Federal TRIO Programs are designed to provide services from disadvantaged backgrounds and serve low-income individuals, first-generation college students, and individuals with disabilities. The goal of the TRIO programs is to help students progress from middle school to postbaccalaureate programs. There are eight different TRIO Programs: Educational Opportunity Centers (EOC), Ronald E. McNair Postbaccalaureate Achievement Program (McNair), Student Support Services (SSS), Talent Search (TS), Upward Bound (UB), Upward Bound Math-Science (UBMS), Veterans Upward Bound (VUB), and a Training Program for Federal TRIO Programs Staff. If there are 8 programs, why are they collectively called TRIO? Let’s take a look at how the programs were founded.
President Lyndon Johnson declares the “War on Poverty” in
1964 and signs the Economic Opportunity Act of 1964 into law later that year;
this allowed the U.S. Office of Economic Opportunity (OEO) to be established,
and the office generated many new social welfare programs, including a
college-preparatory demonstration projected called Upward Bound. In the summer
of 1965, the first group of Upward Bound students participate in summer
programs hosted by 17 different institutions across the nation.
In 1965, President Johnson signed the Higher Education Act
of 1965 (HEA), which authorized Talent Search to be created. Talent Search’s
mission was to identify “exceptionally talented, exceptionally needy” students
(TRIO History). In 1966, The
U.S. Office of Education administers the first 42 Talent Search projects,
serving approximately 50,000 students.
The first reauthorization of the Higher Education Act took
place in 1968. Congress created a new program for undergraduate college
students: Special Services for Disadvantaged Students (currently known as
Student Support Services). In 1970, the Office of Education funded the first
118 Special Services for Disadvantaged Students, serving a total of 30,000
students.
The three programs (Upward Bound, Talent Search, Special
Services for Disadvantaged Students) informally became known as the TRIO
Programs.
Want to know more about the history of TRIO and how the
other TRIO programs came about? Check out the Council for Opportunity in
Education’s “TRIO History” website: https://coenet.org/trio-history/
