200 LAUSD Girls Gather at the Millennium Biltmore Hotel to Take Charge of Their Future

Listen to the full audio story

Download the MP3

The Los Angeles Unified School District is facing budget cuts and tough times. But some programs out there are trying to help students succeed. Here is a look at one of them.

Tens of thousands of students drop out of the LAUSD every year. But the nearly 200 girls gathered today in the Millennium Biltmore Hotel have a different plan. All of them want to go to college.

MOSTE (Motivating Our Students Through Experience), a grassroots mentoring organization, wants to help them get there. The group matches underprivileged seventh and eighth grade girls with mentors, and helps them prepare for high school, college and careers.

Mentee Amairani Gonzalez says she now wants to go to Princeton or USC.

MOSTE is a really good program, and they help you go to college, she says. You get scholarships, and it leads you on your way through college to become someone really important.

For students who have never thought about attending college, touring campuses can open new possibilities. For mentor Michelle Owens, it was eye-opening in another way.

You know, I took it for granted that as you are finishing high school, you apply to colleges, you go on campus visits, she says. I now realize what a limited perspective that is. For a large percentage of todays middle school and high school population, not going to college can seem like the only option.

MOSTEs office administrator, Monique Watts, says she wishes she had had a similar program to guide her along.

There was nothing like this that I was aware of growing up, and so I just had to wing it, she says. I didnt have anybody to mentor me along.

All the seniors in the program this year are graduating and going to college.

Ariel Edwards-Levy, Annenberg Radio News.