When the Neighborhood House Charter School (NHCS) valedictorian, Jaylen Scott, leaves in August for Pennsylvania’s Bucknell University, it will mark one of the first times in years that the Centre Street resident won’t be living at home and attending school on the same street.

He started at the Henderson Inclusion School on Centre Street and transferred into NHCS in the 5th grade before spending a few years at the charter school’s Queen Street campus off Neponset Street before returning to the NHCS Centre Street campus just down the street from his home several years later for grades 8 through 12.

It’s rare for a student in Boston to be so centered in the neighborhood, but the experience, said Scott, 18, has been special.

“I feel like that’s been a real benefit that helped me to understand my neighborhood better,” he said. “I used to walk with my grandfather and my family to school and I made connections to my neighborhood when I was dropped off and picked up. It was much more special than just going out to a car or taking the train home.”

While NHCS has been around for nearly 30 years in Dorchester, its high school expansion is relatively new, and Scott is only the third valedictorian in the school’s history – having graduated on June 7 with the Class of 2023 in the Strand Theatre. He said that NHCS has provided him with both teachers who really cared about his future, and the resources for him to get places.

“I always had someone to help me get the resources at NHCS to be successful,” he said. “At other schools I went to teachers who just let you be, but at NHCS I felt the teachers really wanted to help.”

In his academic career, Scott said he always got “A’s” in every subject but math, and frequently got beat out for top honors by friends. However, by 9th grade he said he really “accelerated” his efforts and got straight ‘A’s’ from then on.

Like Burke High School’s Alicia Rose, Scott’s counterpart in this edition’s valedictorian report, diligence in and out of the classroom got the attention of the Posse Scholarship Foundation, a Boston-based program that supports urban students in Boston and nearby suburbs as they transition from high school to out-of-state colleges they partnered with – including Bucknell, Union College, Centre College (Kentucky), and others. The support program includes a scholarship that pays for full tuition.

Scott said he wasn’t going to apply for the Posse Scholarship at first because he wanted to attend a Historically Black College and University (HBCU), but his guidance counselor persuaded him to reconsider due to the program’s financial benefits, and that counsel lead him happily to Bucknell.

“I looked at other schools, but I was looking for a school like NHCS with a similar kind of small community and teachers who cared,” he said. “That was a value I wanted in a school.”

In the meantime, he was chosen as a Bill and Melinda Gates Millennium Scholarship winner – the first ever at NHCS and a rarity anywhere. That scholarship covers all expenses, tuition, and costs not covered by other scholarships all the way through a Ph.D degree. For Scott, the stresses of paying for college are gone.

“I am going to be able to go to school debt-free, and that’s very good,” he said. “It’s a huge accomplishment and it was a very long application process.”

During his time at NHCS, Scott was a member of the National Honor Society, and was always found around the school volunteering or helping at special events. He was the co-founder of the Student Ambassadors Club and participated in the NHCS Design Team.

He plans to major in biology at Bucknell, having developed a fondness for the subject while studying it at NHCS. He hopes to become a research scientist and work in a laboratory environment.

However, he said, he won’t forget about the neighborhood, and Centre Street, where he came of age. He said he will miss the sounds of the city, walking to Codman Square, and motorcycles going up the street late at night, but what he will take with him is a desire to give back.

“I feel like the biggest thing I learned living in Dorchester was about helping one another,” he said. “I want to create a strong network so I can give back to my community – especially to NHCS. I can’t just be selfish and not give back to the places that helped form who I am.”

Scott is the son of Cheryl Norville, and the grandson of Michael Norville.