You are here

GEAR UP Spring Break Trip Introduces Students to HBCUs

Tuesday, April 29, 2025


Over Spring Break, 34 GEAR UP students, 5 DPI Chaperones, 1 Bus Driver, and 1 service dog (Lala) embarked on a 5 day, 4 night driving tour to visit Historically Black Colleges and Universities! The group visited five college campuses and traveled to five different states, getting a taste of what higher education possibilities might be in their futures.

A group of GEAR UP students pose together under the Chicago State University banner.
Group picture at Chicago State University.
Students walk down the "yellow brick road" which is an outdoor path painted to look like the yellow brick road from the Wiz.
Walking down the “Yellow Brick Road” at Kentucky State University.
Students pose in front of the Grand Ole Opry.
Group picture outside the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, TN.
Students pose outside the gates of Fisk University.
Group pic at Fisk! Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall was an alum.
Students visit Tennessee State University, where they pose in front of balloons and the university's blue "TSU Tigers" logo
Students visited Tennessee State University, where Oprah Winfrey attended college.
The students pose in front of the Gateway Arch in St. Louis.
Students pose in front of the Gateway Arch in St. Louis. They went all the way to the top!
Students pose in front of a red brick building at their final stop-- Harris Stowe University.
Final group picture in front of Harris Stowe State University. 

GEAR UP (Gaining Early Awareness and Readiness for Undergraduate Programs) is a discretionary grant program designed to increase the number of low-income students who are prepared to enter and succeed in postsecondary education. GEAR UP provides six-year or seven year grants to states and partnerships to provide services at high-poverty middle and high schools. GEAR UP funds are also used to provide college scholarships to low-income students.

Wisconsin GEAR UP (WIGU) is a State grant. State grants are competitive matching grants that must include both an early intervention component designed to increase college attendance and success and raise the expectations of low-income students and a scholarship component. In 2019, Governor Tony Evers designated the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction Wisconsin Educational Opportunity Program (WEOP) as the sole state agency to administer the GEAR UP grant. The GEAR UP grant is funded through the US Department of Education. 

Learn more about the GEAR UP program on the DPI's web site. 

Return to main ConnectEd index