Woodbury Graduate Making a Difference Through Service

ST. PAUL, Minn. – Woodbury High School graduate Sam Sickbert finished her second term as an AmeriCorps member at Twin Cities nonprofit College Possible, helping 100 percent of her students earn admission to college. Sickbert served her first year as a senior coach at Roosevelt High School in Minneapolis, and her second year as the senior coach at Park Center High School in Brooklyn Park.

College Possible works to make college admission and success possible for low-income students in the Twin Cities by providing afterschool programming to 1,600 juniors and seniors at 19 public high schools. The organization also serves 3,500 college program participants as they work to earn their college degrees. Historically, 98 percent of College Possible students have earned admission to college and they are ten times more likely to graduate from college than low-income students nationally.         

“I believe that every student should have the right to go to college no matter the background they come from,” Sickbert said. “I wanted to help close the achievement gap in Minnesota, which is one of the largest in the United States. This opportunity to serve was a way that I could utilize my strengths to make as much of an impact as possible.”

Sickbert, who graduated from St. Olaf College with a degree in psychology, decided to apply with College Possible after seeing an email from the career center that instantly resonated with her feelings on tackling the cycle of poverty.

“I worked with 69 students over the past two years, and they’ve all had great successes,” Sickbert said. “It has been so much fun keeping in touch with my students from last year and watching them go through their first year of college and succeed. At the same time, it was amazing building relationships with new students and watching them grow into young adults, ready to take on their first year of college.”

This fall Sickbert will start graduate school at Colorado State University where she will study student affairs in higher education.

ABOUT COLLEGE POSSIBLE TWIN CITIES

College Possible™ is making college admission and success possible for low-income students through an intensive curriculum of coaching and support. Launched in 2000, College Possible Twin Cities serves 8,600 low-income high school and college age students through its college access and completion programs. Nationwide, College Possible’s innovative and award-winning model serves nearly 12,000 Minnesota, Nebraska, Wisconsin and Oregon students in 2012-13 with plans to reach 20,000 students annually in 10 locations across the country by 2020. According to a recent Harvard study, the program more than doubles a student’s chances of enrolling in college. More information at www.CollegePossible.org