Centennial Senior Receives Full-Ride Wisconsin Scholarship Through Posse Foundation
Media Release
Centennial High School Senior Jonathan Valor recently accepted a full-tuition scholarship to the University of Wisconsin – Madison, courtesy of Posse Los Angeles. He was among 2,000 people who applied to be a Posse Scholar, and was one of 100 who was selected.
Valor plans on majoring in Psychology at Wisconsin and hopes to become a marriage and family therapist after college.
As both a scholar and athlete at Centennial, Valor is taking four AP classes as well as a college course his senior year. “The course load is very hard, but the teachers really care a lot about you, which means a lot,” he says. He was also a two-year starter on the varsity football team.
Valor is thankful for the role the high school staff played helping him get connected with the Posse Foundation.
“This school has really pushed me to have the ability to go to college,” he says of the Centennial College and Career Counseling Team. “I wasn’t actually going to apply for the Posse program, but I did, and I got it. I’m very happy to have people here who push me, who care about me, and who want me to do well.”
He says he values his education because neither his father or mother went to college, but they always encouraged him to get a college degree. “Ever since I was a young age, my parents preached education, education. It’s important for me too, because I want be able to help my parents when they retire.”
Getting a scholarship was important to Valor, who now lives in a single-parent family. “I always knew getting a scholarship would help my mother out and not take money out of her pocket to pay for me to go to school.”
The Posse Foundation is one of the most comprehensive and renowned college access and youth leadership development programs in the United States. Posse identifies, recruits, and trains individuals with extraordinary leadership potential. Posse Scholars receive full-tuition leadership scholarships from Posse’s partner colleges and universities. Since 1989, Posse’s partner colleges have awarded more than $2 billion in scholarships to Scholars.
Jonathan Valor is another Compton Success Story.