by Anne Donofrio-Holter
6/16/11
Rosemead High School students Janice Trang, Adrian Rodriguez and Andy Chung have each been selected by the Posse Foundation to receive a full scholarship. Trang and Rodriquez will attend Grinnell College in Grinnell, Iowa and Chung will attend the University of Wisconsin at Madison.
"Andy will be the second Rosemead High School Posse student attending the University of Wisconsin at Madison. Carese Rios was selected to attend last year," said principal Larry Cecil. "We also have Rosemead graduates Lawrence Chen attending UCLA and Regina Chagolla who completed her Master's at UC Berkeley, both Posse students."
This year over 2,500 high school seniors from the Los Angeles area were nominated for 80 Posse scholarships. Trang, Rodriguez and Chung were selected through an extensive process including assessment of academic achievement and a series of interviews.
"Posse’s incredible partners are investing time, energy and resources in the promotion of equity in education and social justice," said a Posse spokesperson. "They believe in the intelligence, talent and dreams of young people who might not always show up on their radar screens, and are giving them a chance to excel."
Rosemead High School has had seven graduates in three years receive Posse scholarships. According to Cecil, the total value of Trang, Rodriguez and Chung's scholarships are between $397,000 and $496,000.
Founded in 1989, Posse identifies public high school students with extraordinary academic and leadership potential who may be overlooked by traditional college selection processes. Posse extends to these students the opportunity to pursue personal and academic excellence by placing them in supportive, multicultural teams of 10 students called posses. These teams are then prepared, through an intensive eight-month pre-collegiate training program, for enrollment at top-tier universities nationwide. Posse partner colleges and universities award Posse scholars with four-year, full-tuition leadership scholarships.
"The Posse Foundation has designed a recruitment strategy called the Dynamic Assessment Process (DAP), an innovative approach to identifying exceptional students who might be missed by traditional college admissions processes," added the spokesperson. "DAP taps into the often unseen qualities of high school students using non-traditional forums to evaluate students. Interactive workshops in which students have the opportunity to work alongside peers to generate and share ideas have proven to be an effective means of identifying an alternative set of qualities that can predict academic success in college."
Nationally, Posse scholars have been awarded $334 million in scholarships from Posse’s partner institutions and are persisting and graduating at a rate of 90 percent—significantly above the national average.
"We are extremely proud of Janice, Adrian and Andy on their selection as Posse scholars," said Cecil, "We wish them much success in their future endeavors."