Project Hope Alliance will offer a scholarship-matching program to enable homeless parents to earn high school diplomas via the Career Online High School. Project Hope sees this partnership as a key step in improving these families’ standard of living while breaking the cycle of poverty and joblessness that accompanies lack of educational attainment.

Project Hope Alliance has become the newest partner in the ed2go/Smart Horizons Career Online Education (SHCOE) Clinton Global Initiative Commitment to Action agreement. The agreement includes a scholarship-matching program, which will provide a total of 50 Career Online High School (COHS) scholarships to homeless parents in Orange County, California.

“Thirty percent of the parents we serve do not have more than a ninth grade education,” said Jennifer Friend, CEO of Project Hope Alliance. “COHS is a tool to empower the parents to invest in and support their children’s education.”

Established in 1989, Project Hope Alliance is a California-based nonprofit organization dedicated to ending the cycle of homelessness. Project Hope works to eliminate barriers to academic performance and cognitive development created by the circumstances of childhood homelessness. By providing opportunities for the parents themselves to increase their level of educational attainment, the organization helps undereducated parents increase household earning as well as their ability to share in the educational development of their children without a sense of shame or incompetence.

SHCOE, the world’s first AdvancED/SACS accredited online school district, and ed2go, the largest provider of turnkey online training and part of Cengage Learning, partnered in 2012 to establish COHS, which enables students to earn both an accredited high school diploma and credentialed career certificate. In 2013, ed2go/SHCOE created a Clinton Global Initiative Commitment to Action to launch a first-of-its-kind scholarship-matching program targeting the millions of adults in the United States without high school diplomas.

By joining this effort, Project Hope will make COHS available to parents in the homeless families it serves, many of whom live in motels, shelters, or as part of multiple-family arrangements in apartments. These parents will be able to access the COHS program either in their places of residence or in special blended learning labs, the first of which is opening in Costa Mesa, CA.

Friend describes Project Hope Alliance as “child-centric” but understands the importance of addressing the educational needs of parents. “A high school diploma increases their earning potential, which in turn creates a more stable environment,” she said.

“I am very impressed with the COHS system. It is unique because it was created to address the challenges faced by high school dropouts and set them up for success. A lot of these parents work more than one job, so it’s also important to offer a program that can be accessed at all hours,” Friend said. “There are 28,000 homeless children in Orange County and this new partnership helps us in our mission to end the cycle of homelessness one child at a time.”

About Project Hope Alliance
Project Hope Alliance is a nonprofit 501(c)(3) based in Orange County, California. Its mission is to move homeless families out of motels and shelters into affordable homes of their own, and to provide homeless children a proper education and brighter future. The Project Hope Alliance exists to end family homelessness through exceptional education and financial stability. The programs funded by Project Hope Alliance eliminate the barriers homeless students experience that prevent them from attending and succeeding in school, and increase family stability by moving homeless families into permanent housing. For more information visit www.projecthopealliance.org.

About the Clinton Global Initiative
Established in 2005 by President Bill Clinton, the Clinton Global Initiative (CGI), an initiative of Bill, Hillary & Chelsea Clinton Foundation, convenes global leaders to create and implement innovative solutions to the world’s most pressing challenges. CGI Annual Meetings have brought together more than 150 heads of state, 20 Nobel Prize laureates, and hundreds of leading CEOs, heads of foundations and NGOs, major philanthropists, and members of the media. To date CGI members have made more than 2,300 commitments, which are already improving the lives of more than 400 million people in over 180 countries. When fully funded and implemented, these commitments will be valued at $73.5 billion.

CGI also convenes CGI America, a meeting focused on collaborative solutions to economic recovery in the United States, and CGI University (CGI U), which brings together undergraduate and graduate students to address pressing challenges in their community or around the world, and, this year, CGI Latin America, which will bring together Latin American leaders to identify, harness, and strengthen ways to improve the livelihoods of people in Latin America and around the world. For more information, visit clintonglobalinitiative.org and follow us on Twitter @ClintonGlobal and Facebook at facebook.com/clintonglobalinitiative.

About Smart Horizons Career Online Education
Smart Horizons Career Online Education, founded in 2009 and located in Pensacola, Florida, is a private, AdvancED/SACS accredited online school district. AdvancED/SACS District accreditation signifies that SHCOE and all of its schools are fully accredited and that SHCOE is recognized across the nation as a quality school system. Smart Horizons Career Online Education offers 18-credit, career-based high school diploma programs that are designed to prepare students for entrance into the workplace. Career certificate offerings include Childcare Education, Office Management, Protection Services, Homeland Security, Transportation Services, Professional Skills, Retail Customer Service Skills, and Food & Customer Service Skills. For more information, visit our website at www.shcoe.org, call our office at 855.777.4265 or email us at info@shcoe.org.