When Oscar Ntakontagize won the green card lottery, he took a chance and moved to the United States on his own from Rwanda. “There’s more job opportunity here,” Ntakontagize said. “And also access to education.”
He arrived in the U.S. in 2014, settling in Dayton, Ohio. The southwestern Ohio city was an affordable place to start a life, in Ntakontagize’s eyes.
Some might know Dayton from the HBO documentary “The Last Truck,” which depicts GM’s decision to close its final Dayton-area manufacturing plant in 2008. GM was formerly one of the largest employers in the area.
Last fall, Ntakontagize enrolled in the local Sinclair Community College, a two-year institution serving approximately 30,000 students in the Dayton area. He had considered four-year schools, but Sinclair was the most cost-effective option out there.
Fortuitously for Ntakontagize, Sinclair initiated a closer transfer partnership with the University of Dayton (UD), a private, four-year Catholic institution in the area, the same year he enrolled. Students had transferred from Sinclair to UD in the past, but school officials wanted to make that transition more seamless.
This past fall, the two schools welcomed the first cohort of six students to the UD Sinclair Academy, a new joint venture intended to bridge the distance between the two schools. One of the most significant barriers to students transferring to a four-year school from a two-year school is course transferability, according to Julia Thompson, associate director of admission and financial aid at UD.
“Course transferability is a huge hurdle for students and the schools that they’re looking at,” Thompson said. “And really understanding from the very beginning are they making the right choices about taking classes that they know down the road will be transferable and will get them that degree in a timely manner.”
