Educational Talent Search at Columbus State is a pre-collegiate program serving students who are enrolled in or who have dropped out of any grade from six through twelve and who live in select areas within the Columbus Public School District. One of the federally funded TRiO Programs the goals of the ETS Program are to:

• Identify qualified youths with potential for education at the post-secondary level and to encourage these students to complete secondary school and to undertake a program of post-secondary education;
  
• Publicize the availability of student financial assistance available to persons who pursue a program of post-secondary education;
  
• Encourage persons who have not completed programs of education at the secondary or post-secondary level, but who have the ability to complete such programs, to reenter such programs.