In the 1980s, New York philanthropist Eugene Lang made a promise to Harlem schoolchildren to pay for their college tuition if they graduated from high school and went on to college. This promise was such a new and creative idea that it was showcased in the media nationwide. Soon, Lang's "I Have a Dream" program was replicated throughout the country.

Following Lang's lead, the late Marjorie Powell Allen, president of the Powell Family Foundation in Missouri, promised a sixth-grade class in Kansas City that her foundation would pay for students to enter college. The media, too, picked up that promise, yet few people grasped the offer's life-transforming opportunity. When I joined the Kansas City program three years after its initiation, students seemed surprisingly disinterested and parents indifferent -- they simply had no idea of the possibilities that the promise provided them.

This past August, when I met Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf and her education director, David Silver, they shared with me the concept of an Oakland Promise, modeled on Lang's. I immediately asked if the Peralta Colleges could be a partner.

Seeing the Oakland Promise as a scholarship program is a mistake, however. Making a promise to young people to pay for their college education risks being seen as an unrealistic pie-in-the-sky proposal. Unless students come from families who have gone to college, or who promote college attendance, the college-going notion is often incredulous to them.

In contrast, ensuring that parents and students do not see the Oakland Promise as an unreachable dream is one of the special strengths of this program.


There are aspects of the Oakland Promise that are truly unique to education and a model for school districts across the state: The "brilliant baby" idea that encourages parents to read and sing to their children -- even before birth; support for students in kindergarten all the way through high school; and financial and emotional help when students apply to college.

And support while in college is critical because the success rate for at-risk college freshmen is relatively low, and the promise of support early in college can make all the difference. At the Peralta Community College District, we intend to have an office dedicated to Oakland Promise students so that they can take full advantage of all that the Promise provides them.

One of the elements that predicts college persistence and success is contact with someone at the institution on a regular basis. For Oakland Promise students, there will be an identified person at the Peralta Colleges to aid them.

The launch of the Oakland Promise in January was nothing short of spectacular. There were donors, state, county and locally elected officials, city officials, Oakland Unified School District leaders, college and university presidents and chancellors and, above all, plenty of students and parents.

The philosophy and structure of the Oakland Promise is sound. The Promise is, perhaps, the very remedy needed to ensure a sound and permanent educational transformation for the city of Oakland.

Jowel Laguerre is chancellor at Peralta Colleges.