I would raise the stakes as they are not high enough (in my opinion) as it is written now. Firstly, best you specify a person whom would generally be considered as someone facing greater challenges than most people, in other words, a person of a minority background. I suggest you make the character Aboriginal Australian, this will describe the main character as an Australian without needing to specify it and it will assign him a degree of social handicap (whether true or not is irrelevant – it’s the perception that matters most). This is his one chance to get a better life…

The other way you could raise the stakes is by making the crime a more severe one such as murder, and changing it so he already has the scholarship – if the deadline is for him to make it to the college by a certain date or forfeit the scholarship there’s more for him to lose.