Patrick Administration Announces Development of College and Career Website to Prepare All Massachusetts Students for Success

BOSTON – Moving ahead on a key Readiness Project recommendation, the Patrick Administration today announced the development of the “College and Career Web Portal,” a new initiative designed to help prepare all Massachusetts students for college and career readiness and success.

The College and Career Web Portal will provide students with a single point of entry for the online tools needed to plan, prepare for, research, apply to and pay for college. The portal will be free and available to all Massachusetts students, beginning with those in middle school, and will play a key role in the Commonwealth’s overall efforts to promote college and career readiness and success. An RFP to build the site was recently issued, and can be found at www.mefa.org. Phase I will be launched in the spring of 2009.

The initiative supports the broad goal of the Governor’s Readiness Project to prepare every student for postsecondary education, career and lifelong economic, social and civic success. Specifically, the Governor’s Education Action Agenda, released in June, cited the need to prioritize the state’s commitment to and investment in a robust high school-to-college web portal.

“Success in the 21^st century global economy requires all students to continue their education beyond high school,” said Education Secretary Paul Reville. “We are committed to providing students with the tools they need to gain access to college and career training and believe that the College and Career Web Portal will help strengthen their ability to take advantage of the many opportunities offered in the Commonwealth and beyond.”

The College and Career Web Portal Project is collaboration among the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education, the Department of Higher Education and MEFA, the Massachusetts Educational Financing Authority. The portal is supported through a combination of federal and local resources including $1.75 million in federal College Access Challenge grant funding, and $1 million from MEFA.

“Massachusetts has a long and proud history of providing high quality public education that promotes academic achievement and success outside the classroom,” said Aundrea Kelley, Commissioner of the Department of Higher Education. “However, despite our many successes and rich learning environments, a myriad of issues continue to hold some of our students back from pursuing postsecondary education. While there is no silver bullet for solving these problems, a logical first step is to simplify the process through an all-inclusive, online venue for information and tools needed to be ready for and to succeed in college.”

Education Commissioner Mitchell Chester agreed.

"In today's global economy, no one should be deterred from pursuing a higher education and earning a degree" he said. "The development of this portal will be a critical step in our efforts to make higher education more accessible to a larger population of our students."

“Increasing access to higher education is a priority for MEFA,” said Thomas Graf, Executive Director of MEFA. “The College and Career Web Portal will provide earlier and more comprehensive support for students pursuing higher education. We are pleased to participate in providing Massachusetts students with this robust college access resource.”

The College and Career Web Portal will offer a significant number of online resources and tools for students, parents and guidance counselors to learn about and manage the college application and financing process. Students will be able to create their own personal account that can be used to store information about colleges, monitor progress toward high school graduation, and store data that can be used to populate application forms for college admission.

The website will also include test preparation tools, including practice exams and tutorials to prepare for tests such as the SAT; virtual campus tours; the ability to research potential scholarships and grants; tools to estimate the cost of college and apply for financial aid online, including the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA); the ability to track and manage multiple college applications and letters of recommendation; a common application to apply to colleges online; and a mechanism to send high school transcripts to colleges electronically.

Similar initiatives have been launched in nearby Rhode Island, as well as North Carolina, Georgia, Colorado and California, among others.