habits," Jenna Vuvall, an Elliott County senior, said.
The program also works to expand students' vision of what their futures could look like.
"There so many more opportunities than just farming or going straight into the trades that they can reach by just being here and experiencing those opportunities that we give them," Johnson said.
Upward Bound continues to close the resource gap for families in Eastern Kentucky — and hopes to be doing so for another 60 years.
Alex Barber is committed to covering stories in your community that matter to you. If you have an idea, reach out to him at alex.barber@wlex.tv
