The District is testing a new mentoring program at three universities in an attempt to keep the large numbers of D.C. high school graduates who drop out of college from calling it quits.

Through the College Retention Initiative, the city’s Office of the State Superintendent of Education is paying 15 juniors at Delaware State University, Morgan State University and North Carolina A&T State University $1,000 per semester to have weekly and monthly check-ins with 83 freshmen who graduated from public high schools in D.C.