When you talk to Allaura Osborne, her passion and drive is enthralling. Allaura is from Raleigh, North Carolina and will be freshman at Harvard this year, majoring in Government and Math with a minor in Spanish and a focus on Pre-Law. She will also be a part of the Harvard’s Track and Field Throwing Team and has big dreams for her future. She would ultimately like to be a lobbyist for nonprofits. But once upon a time, Allaura thought school was boring. Can you imagine it? 

A student this driven, this enthusiastic about her future once disliked school. Allaura’s story is the story of many American kids today. Her assigned public school did not fit her academic needs. In elementary school, Allaura was put on a gifted track at her assigned school. Every week, she had meetings with other gifted students where she could solve more complex problems and where she felt encouraged and challenged. But by middle school, the experiences for “gifted students” at her assigned school were monthly at best, and they no longer felt challenging to Allaura.

As she reflected on her years prior to receiving her North Carolina Opportunity Scholarship, Allaura also realized that she did not feel “known” by her teachers. She was bored and frustrated, and yet her teachers were unaware and disconnected. But after receiving the Opportunity Scholarship, she was able to attend North Raleigh Christian Academy (NRCA). When describing her experience at her new school in an interview, Allaura wrote: 

By moving schools, I was able to challenge myself as they offered a myriad of classes, some hard, some easy, but I could take what I wanted. I was able to take the classes that challenged me, and I grew as a student and person throughout it. 

Not only was I challenged academically, but I also got the close knit community I so desperately desired. I knew my teachers and they KNEW me, the real me, not just the in school Allaura. 

Through changing schools I was also introduced to opportunities I would not have experienced if I had attended my assigned school. NRCA participated in Youth and Government (YAG), and this was one of the most pivotal extracurriculars I participated in. It has spurred professional and personal growth and also opened doors to even more opportunities such as the Conference of National Affairs and paging for the Governor.

Allaura is the oldest of five children in a single parent household, four of her siblings being quadruplets. For her mother, the Opportunity Scholarship felt like the only opportunity to send her children to a school other than their assigned public school. As Allaura described her boredom in school, I couldn’t help but be reminded of Raj Chetty’s research on “Lost Einsteins,” where Chetty wrote, 

This fact may be the starkest: Low-income students who are among the very best math students — those who score in the top 5 percent of all third graders — are no more likely to become inventors than below-average math students from affluent families.

What a statistic. Don’t you want to live in a country where opportunity is not connected to affluency? Academic rigor, meaningful mentoring relationships, exposure to new ideas - the Opportunity Scholarship, as Allaura pointed out, gives students access to these types of experiences. More students like Allaura should be allowed to attend schools that fit their academic needs. As she put it, these students, “They are our future, and I think that this is exactly what the scholarship does, it supports the youth and invests in the leaders of tomorrow.” 

Don’t let more students in your community stay stuck in schools that don’t fit their needs. Consider Allaura’s story, and consider how you might impact the story of another student in her same shoes.