2020–2024 FIVE-YEAR IMPACT REPORT
A small, timely investment can keep a financially vulnerable STEM student on track to graduation and open the door to a life-changing career. From 2020 through 2024, Last Mile invested more than $11 million in over 9,000 students—and built a national model for protecting talent already within reach of the finish line.
Five years. One powerful proof point.
THE YEAR IN REVIEW
The model works. Now it is time to scale it.
Last Mile began with a simple conviction: capable students should not lose years of educational investment because of a financial barrier at the wrong moment.
During our first five years, we turned that conviction into a national model. We delivered rapid, flexible support to students pursuing high-demand STEM degrees, built partnerships across education and industry, and demonstrated that students facing financial vulnerability persist and graduate when the right support arrives at the right time.
2019–2024
From an urgent idea to a national safety net.
Last Mile was founded in 2019 by Ruthe Farmer, Rian Ferria, and Sarah Lee, PhD, who saw the same systemic failure from different vantage points: financially vulnerable students were reaching the final stretch of technical degrees only to be derailed by barriers that had nothing to do with their talent or ability.
What began as a test of rapid emergency funding during the COVID-19 lockdown grew into a national organization reaching thousands of students each year.
THE MILEMARKERS
National Reach. Targeted Intervention.
Last Mile students attend community colleges, four-year universities, minority-serving institutions, and graduate programs across the country. They are pursuing degrees that lead to high-demand careers, but they are doing so without the financial safety nets many traditional systems assume students have.
Their most common needs are not extraordinary. They are tuition balances, housing, utility bills, certification fees, and the devices required to participate in modern technical education.
THE STUDENTS
Talent already in the pipeline — and too often overlooked.
Students from the lowest income quartile leave college without a degree at dramatically higher rates than their more affluent peers. The problem is not a lack of talent or commitment. It is the cumulative effect of navigating higher education without financial margin.
Last Mile students are working multiple jobs, supporting family members, managing food and housing insecurity, and pursuing demanding technical degrees—often at institutions with fewer advising, recruiting, and career-development resources.
Financial vulnerability is not a measure of potential. It is a temporary barrier with a practical solution.
WHY THE MODEL WORKS
Not a scholarship. An investment in completion.
Traditional scholarships typically reward prior performance. Last Mile protects future potential.
We focus on students within four semesters of completing high-demand STEM degrees and respond to the financial obstacle in front of them. Funding is fast, flexible, and grounded in trust because timing often determines whether a student persists or stops out.
We invest in potential rather than rewarding privilege-shaped markers of prior performance.
The right investment for the barrier in front of the student.
UNDER THE HOOD
Last Mile provides four connected forms of support, meeting students at the point of need and continuing through the transition from education into employment.
A relatively small intervention removes the immediate obstacle. That relief creates room for students to focus, persist, and compete for the academic and career opportunities that lead to lasting economic mobility.
PARTNERSHIP IN ACTION
One model. Many pathways to impact.
Last Mile’s flexible national model can be focused by industry, geography, field of study, or student population. Through collaborative funds, partners address immediate student needs while strengthening the specific workforce pipelines and communities central to their missions.
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Applied Materials
119 students supported since 2023
Supports women and nonbinary students pursuing degrees that lead to careers in the semiconductor industry. -
Detroit Area Talent Fund
1,363 students supported since 2023
Brings regional stakeholders together to strengthen Greater Detroit’s STEM talent pipeline and fuel local economic growth. -
Microsoft Cybersecurity Scholarship Program
5,414 students supported since 2021
Provides community college cybersecurity students with emergency awards, certification support, and career resources from Microsoft, LinkedIn, and GitHub.
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Rewriting the Code Future of Tech Fund
266 students supported since 2022
Helps Rewriting the Code members overcome urgent financial barriers to degree completion. -
Dow Last Mile Fund for Manufacturing & Skilled Trades
45 students supported since 2022
Supports students pursuing manufacturing and skilled-trades pathways near Dow communities across the United States. -
NYC STEM Talent Fund
24 students supported since 2022
Supports New York City students pursuing pathways in mathematics, physics, neuroscience, and related sciences.
Collaborative funds turn student-completion support into a shared workforce strategy.
