Elon alumna honored for supporting children of incarcerated parents – Elon News Network
By Mia Torres | 11/2/25 5:42pm
Yasmine Arington Brooks ’15, was a junior in high school when she started a grassroots nonprofit scholarship program for children with incarcerated parents. Now she is an honoree of the L’Oréal Paris USA Women of Worth award.
The L’Oréal Paris USA Women of Worth award recognizes 10 women who demonstrate leadership, innovation, and service as well as those who are driving transformative change across the United States through their non-profit organizations.
“I’m really grateful, especially in a time like this, because this type of visibility and of course you know the sisterhood that comes with it, and just meeting amazing women who are, who have just beautiful hearts and they’re doing incredible things in their communities,” Brooks said. “But this type of visibility, it’s rare, it’s a rare type of thing to happen in the nonprofit sector, especially if you’re not especially, if you started a nonprofit from the ground up.”
Brooks was born and raised in Washington, D.C. Her father was incarcerated, leaving her maternal grandmother as her guardian figure. Brooks said she recalls her grandmother’s love of education.
“My maternal grandmother primarily raised me, and she was always a big advocate of education,” Brooks said.
When Brooks was in high school, she knew that college was her next step, but the question was how to cover her tuition. She looked for scholarships, and her grandmother realized that there were none for people with incarcerated parents.
That’s what inspired Brooks to pitch the idea of a mentoring scholarship program for young people with incarcerated parents; she called it ScholarChips.
“My initial pitch was that I was going to raise $30,000 and give out three $10,000 scholarships to young people with incarcerated parents going to college,”Brooks said.
In October 2010, Brooks initially launched it as her Girl Scout Gold Award, where scouts research an issue and produce a project that creates a lasting impact. Learn Serve, a program that teaches students about social entrepreneurship and global citizenship, agreed to be the fiscal sponsor until they were able to be exempt from federal income tax and receive tax-deductible donations.
In 2012, Brooks created the first scholarship cohort and since then, she has supported over 120 young adults and around 54 college graduates.
“I just kind of ran with the vision and, you know, I kept it in the forefront of my mind,”Brooks said.
Brooks said one of the taglines associated with ScholarChips is, “ScholarChips is more than just a Scholarship.”
ScholarChips not only provides financial aid for young people but also launched a mental health and wellness program in 2020, where students can attend therapy and participate in mental health webinars — all while receiving financial aid.
ScholarChips offers professional development and financial literacy workshops. It also gives students and alumni opportunities to do public speaking to share their stories at different conferences.
“ScholarChips is very much a community, and it becomes sort of like an extended family to our scholars,”Brooks said.
Brooks said a lot of the students are already leaders when they get the scholarship, whether it is in their faith-based communities, high school or within their families.
“What I love most about being a peer mentor to our scholars is just seeing them blossom and grow over the years, and like seeing their confidence build up,” Brooks said. “I feel so much pride and joy seeing them walk across the graduation stage, but also just doing life like, you know, achieving and succeeding.”
Brooks said for anyone who wants to start something meaningful, they should just do it.
“In order for a dream or a vision to become a reality, you have to, you have to put your hands to it and actually work to make it become a reality,” Brooks said.
Brooks says that right now, the scholarship is scratching the surface. The more resources and strategic partnerships ScholarChips can secure, the more children of incarcerated parents they will be able to support.
Yasmine Arington Brooks ‘15, was a junior in high school when she started a grassroots nonprofit scholarship program for children with incarcerated parents. Now she is an honoree of the L’Oréal Paris USA Women of Worth award. “I’m really grateful, especially in a time like this, because this type of visibility and of course you know the sisterhood that comes with it, and just meeting amazing women who are, who have just beautiful hearts and they’re doing incredible things in their communities,” Brooks said.
The final regular season game for the Elon University men’s soccer team ended in a slugfest against William & Mary. For the first 70 minutes, it appeared as if Elon would notch a tie for the seventh time this year. But with the No. 1 spot in the CAA South Division on the line, a goal by junior forward Jordin Wilson helped grind out a 1-0 win to advance to 7-2-6. Elon will rest for a week before hosting the winner between University of North Carolina Wilmington and Campbell University on Nov. 9 at 2 p.m.
