The Penn Foster Blog

By definition, Nikkiya Gentry was a "typical" high school dropout. She didn't have a diploma and had no high school credits. But if you delve deeper into Nikkiya's inspirational story, you discover she was far from any of the stereotypes some people hold about high school dropouts.

Administered by the U.S. Department of Labor, Job Corps is a federally funded job training and educational program, and serves as an alternative for youth who are unable to learn in a traditional academic environment.  Job Corps runs 125 centers serving roughly 60,000 young people across the country each year who are between the ages of 16 and 24 and meet certain criteria. Job Corps functions as a full-service school which educates and trains individuals to embark on educational and professional pursuits, such as:

The Dorsey Schools and Penn Foster have been working together on a High School Completion program since the Fall of 2013 and have brought the program to six campus locations in the Detroit and Michigan area.  The program provides interested students with the chance to earn a high school diploma and has helped Dorsey campuses boost enrollments, increase awareness in the community and helped people change their lives through education. Together they have graduated 200 students with a fully accredited diploma who now have the opportunity to continue their education or go out into the marketplace with superior credentials.  Since launching the program just over a year ago, Dorsey is about to graduate its first Penn Foster high school student from their Culinary Arts program this month. Dorsey and Penn Foster both have a long history in their communities and are committed to helping people through education.  The two schools have been educating Americans for over 200 years and are looking into new ways online and blended solutions can help them reach and support more people in our communities.

Penn Foster recently welcomed Beckfield College into our family of career college partners, offering our high school completion program to local students in the Florence, KY and Tri-County Cincinnati areas.

Last week, The Native Society sat down with Penn Foster CEO Frank Britt to talk about his career journey to CEO of an education company, industry trends effecting Penn Foster and its partner institutions, and what's next for this 124-year old company. Here is an excerpt from the interview:

It's no secret that enrollments have been declining at Career Colleges nationwide. With 6 million Americans age 25 to 39 years old lacking a high school or equivalency diploma1, and increasingly limited options to earn their diploma due to changes to the GED and the elimination of Ability to Benefit, many Career Colleges are turning away a growing number potential enrollments that are unable to meet POG requirements. Often times, these non-completers seek out local career colleges as they strive towards improving their marketable skills for in-demand careers " representing a large, but ultimately unqualified, market of interested students.

Like so many other schools and businesses, life within Penn Foster operates at breakneck speed. "Breakneck" is increasingly the default gear for life in 21st Century America.  With 24/7 access to the Information Superhighway securely tethered to everyone's hip pocket, the expectations and deadlines packaged as digital 1's and O's never stop arriving in your inbox.

At Penn Foster, our mission is to provide accessible, affordable education to all. Through the power of education, we strive to build up student confidence for success in further academic pursuits and future careers.  This year, we've made some significant strides towards this, thanks to the support and efforts of our incredible partner network and the communities and students they serve.

Life is complicated and there is no shortage of financial, academic, motivational and societal blockers that could derail an individual from continuing with a college education. Without the knowledge or motivation to seek support from available resources, these students see leaving school as their only option.