SYSTEMS CHANGE
Support one student. Change what becomes possible for many more.
Last Mile’s first five years demonstrated that direct student investment can do more than remove an individual financial barrier. It can reveal system failures, influence institutional practice, and change how public and private resources reach students.
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Research Experiences for Undergraduates
A Last Mile pilot addressed the compensation gap preventing financially vulnerable students from participating in research experiences. The resulting findings helped inform a National Science Foundation supplemental funding opportunity that increased potential support to $10,000 per student.
With approximately 2,000 students participating in computing research experiences each year, the change represents a potential annual gain of $6 million to $10 million for students.
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Fellowship for Indigenous Women in Tech
Supported by the Capital One Foundation and Hopper-Dean Foundation, the fellowship provides sustained support to Indigenous women pursuing computing degrees.
The initiative had supported 10 fellows through graduation by the report’s publication, with two more expected to graduate in 2025. -
Debt Relief for Tech Equity
This initiative provided 22 Last Mile alumni with awards of up to $20,000 to reduce student debt and expand their freedom to pursue graduate study, research, entrepreneurship, and other career opportunities. Direct support generates immediate impact.
The lessons it produces can change the systems surrounding students.
PAVING THE WAY
Students should not need financial privilege to access opportunity.
Five years of listening to students revealed barriers that extend well beyond tuition. Many higher-education and recruiting systems assume students have the money, time, networks, and family support required to pursue internships, conferences, research experiences, relocation, and lengthy interview processes.
That assumption causes institutions and employers to mistake access for merit—and privilege for potential.
For Colleges and Universities
Make basic-needs and emergency-support resources visible in syllabi, LMS, and faculty communications.
Eliminate scholarship displacement and small-balance registration holds.
Offer completion grants and emergency support from a dignity-centered approach.
Provide funding upfront for conferences, research, travel, and other career-building opportunities.
Ensure campus jobs and research positions pay enough to remain accessible to financially vulnerable students.
For Employers
Examine recruiting systems for GPA requirements, narrow target-school lists, unpaid preparation demands, and other hidden barriers.
Prepay internship relocation and housing expenses.
Ensure new hires have sufficient upfront support and time to relocate.
Build multiple recruiting pathways rather than rely on conferences, hackathons, and opportunities with participation costs.
Recruiting systems too often conflate financial access with potential.
WHAT FIVE YEARS PROVED
With a modest investment at the right time, students persist.
Last Mile confirmed that 74% of students eligible for graduation had completed their degrees by the close of the reporting period. Earlier cohorts showed confirmed graduation rates between 78% and 88%, while the more recent 2023 and 2024 rates were expected to continue increasing as delayed outcomes were reported.
These students are not simply completing credentials. They are becoming software engineers, cybersecurity professionals, researchers, data specialists, educators, product designers, and contributors across the innovation economy.
The economic logic is as compelling as the human one. Degree completion increases earnings, wealth-building potential, tax contributions, and long-term economic stability while reducing the likelihood that years of educational investment end without a credential.
FROM PROOF TO SCALE
Build the safety net 10,000 students need every year.
Last Mile’s first five years validated the model. The next chapter is about reaching the full scale of the need while preserving the speed, trust, and dignity that make the intervention effective.
Immediate priorities:
Secure the investment required to support 10,000 students annually.
Establish Last Mile as the nationwide completion safety net for financially vulnerable technical students.
Expand awareness and trust among students, institutions, employers, and ecosystem partners.
Close advising and career-preparation gaps through technology and strategic partnerships.
Build direct pathways to internships and employment.
Strengthen longitudinal measurement of graduation, career attainment, and alumni reinvestment.
Long-term ambition:
Change how higher education and industry recognize potential.
Replace privilege-shaped measures of merit with systems that see resilience, ability, and the extraordinary value of students already striving toward technical careers.
The first five years proved that the finish line is within reach—and that a relatively small investment can make the difference between leaving college and launching a career. Together, we can ensure that every capable student has the opportunity to finish what they started and help build what comes next.
Explore the journey behind the numbers.
Read the complete report for five years of student stories, program milestones, impact data, collaborative funds, systems-change initiatives, policy recommendations, and the partners who helped take Last Mile from an urgent idea to a national model.