For more than two decades, the nonprofit Pathways to College has helped propel Newark students towards higher education. Now the group is getting a big boost of its own — from Oprah Winfrey.

On Thursday, the media mogul and philanthropist announced a $5 million gift to the New Jersey-based after-school program, which helps high schoolers develop leadership skills and apply to college. Already based in three Newark schools as well as other sites across the country, the nonprofit hopes the major new grant will help it expand its services in Newark and beyond.

“We want to share this broadly,” said Judith Berry Griffin, the group’s founder and president. The program “can help our children do the one thing that makes the most difference in the world in terms of what they’re able to do — that is, to get a college education.”