 "Photo: Jordan Jessup")
A full house showed up at the Richards Auditorium in Murkland Hall Tuesday night to honor the 10 successful years of Seacoast Reads and Project Mentor. The audience was treated to an evening of heartfelt stories and a keynote address from Congresswoman Carol Shea-Porter (D-1).
"I thank the college students involved in Seacoast Reads and Project Mentor for the gifts they give to children and to our communities," said Shea-Porter in the press release. "By helping these children, these students enrich the children's lives and the communities that these children will live and work in."
"The college students who give so freely of themselves are great role models for the children and inspire all of us to reach out and help others," she said.
The congresswoman touched upon her childhood during her speech, saying that she came from a large family with a grandmother who had mental problems and a great uncle who had physical problems. She said that reaching out and volunteering to help her family and within her community was very much a part of her life.
She recalled about when she was 16 and 17 years old, her mother had suffered a devastating injury to her legs and couldn't walk for about a year. Shea-Porter said she assumed the role, relaxed and willingly, to be mother to her younger brothers and sister during that time.
"And I know that it had an affect on me," she said, "because we found my sister's high school yearbook just a few days ago, and I, at the back, got something very compelling. 'What will you do now?' is as they called it in the book, and I, had written 'how about cleaning your room?' (laughter). "It was in my sister's yearbook forever."
Executive Vice President for Academic Affairs Bruce Mallory began the ceremony introducing everybody involved and giving a warm welcome into Project Mentor.
The program was started in 1997 at UNH, and since has had a constructive impact on hundreds of middle school students and undergraduate mentors. Due to its success, Project Mentor expanded last fall by the University System of New Hampshire to be active also at UNH Manchester, Plymouth State University, Keene State College and Granite State College.
Barbara Krysiak, the program's founder, spoke to the crowd about what the program has been doing these past 10 years. The program helps educationally and economically disadvantaged middle school students to build self-esteem, graduate high school and consider secondary education. It pairs sixth graders with college students and trains the undergraduate men and woman to serve as mentors for those middle school students. The program currently works with nine school districts in the Seacoast area.
Statistics show that in New Hampshire, one out of every five ninth-graders does not graduate from high school. One high school student drops out every nine seconds, and high school dropouts are 72 percent more likely to be unemployed compared with high school graduates. Many middle school students make the decision to drop out of school before they have even entered high school.
"We have averaged between 55 to 70 mentors each year for the 10 years we've been in the program," said Krysiak. "We require our mentors to commit for one full year, but many mentors who start as sophomores opted to come in for the three years of middle school. The difference this has made in young children's lives is extraordinary."
A spring 2006 mentee survey has indicated that 74 percent of those who were mentored through Project Mentor improved their expectations about graduating from both high school and college.
For UNH students to commit, not only do they need to do it for one year, but they must take Mentoring Adolescents, a two-credit course that meets every other week.
"The purpose of the program is to increase aspirations and to decrease the drop out rate," said Krysiak," and I think we've been very successful at that. Our mentoring program is a relationship program.
Krysiak made sure all the mentors who were present that night to stand for a congratulations for all their hard work. More information about the program can be found at www.projectmentornh.org.
The other program receiving recognition for their fine efforts over the past 10 years was Seacoast Reads, as mentioned in the Feb. 16 article. A sheet of names printed on quality paper was slipped into the programs of Tuesday night's event. The list contains the names of every student involved with the program up to this year, totaling at what Professor Grant Cioffi said was about 989 people listed.
UNH students who work in Seacoast Reads tutor local children in literacy, offer organizational support for middle school students and serve as educational coaches in after-school programs. This year 140 university students have worked in 15 schools in eight school districts and three community-based programs.
This program is a local chapter of the America Reads Challenge, initiated by the Clinton administration in August 1996. According to its archives on its home page, The America Reads Challenge came about when reading deficiencies had reached great lows by 1994.
According to Cioffi, who supervises the program, UNH focuses its efforts on improving the reading and writing abilities of at-risk elementary school children, fostering children's educational aspirations through interactions with university students, and providing service learning opportunities to UNH undergraduates.
Associate Professor John Carney, VISTA Coordinator Kristin Haskell and former Student Coordinator Maryanne Fortescue have also played huge roles in the programs shaping since 1997.
Haskell presented Congresswoman Shea-Porter with a bouquet of flowers at the end of her address.
Shea-Porter praised both efforts of the programs, saying that the reality of this is that if you have literacy, you can make more money. She described a trip she took once to Pompeii, Italy, saying that even then, the pictures on the walls are writing. Then and now, those were signs that people could communicate, according to her.
Be the first to comment on this article!