The link between enabling residents access to a better education and providing resident businesses access to a better workforce is crucial for our region to thrive. DEF projects will continue to assist and support the people of our communities, businesses, and schools so that the value and importance of education in our region will grow and all will benefit.

Financial Aid Clearinghouse

College/Career Access Program

This project involves continually updating and compiling information on scholarships sponsored locally or where local students have a priority, as opposed to national scholarships where one competes with students all over the nation. These scholarships provide financial aid for individuals including: graduating high school seniors, high school graduates returning to school, as well as college undergraduates and graduate students wishing to further their education and/or skills. This information is accessible from this website thanks to grant monies from the Lower Shore Workforce Alliance and our partnership with the Wicomico Public Library.

DEF will further develop this project and continue to expand DEF-CCAP, our College/Career Access Program in this region by working to secure funding through grants and donations. DEF-CCAP has been made possible by funding from the Maryland Higher Education Commission (MHEC), the Rural Maryland Council (RMC), and the Jack Kent Cooke Foundation and support from local educational institutions, businesses, and individuals. In 2007 this program grew thanks to a GEAR UP grant from MHEC via the University of Maryland Eastern Shore, and an additional grant from RMC. For more about DEF-CCAP click the purple highlighted area above.

*Join those who have contributed to DEF and the DEF-CCAP Last Dollar Scholarship Fund.

DEF forms Delmarva High Schools Principals Network - read more about this important initiative (May 2007)

DEF has developed the DEF Delmarva Common Scholarship Application to facilitate the scholarship application process for local students and organizations. If you or your group sponsors or administers a scholarship for which Delmarva students would be eligible and you would like to use this application please contact us (Contact Us page link). DEF received grants from the Rural Development Center at UMES, an EDA University Center, to initiate and follow through on this project in 2007. DEF held a Financial Aid Forum in 2005 for area high school guidance counselors, college financial aid officers, and representatives from organizations that provide scholarships to local students to discuss ideas for streamlining the scholarship application process in general and to look at the pros and cons of a regional common scholarship application. The group looked at samples and offered suggestions to DEF for a draft of a local common scholarship application and ways to promote awareness of such a resource to local scholarship sponsors for which it would be useful.

Visit www.skipjack.net to read Scholarships for Delmarvans by Jackie Lanza Jennings.

The Shirley B. Harting Regional Education Information Center (REIC)

Complementary to our college/career access program, DEF is establishing an inventory about local programs available that further education and/or skills for local residents. Our aim is to be able to tell anyone where he or she can get the education and training in our region for most careers or jobs. Additionally, information on our local schools (private and public, academic and technical, pre-elementary to post-secondary), home schooling groups, libraries, tutoring services, GED classes and other resources that provide the opportunity to gain more knowledge or skills is being compiled, becoming a significant resource for our seven-county region. Grants and donations will provide the funds to enhance this service.

Rural Education: Research and Policy

Through the leadership of Dr. Sharon Clark and our association with the national rural education network, DEF will find passageways for exploring and sharing the special nature of our region with others and thus bring to our communities whatever benefits that research makes possible. With the proper funding, DEF will be able to establish a Center for Rural Education: Research and Policy that would function as the research and development arm of this region's numerous educational systems.

DEF hosted a Rural Education Symposium in 2003 to bring together active members of the national rural education and policy research community with our regional educational leadership to share what is known about rural education policy and research across the United States.

By following up in 2004 with a Forum on Place-Based Education, an instructional strategy with a background of proven success in rural areas similar to ours, we have kept our commitment to provide more information about this learning method and its potential benefits to our region.