M. Michelle Mattox
Achievers Scholars Program
Garfield High School
400 23rd Ave
Seattle, WA 98122
206-252-2282 GHS office
206-931-6768 mobile/text
mmattox@collegesuccessfoundation.org

I am one of your College Access Providers (CAPs) here in the building. I am writing to give you info about who CSF (College Success Foundation) is, the CSF Scholars program and how we are a unique college access program, and to ask your help in recruiting eligible Juniors to the program.

The College Success Foundation is in our 14th year Statewide, and our fifth year here at the Dawghouse. Our founder Bob Craves, who is also a Coscto founder, opened our doors to provide low-income students scholarships for college, and mentors to guide them in the journey to college while in high school. Our HERO staff and AmeriCorp Coaches begin working with students in 7th grade, and we continue to work with them thru their undergraduate career and often beyond. Our students come back to CSF as mentors, AmeriCorp Coaches, and increasingly as CSF employees; my HERO colleague here at Garfield, Josh Bellinger, is a Cohort 1 Achiever J As busy as you are, I invite you to peruse our website, College Success Foundation.

Here at Garfield, I recruit and work with Juniors thru their Senior year. Our programming is similar to College Access Now and Y Scholars in that we conduct workshops with our students on writing college essays, preparing for the SAT/ACT, and filling out college applications. Our program is unique in that we meet with our students year-round (Summer programming includes an 3-day, 2-night stay on a Washington college campus). We also, as I stated earlier, provide each of our students a 1:1 mentor to walk them thru the Senior year college application and acceptance process. In addition, I supplement what you wonderful teachers and counselors do in and out of the classroom by following the academic progress of the students enrolled in the CSF Scholars program. I will, like you, encourage our students and, along with you and their mentors, assist them however I can to ensure academic success.

Hopefully I’ve given you a decent overview of the CSF Scholars and my role here at Garfield. Now I humbly ask that you help me to identify any Free/Reduced Meals and/or College Bound Scholarship students that you feel would benefit from being a part of this program. CAN, Y Scholars and Upward Bound are awesome, and I am always excited to work alongside such stellar programs. We are all here to help fill the gap in serving all of GHS’s low-income, deserving students. Please listen for announcements of our collaborative events and fieldtrips for all Bulldog students.

Our other staff member work with CSF is Joshua Bellinger, see his announcement also.

Please refer Juniors to me in room 121. I am happy to answer any questions, and would very much appreciate coming to your classroom to speak with your Juniors, as our application deadline is November 4th. All of my contact info is below. I thank you, truly, for your hard work as teachers!

Sincerely,

-MindaMichelle

Hello Everyone,

I wanted to send you all a quick introduction email and let you all know how blessed I am to be working with you all this year. I know I have met a few of you all over the summer while running the credit retrival summer program here.

My name is Josh Bellinger and I am the new HERO Advisor with the College Success Foundation. Many of you know my collegeaue M.Michelle Mattox we now share an office down in room 121. My hope is that I will have the opportunity to meet you all in the following weeks to say hello.

As a HERO Advisor I will be specifically working with you all to ensure the success for our incoming 9th graders, and also working with 10th graders my goal is to be a great resource for you all.

I am so excited to be working at Garfield High School, and I am excited to assist in helping all students are Garfield be successful. All of my contact information is below so please do not hesitate to contact me for anything.

Thank you and Go Bulldogs!

Make it a Great Year!

Joshua Bellinger
HERO Advisor
Garfield High School
Washington Middle School
College Success Foundation
Cell: 206-397-7220
Work: 206-252-2282
jbellinger@collegesuccessfoundation.org