Posted on September 30, 2002

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Maine Department of Education Receives $10 Million From Gates Foundation

The Seattle-based Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation has announced a $10 million grant to improve high schools in Maine through the state's Promising Futures initiative.

Managed by the Senator George J. Mitchell Scholarship Research Institute, the initiative will create ten to twelve new high schools and strengthen the existing Promising Futures schools across the state. The initiative also will link key education organizations across Maine so that they can share best practices and models that have been successful.

"Too many high school students in Maine are falling through the cracks," said Tom Vander Ark, executive director of education for the Gates Foundation. "This initiative promises to build on the statewide effort to reform high schools already underway and improve the college-going rate for all of Maine's students."

While Maine's high school graduation rate is one of the highest in the nation, fewer than half its high school graduates go on to college and only a quarter of the state's population holds a bachelor's degree. According to recent studies, 65 percent of graduating seniors in the state say they intend to go on to college, but fewer than half actually enroll.