In the Los Angeles Unified School District only 44% of low-income students will graduate from high school. Of those that do complete high school in LAUSD, only one in five will have met the curriculum requirements to qualify for admission to a four-year public university in California. There are so many factors that play into creating these statistics, but the sad reality is that low-income students, those that stand to gain the most from higher education, are not being presented with adequate resources to even qualify for the next level.

These statistics have pushed some teachers at Johnnie L. Cochran, Jr.  Middle School to work even harder to ensure student success.  In 2008, a group of teachers focused on three high-achieving students and made it their mission that these kids beat the odds and succeed in high school and beyond.  The students - Heven, Joel, and Francisco worked relentlessly to overcome many obstacles and achieved their goals.  After a year of hard work, each of them received full-ride scholarships to some of the most elite private schools in Los Angeles.  In the fall of 2008, they started their freshmen year at Brentwood School, Harvard-Westlake, and Crossroads school, respectively.

Our vision for 2009 and beyond is that Heven, Joel, Francisco, and our 2009 group of Miriam Cortez, Jose Rempola, Steve Jaramillo and Arturo Garcia and every future group of students have the resources to achieve beyond what they knew was possible – attending the top universities.

Additional funding is urgently needed so that distractions (the affordability of tuition, computers, textbooks and transportation) are removed and each child is able to focus on what truly matters – studying and good grades.  Funds are necessary for tuition, textbooks, school supplies, lunch money, field trips, extracurricular activities, and school social events.  As the Independent School Support Systems (ISSS) we hope to raise money for these and future groups of students that are applying to elite high schools. Our mission is to allow the students to take full advantage of every possible opportunity and achieve a high level of success that should be afforded every student no matter their socio-economic background.