Quinnipiac Avenue has become New Haven’s first million-dollar “Promise” street. That means that families living on the east-end avenue have cumulatively received over $1 million worth of college scholarships for their kids through the New Haven Promise program. Promise — which p ays most of the cost of college for New Haven public school students who maintain a B average and do community service — announced that ranking as the program itself reached a milestone: It turns 16 years old on Nov. 9. Executive Director Patricia Melton offered that Quinnipiac statistic Thursday during a broader discussion about Promise’s first 16 years and plans for the next 16 on WNHH FM’s “Dateline New Haven” program. Promise launched with high civic hopes in 2010. Then-Mayor John DeStefano portrayed it as a life-changing opportunity for every New Haven student to attain the American Dream regardless of their family’s income. Since then, New Haven Promise has enabled or helped 3,000 students to attend Connecticut-based colleges or HBCUs (historically black colleges and universities). Promise kept: “We’ve definitely made college affordable,” Melton said. Melton’s planning a year of activities highlighting the stories of Promise graduates and culminating in a spring “Sweet 16” gala. Melton, a first-generation college student who graduated from Yale, returned to New Haven to run the program in 2012. She has built confidence among funders (chief among them Yale, Yale New Haven Health, and the Community Foundation for Greater New Haven) to pull in $48 million and counting for New Haveners’ scholarships. She also tapped employers to provide summer internships to Promise recipients in order to start them on post-college career paths. Many of the students kept their New Haven roots after graduation, buying homes and starting families here. About 70 percent of the 3,000 Promise “scholars” were the first in their families to attend college. Like other broad-based programs such as Social Security, New Haven Promise has enjoyed widespread support in part because everyone can benefit from it regardless of income. “We have scholars that come from every neighborhood, every street, every type of home,” Melton noted. The national “Promise” college scholarship movement has grown over the past 16 years, with around 300 such programs around the country, according to Melton. The lesson so far is that the most successful programs grow from grassroots community-based knowledge and direction. “It really gets back to local,” Melton said. “Folks want the American dream for their children, and those children want the American dream for themselves,” Melton said. “Communities really pull together to try to make that happen.  Here in town, New Haven Promise is moving around the corner of its cramped Lincoln Way space to a larger suite on Whitney Avenue. It will use the space to expand its mission by involving program graduates more in public service and become civic leaders — part of Promise emerging into institutional “adulthood” as it marks its Sweet 16th. By the way, the runners-up to Quinnipiac for top Promise-grantee streets are Eastern Street, then Townsend Avenue, then Central Avenue. Click on the above video to watch the full conversation with New Haven Promise Executive Director Patricia Melton. Click here to subscribe or here to listen to other episodes of “Dateline New Haven.” Click here to download the WNHH FM app. The post New Haven Promise Marks Sweet 16 appeared first on New Haven Independent. ...read more read less