Aliana awakens at 4:00 a.m. She quietly dresses and goes out into the single-digit cold of the Colorado Plateau to start her car, so the ice will melt from her windows, and the vehicle will warm up. Back inside, she brushes her teeth and hair and gathers her school supplies and the breakfast and lunch she prepared for herself the night before. She slips out silently, so as not to awaken her family. She has to be at her 8:00 a.m. biology class at Northland Pioneer College’s Little Colorado Campus in Winslow, Arizona, a one-way trip of over 170 miles. It will take her almost three hours, barring any delays due to winter driving conditions. It is a journey the 18-year-old makes three times every week. She is dedicated to completing the prerequisites for admission into the college’s nursing program. Aliana dreams of becoming a pediatric nurse and caring for the children of her beloved Navajo Nation.

For anyone not familiar with rural, northeastern Arizona, Aliana’s story is astonishing. But Aliana is not an atypical NPC student. NPC Friends and Family is devoted to helping the most dedicated, courageous college students you will ever encounter. Northland Pioneer College (NPC) serves all of Arizona’s Navajo and Apache counties, a rural, remote area of over 21,000 square miles that encompasses the tribal lands of the Navajo, Hopi, and White Mountain Apache people. Poverty is endemic across the college's service area, yet our students are determined to empower themselves through education. For NPC students, many of whom are the first generation in their families ever to attend college, scholarships are more than just financial assistance. For the students who receive them, scholarships are a validation of their endeavor to succeed in earning a post-secondary degree. Many balance college programs with work and support of children and elders. Because of the remote nature of the service area, many students, like Aliana, drive literally hundreds of miles each week to attend their classes.

These students ask nothing; they expect nothing. They lack nothing in the way of ability, dedication, or desire. Financial constraints are the greatest barrier they face on the path to a college degree. The scholarships NPC Friends and Family is able to provide supplement expenses, such as the cost of tuition, books, fees, travel, and child care. More than that though, they encourage these inspiring students to persist, in spite of the many socioeconomic barriers they face. Success in post-secondary education positively impacts a student's entire life, the lives of their family members, and their communities. Through increased job opportunities and earning power, NPC graduates are literally breaking the cycle of poverty, improving income, reducing dependence on social programs, and serving as an example to friends and family members that attaining a college degree – a goal that will serve them all their lives, and that no one can ever take from them - is not only desirable, it is attainable.

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