For seven years, ScholarCHIPS has been providing college scholarships for students with incarcerated parents.

Yasmine Arrington turned her own life around when she signed up for a program call LearnServe in D.C. when she was in high school.

“In LearnServe, they asked us to identify an issue in our community and/or our personal lives that makes us angry or something we want to see changed or improved,” she said. “The issue I identified was mass incarceration. More specifically, the effect of incarceration on children and families.

She said her biological father has been in and out of jail and federal prison most of her life.

“After I was about 3 years old … I didn’t see my father until i was a teenager,” she said.

She knew there were other kids with the same secret she had been ashamed to share.

“I found out there are 2.3 million youths in the United States that have an incarcerated parent,” she said. “And the number is much higher if we also consider immigrants and the number of children whose parents are in detention centers.”

She created a ScholarCHIPS — CHIPS stands for children of incarcerated parents.

With her first grant of $1,000 from LearnServe, she went looking for donations and found so many kids like herself.

She has raised and awarded more than $100,000 to 51 students. Thirteen have already graduated.

Raynna Nkwanyuo, whose mother was incarcerated, is in law school and says ScholarCHIPS has been more than just financial help.

“I'm so thankful for the opportunity,” Nkwayeo said. “It actually got me comfortable about having an incarcerated parent.”

“ScholarCHIPS was the perfect scholarship program aligned with some of the things I experienced, suffered from, and put me in with a group who could understand,” Said Deronte Craig, whose father is in prison.

Most of them have found a way to reconnect with the family member they had tried to erase.

“It’s always great to hear from him and to understand how much he does care for me,” said William Cousins, whose father is incarcerated.

Arrington now has a relationship with her father.

“He's now moved back to Washington, D.C.,” she said. “He’s working very hard, has two jobs, and I'm proud of him and I know he’s proud of me.”