Our PR program starts at the 7th grade to ensure that middle school students are prepared to make a smooth transition to high school.

College Tour:

Students from Elyria, Lorain and Oberlin visit schools in and outside the State of Ohio. You can click here and view a College Tour Video.

Career Exploration: Our college readiness starts with Careers-to-College, LCUL's Career Exploration, which encourages students as young as 10 years old to name what they want to be when they grow up. We support their goals with career specific mentoring; they get a chance to meet someone in their chosen profession and learn about what it would take to achieve that goal.

This program, a partnership between MERCY (formerly Community Health Partners) and the Lorain County Urban League (LCUL) completed its 5th year in August 2011.

The Rising Stars program provides a highly unique month long paid medical internship for 4-5 selected high school students who want to pursue careers in the Medical field. Selected participants spend the month of July in a 40 hour per week Medical Exploration experience which enables them to experience all facets of patient care within a medical environment. The goal of the program is to teach aspiring medical students the important role that all departments within a medical facility play in providing the best service possible to patients seeking medical attention in today's hospitals. Participants will experience multiple fields ranging from oncology, surgery, and obstetrics, the hospital emergency room and any other field of interest that they are curious about or may wish to pursue in the future. They will also work in human resources, marketing, accounting, housekeeping, the cafeteria and other areas which make significant contributions to patient care. At the conclusion of the internship participants will have secured a host of mentors and friends which they can call upon as they continue their journey towards a career in the medical field.

Along with the 4-5 new interns accepted each year, MERCY also invites back many completing interns every year to continue exploring new areas and serve as mentors for incoming interns. Although our target areas are Lorain, Elyria and Oberlin, any Lorain County student can apply.

Eligibility: To be eligible for a Rising Starts paid Medical Internship you must:

• Be at least a sophomore attenting school within Lorain County;
• Be 16 years of age or about to turn 16;
• Have a respectible cumulative grade point average;
• Have no other commitments during the month of July of the year accepted;
• Secure recommendations of two teachers or 1 principal at your high school;
• Have a strong desire to succeed and serve as an ambassador of both the MERCY medical system and the LCUL for the duration of your internship.
• Convince the selection committee that you are ready for this coveted internship.

Application Process:

• Contact Project Director Michael Ferrer at 440-336-1501 and mferrer@lcul.org to explain why you want this internship;
• Follow-up from the time you apply to the time you are accepted for the internship;
• Provide any and all information requested of you throughout the application process;

Note: Grades alone will not secure this internship. Final decisions are based on a combination of grades, desire, levels of commitment and other objective and subjective criteria.

Partnerships with Service Learning programs at Oberlin College and Lorain County Community College help our students to engage in meaningful community service projects designed to teach them about the value of serving others and giving back to the community.

A majority of the first generation and low-income students that we serve have not traveled beyond Lorain County. It is a huge cultural shock to them when we visit a big university campus as The Ohio State University that is almost as big and as populous as the City of Lorain. The cultural and global components of Project Ready are designed to engage student in discussions about class, race, ethnicity and multi-cultural issues. We use college visits to reinforce what they are learning by putting them in a position to interact with international students.

Contact Tina Allen, Project Ready Director, tallen@lcul.org, for more information about Project Ready.