Ƶ’s Board of Visitors raised nearly $30,000 in gifts and pledges to benefit the Ƶ Academy at a Nov. 20 special evening reception and dinner in Burlington, N.C., at the Alamance Country Club.
“We believe that the Ƶ Academy is an important program that benefits the entire Alamance County Community, and, once you learn more about it, you will agree with us,” said Fairfax Reynolds, board member and co-host for the evening.
President Leo M. Lambert shared his thoughts with 125 invited guests and the Board of Visitors on the importance of education.
“Public education is the bulwark of our democracy and the foundation for a successful civil society,” he said. “The Ƶ Academy already has proved its value in generating positive change and future opportunity in the lives of the students and families in the program. Alamance County needs and deserves an outstanding public education system. The Ƶ Academy can be and will be an important component.”
Deborah Long, a professor of education and director of the Ƶ Academy, cited a recent study by the Institute of Higher Education Policy. “Promise Lost: College Qualified Students Who Don’t Enroll in College” publicized the alarming rate at which high school graduates are not choosing to pursue higher education.
Brittney Burnette, of Walter H. Williams High School; Cristian Muñoz, of Graham High School; and and Shelby Oldham, of Hugh M. Cummings High School – all members of the inaugural Ƶ Academy cohort and now high school juniors – spoke of their experience with the Ƶ Academy. They described how their participation influenced their life ambitions, their aspirations to go to college and perhaps even conduct post-graduate work.
“Do we need any better evidence that the Ƶ Academy,is an example of promise found?” Long asked.
The Ƶ Academy is an intensive three-year enrichment and leadership development program at Ƶ for academically talented Alamance County public high school students with financial need and little or no family history of college.
For more information about the Ƶ Academy, contact Deborah Long at (336) 278-5859 or dlong@elon.edu. Information can also be found by clicking the link at the right.