Bring together community roots and future horizons.
Compass is built on a belief: every young person, no matter their town’s population, deserves access to opportunity.
Community
Our north star, rooted in connection, belonging, and shared responsibility.
Learning
The sunrise value: education as growth, self-knowledge, and transformation.
Mobility
The path forward into college, careers, and life opportunities.
Leadership
Grounded practice in humility, courage, and service.
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Community
We take Community as our north star—the value and experience that sparked Compass’s creation and continues to guide our growth. Rural America is often mischaracterized by deficit, but we see its truest strength: a deeply ingrained sense of shared connection, responsibility, and compassion.
The Compass curriculum is designed to ignite that local spirit and nurture it through service, solidarity, and support. Our Scholars are not only shaped by their communities but poised to serve and transform them. With community at their backs and in their hearts, our Scholars are more than recipients of rural opportunity—they are its fiercest advocates.
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Learning
Learning is our sunrise value—the light that clarifies and energizes the path ahead. For Compass, learning is not confined to test scores or textbooks; it is personal, political, and liberatory. For many rural students, high-quality education has been a historically gate-kept privilege.
At Compass, we treat Learning as a practice of reclamation and radical self-knowledge. Through rigorous workshops, intimate mentorship, and reflective exercises, we encourage our Scholars to see knowledge as a tool for transformation rather than merely a means to a degree. Learning in this context is a sustained act of growth—and an intentional act of breaking down barriers.
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Mobility
Paired with Learning, our western pillar is Mobility: the pull forward into new geographies, new ideas, and new possibilities. While deeply embedded in the soil of rural towns, Compass also clears paths forward.
We equip our Scholars with resources and support to move confidently into the future, whether that means a four-year university, technical school, military service, or a meaningful early career. We demystify the admissions process, provide financial aid guidance, and award transition stipends. Most importantly, we walk with our Scholars, ensuring that Mobility is never a movement in isolation, but a shared journey.
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Leadership
Leadership is our grounding force as the southern anchor. To us, leadership is not a title; it is a daily practice. Leadership is forged in the continual exercise of humility, courage, and service. Embedded in the Compass experience are opportunities to make decisions, tell one’s story, guide others, and imagine bold possibilities.
From public speaking to peer mentorship, from service projects to college planning, we teach that true leadership uplifts rather than dominates. Our Scholars are taught to lead from within and among—not above. They stand in a tradition of rural care and conviction that is too often overlooked but endlessly vital.