ABSTRACT
An African American man starting over after incarceration and homelessness writes, “The Odyssey Project helped me unwrap my gifts and rewrite the story of my life.” “Transformative education” and “life-long learning” are not just slogans or catchphrases for us; they capture a reality happening each Wednesday night in a low-income neighborhood in Madison, Wisconsin, as we offer free of charge a 2-semester, 6-credit humanities course designed to empower adults at the poverty level to overcome adversity and achieve dreams through higher education. Our hard-won successes over the past 14 years of the program may offer insights to others around the world seeking to raise retention rates for low-income, first-generation college students from racially diverse backgrounds who view themselves as “not college material.”
