The Virginia Foundation for Community College Education

Rural Virginia Horseshoe Initiative

Expanding opportunity and transforming the educational and economic landscape of rural Virginia.

Fourteen of the state’s twenty-three community colleges are located in Virginia’s Rural Horseshoe, an arc of countryside stretching from the Eastern Shore to the far Southwest and up the Shenandoah Valley. The Rural Virginia Horseshoe Initiative (RVHI) is working to cut in half, from over 20% to under 10%, the number of residents living within the Rural Horseshoe who lack a high school diploma or its equivalent.

The Initiative also aims to double the percentage of rural residents who earn an associate degree or other college certification from 26% to 52%. RVHI places career coaches in rural high schools to guide students through the transition to college, and offers targeted scholarships for post-secondary degrees and certifications for students of all ages. The Initiative develops workforce training programs that can launch students into sustainable and rewarding careers.

Rural Virginia Horseshoe Initiative logo

Building the Bridge from High School to College to Career

Every teenager wrestles with questions about the future. In Virginia’s rural communities, thousands of high schoolers face these decisions on their own. But when students have a skilled and caring adult in their lives, remarkable things start to happen. Since its inception in 2014:

  • Approximately 51,000 students have been served by career coaches
  • 700+ individual student scholarships have been awarded
  •  28 coaches have been partially funded by the VFCCE

The coaches help students identify personal interests and talents, make career plans, and locate scholarships and financial aid that made college financially feasible. They help complete applications and forms. When necessary, they take students on college visits to show them what was possible. In less than ten years, the Foundation’s work has yielded a sharp increase in college attendance rates.

Student smiling

Our goals for the Rural Virginia Horseshoe Initiative are bold.

Cut in half the number of residents living within the Rural Horseshoe who lack a high school diploma or its equivalent from nearly 20 percent to 10 percent

Double the percentage of rural residents who earn an associate degree or other college certification from 26 percent to 52 percent

Double the number of participants in the Great Expectations program, as well as the number of foster youth who graduate with an associate degree or a workforce training certificate

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