Community College Month Featured Student: Shelby Coombe

“Student Shelby Coombe found UACCB to be a great, real option for college”

April is Community College Month, and the University of Arkansas Community College at Batesville is dedicated to preparing students for success in a variety of fields. UACCB is an affordable, valuable destination for those looking to continue their education close to home, and this month is set aside to highlight the opportunities for all.

Shelby Coombe, 22, of Bald Knob attended beauty school after high school and became a cosmetologist. She even had her own salon for a couple of years, but never thought she could go to college.

“I was homeschooled and didn’t take the ACT,” so she thought that was where her education career would end. Her younger brother, Nathan Coombe, however, kept trying to convince her that college was a very real option, if that’s what she wanted.

Coombe went online and looked at colleges that she might attend. When she saw footage taken from a drone over the UACCB campus, she said she fell in love with its beauty.

Still unsure of what her next steps would be, Coombe said she found the TRIO Student Support Services program at UACCB, where the staff not only explained how to enroll and how to pick a field of study but they also helped Coombe qualify for financial aid.

Coombe settled on elementary education, with hopes of becoming an art or music teacher, and works 20 hours a week in the College Store as a cashier through the work-study program, as well as works part-time (9 hours) in the Student Success Center as a writing tutor, through the work-study program.

Coombe will graduate in May, with plans to take a semester off and work, hopefully continuing to tutor others, so she can save some money.

There are times students come in the bookstore looking as lost as she once felt, and Coombe is quick to tell them about the TRIO program, which offers free tutoring, academic advising, individualized financial aid assistance, transfer assistance, career exploration, and more.

“It’s such a good resource,” she said.

Story by Andrea Bruner