WGU Missouri Launches Partnership with Urban League

In an effort to help expand access to affordable, high-quality, higher education across the St. Louis area, Clayton-based, nonprofit university WGU Missouri has announced it has entered into a new partnership with the Urban League of Metropolitan St. Louis. The two entities officially celebrated the launch of the partnership with a joint event, held on Friday, Dec. 15, at the Ferguson Community Empowerment Center. During the event, representatives from WGU Missouri presented the Urban League with 30 ThinkPad computers and committed to providing at least $20,000 in scholarships to Urban League’s staff, members and program participants.

The ThinkPad computers, valued at $16,500, will be used by Urban League’s Save our Sons participants at the Ferguson Community Empowerment Center. The initiative was started in 2015 after the unrest in Ferguson exposed the fact that many young African-American men in North St. Louis County were either unemployed or underemployed and did not have access to workforce preparation programs or job training. The program, which is held at the Ferguson Community Empowerment Center, lasts for four weeks and includes career/job readiness and retention training, job coaching, career inventory assessment, employment opportunities and more. The computers donated by WGU Missouri will help support program participants as they prepare to enter the workforce. To date, the program has helped 500 men with job placement.

“We are thrilled to be entering into this partnership with the Urban League and supporting their efforts to educate and prepare St. Louis’ underserved population for the workforce,” said Dr. Angie Besendorfer, WGU Missouri’s Chancellor. “WGU Missouri is committed to changing lives by giving all Missourians the opportunity to advance their education. This partnership will not only provide Urban League employees with greater access to high-quality, affordable education, it will also positively impact the many people served by the Urban League.”

As part of the event, Dr. Besendorfer presented the Urban League of Metropolitan St. Louis with an oversized check for $20,000. The check represents the amount of scholarship dollars the university is committing to Urban League staff, members and program participants who are interested in furthering their education at the fully online, nonprofit, competency-based university. WGU Missouri will also offer a five percent tuition discount to employees of the Urban League as part of the new partnership. The discount will apply to any of WGU Missouri’s 50+ undergraduate and graduate degree programs in business, information technology, education and health care.

“We greatly appreciate the laptops and scholarship support, as well as our new partnership with Western Governors University,” said Michael P. McMillan, President & CEO of the Urban League of Metropolitan St. Louis. “We look forward to providing the many new opportunities for advancement to our clients, members and staff through WGU.”

To learn more about the partnership between WGU Missouri and the Urban League of Metropolitan St. Louis, visit https://missouri.wgu.edu/landing/ulstl.