When she attended Sexton High School in Lansing, Cadence Jackson wanted to study abroad when she got to college. But she didn’t think it was possible.
Then Lansing Spartan Scholars came along and showed her a way. Today, Jackson is in her second year at Michigan State University. She is a journalism major studying in South Korea with the help of a scholarship from this 1-year-old organization.
Lansing Spartan Scholars’ main goal is to increase education for Lansing residents through community building, direct enrollment and scholarships. LSS wants to bridge the gap between MSU and the Lansing community, program director Cece Sumpter said.
The program has 76 students this year. Last year, 37 applied and were accepted; this year, 39 applied and were accepted. Sumpter says that the number of student ambassadors has also increased.
LSS is the reason some students at Lansing schools were able to attend MSU and apply for opportunities like the study abroad program Jackson is on.
“There would be certain opportunities that I wouldn't have pursued” at MSU, Jackson said. “For example, studying abroad.”
To be eligible for LSS, students must be admitted to MSU, be eligible for the Lansing Promise Scholarship or Lansing Promise Guarantee and have lived in the area and graduated from high school within the Lansing School District boundaries.
“They introduced us to the program, and they gave us the chance to start the application, ask any questions that we had, make those connections before we got on campus,” Jackson said.
“There would have been a lot more of trying to figure things out on my own,” she added.
LSS teaches students skills needed for college. These skills include setting up office hours and making a planner. These are life skills that Jackson didn’t realize she needed when she started college.
The Lansing Spartan Scholars program was started as a presidential initiative in 2025, Sumpter said.
“President Guskiewicz saw the great work that Detroit M.A.D.E was doing, and said, ‘Well, that's great. How do we model that for students in Lansing?’” Sumpter said.
“It's exciting to be able to tell a community that we care about you and really do the work and really have a program that represents that,” Sumpter said. LSS aims to have events for the students.
For Homecoming Weekend, it will host a dinner for alumni at Toscana in Lansing. Friday, it will have a table at the Student Services Building where alumni and students can meet.
Another program LSS puts on for its students is “Three Sundays.” The three stands for relaxed, resource and recharge, and its goal is to relax the LSS students after their school week. Here, Sumpter aims to grow this community of students closer together.
Through such programs LSS gives MSU students from Lansing a chance to bond.
There's just something about meeting people who have grown up in the same city and have the same relationship to the area,” Jackson said. She enjoys hanging out at LSS events.
Also, LSS has provided her many opportunities and made the campus easier for her to navigate.
“LSS is just an opportunity to shrink down, because I think it makes campus feel smaller. It makes campus feel more comfortable, and it makes it feel a lot more familiar,” Jackson said. Mentors from the program advised her when she first got to campus. She has lived near MSU her whole life, but it's different to be on campus.
“It was really comforting to know that there was a program there for people who were in the same situation as me from the same place as me,” Jackson said.