SOUTHLAND COLLEGE PREP CLASS OF 2024 ACCEPTED TO COLLEGE; OFFERED $50 MILLION AND COUNTING IN MERIT AND NEED-BASED SCHOLARSHIPS

SOUTHLAND COLLEGE PREP CLASS OF 2024 ACCEPTED TO COLLEGE; OFFERED $50 MILLION AND COUNTING IN MERIT AND NEED-BASED SCHOLARSHIPS

RICHTON PARK, Ill. -- Southland College Prep Charter High School in Richton Park, Illinois celebrated for the eleventh consecutive year that all members of the senior class have been accepted to college.

During an “All-In” event Tuesday, it was announced that the Southland College Prep class of 2024 at the predominantly African American school was offered $50 million and counting in merit and need-based scholarships.

Southland seniors were admitted to some of the top colleges and universities in the country, including class valedictorian Knyiema Martin, 18, of Matteson who was accepted to 28 schools and has been offered more than $5 million in merit and need-based scholarship offers. Martin, who earned a 4.89 GPA on a 4.0 scale, was named a Gates Millennium Scholar, the third student to be awarded the prestigious scholarship in the school’s history. Martin is currently deciding between Columbia University, the University of California-Berkeley, Pomona College and Dartmouth College. She plans to major in psychology and become a clinical psychologist.

The Class of 2024 had to deal with a college admission process that was more stressful than usual because of problems with the rollout of a new FAFSA (Free Application for Federal Student Aid) form which delayed college financial aid offers, said Robert Lane, Southland’s director of college admissions.

Usually, colleges are able to offer students financial aid awards by the end of March. But because of the problems with the rollout of the new form, which must be submitted if a student wants to qualify for certain loans, grants and scholarships, many students across the country do not know how much college will cost them next school year, making it difficult for high school seniors to decide where, or if, to enroll by the May 1 deadline of many schools.

Despite the FAFSA delays and challenges of navigating their high school years during a pandemic, members of the class of 2024, the school’s 11th graduating class since its founding in 2010, made remarkable achievements, according to school administrators.

“Our students faced unprecedented challenges and they addressed every one of them and more than met them,” said Dr. Blondean Y. Davis, Southland’s CEO.

Dr. Davis, who is also the superintendent of Matteson School District 162, said that when she founded the school in 2010 naysayers told her that “students from our area would not be able to access the Ivy League or top schools in the country.”

Fourteen years later, not only are students being admitted to these schools, but Davis said that it is important that students are also being given the financial means to stay in school. Davis noted that the first graduating class of Southland, the Class of 2014, will be celebrating its 10th anniversary this year and that many of the alumni of that first class have gone on to graduate from college, graduate school and start careers in law, health, education and the military.

“This is what happens when what seemed impossible becomes a reality and a vision is realized,” Davis said. “This is what happens when a community’s dreams for their children are achieved.”

Collectively, the 11 graduating classes of Southland have earned more than $400 million in merit and need-based scholarships, according to Lane.

“These college admissions and the financial aid and scholarships these students have worked hard for and earned represent hope for the future of not just these students and their families, but for our communities in the south suburbs,” Lane said.

Lane said that admissions to the top schools are important, but equally important is that every class member finds a school that is right for them. For example, Lane said, several seniors were accepted to all of the top 25 Historically Black Colleges and Universities including Howard, Spelman, Morehouse, Xavier University of Louisiana, and Hampton and a record number of Southland students were admitted to one of the top universities in the country, Northwestern.

Every year since its first graduating class in 2014, Southland, whose enrollment is not selective but chosen by an annual lottery, has had a 100 percent college acceptance rate.

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