BRUNSWICK — Bowdoin College, along with more than 100 colleges and universities nationwide, is working with the American Talent Initiative to help draw more low-income students. This push coincides with recent efforts to diversify the student population, including veterans interested in pursuing higher education.

The American Talent Initiative is a “nationwide alliance” between schools essentially networking to share ideas on how to recruit and retain low-income students, according to Whitney Soule Dean of Admissions and Student Aid. Lower-income students are less likely to graduate from a four-year school, the talent initiative published in its 2018 report.

More than 75 percent of bachelor’s degrees are granted to young adults from the top half of the income distribution and more than half of students at the colleges and universities with the highest graduation rates come from families in the top-20 percent income bracket, the report said.

“There is talent and wonderful minds all over this country,” Soule said. “Low-income students are less likely to find themselves at competitive schools like Bowdoin if they think they’re too expensive, so we want to make sure we can do whatever we can to put Bowdoin in front of them and show them what we have to offer.”

With tuition, room and board and student fees, Bowdoin costs about $68,620 per year without financial aid, which roughly half of the 1,800 students receive, Soule said. 

For students whose families make less than $30,001 per year, Bowdoin typically covers all but $4,200 in student aid. That remaining $4,200 for domestic students is expected to be met through an average $2,300 summer earnings and $1,900 through a campus job, according to the school’s website.

The drive is not just to recruit students to come to the schools, Soule said, but to help them find schools that will be a good match and help increase the potential for graduation.

“We hope to reach students who may not have heard of a small school in Maine,” she added.

This year, Bowdoin also rolled out a new initiative to help identify and recruit veteran students in a school with an “almost non-existent” older, non-traditional student population.

“We are educating students for the world in which we live,” and the student body should be representational of that world, Soule said, calling the talent initiative “inspiring.”

By 2025, the American Talent Initiative hopes to make quality education accessible for more than 50,000 additional students.

Since the 2016/2017 school year, the group has increased enrollment of students who receive federal Pell grants — which, unlike loans, do not need to be repaid — by more than 7,000; 15 percent of the overall goal.

“We are committed making higher education accessible,” said Bowdoin College President Clayton Rose in a statement. “We’re proud to be part of (this) effort.”

hlaclaire@timesrecord.com