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Wilmington educator in Washington to help promote legislation before Congress

TeenSHARP
Tatiana Poladko

Sen. Chris Coons (D-Delaware) is spotlighting Wilmington’s college-level tutoring program TeenSHARP, along with two other national programs, to help bring attention to education legislation.

Coons is cosponsoring The American Dream Accounts Act with Florida Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FLA). Among other things, the bill would create online savings accounts for low income students.

To help promote the measure, Coons is hosting a series of Higher ED Innovation Briefings. The first of which is this week and features TeenSHARP CEO Tatiana Poladko. TeenSHARP opened its new headquarters in Wilmington late last year, where it seeks out high performing, low-income students for its afterschool programs.

“I’m hoping to specifically, kind of, talk about: what are the structures that need to be in place in order for us to truly create opportunity for students that have been historically excluded,” said Poladko.

Poladko says she will discuss the success of her own organization, and add to the conversation on federal education legislation—not exclusively the Coons-Rubio bill.

“Around the reauthorization of the Higher Education Act and the role of federal government in lowering the barriers to college access and college success for underrepresented youth,” she said.

In a statement, Coons said it’s critical to further highlight the power of college savings accounts, mentorship and other pre-college interventions that increase college access.

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