A new program in Schenectady schools is working to foster a more productive and supporting community.
On Monday mornings, students in Jeremy Dow’s third grade class at Jessie T Zoller Elementary School are antsy to meet with their Big Brothers and Big Sisters.
The elementary students, or Littles, are work toward getting to know their Bigs during their first activity meeting of the school year.
It’s part of a joint effort from Schenectady High School, two elementary schools, and Big Brothers Big Sisters of the Capital Region.
The one-hour weekly meetings are meant to encourage mentoring relationships. The Bigs and Littles fill out Venn diagrams to showcase their shared and different interests. WAMC got to sit in on the meeting between Big Elijah Jackson and Little Z’myus Springsteen.
Surrounded by his classmates and eating a lunch of cheesy breadsticks, milk, and beans, Springsteen and his fellow classmates are participating in the High School Leadership Program through B-B-B-S. The pilot program, which will run through the school year, is the first of its kind to be implemented during school hours for the nonprofit. The one-to-one pairs are carefully matched through interviews that pair participants with similar personalities. Springsteen and Jackson ask questions to get to know each other.
Springsteen says he hopes to bond over football with his Big Brother, who is the varsity quarterback.
What do you like about Big Brothers so far?
“It’s really good,” Springsteen said.
What do you like about it?
“They get to come here every Monday.”
Do you like your Big Brother? Why?
“The Big Brothers Sisters or my big brother?”
Your Big Brother here.
“I feel good about it.”
What makes you feel good about it?
“I don’t really know but I just know that it feels good.”
Jackson, a sophomore, says through an early college program, the students need to complete community service to help them leave high school with an associate’s degree. Jackson says he looks at being a Big Brother as a great opportunity to get college credit while gaining experience working with others.
“You know it’ll most definitely help us understand the younger generation coming up, you know,” Jackson said. “We just have to be a mentor to them because some kids may not have the mentor, the mentorship at home or, you know, they may not have the best living situation or whatever. It'd be good for them to talk to people like us, because we understand to an extent, we understand what they go through, and we you know, we was little was a little once so we can help them along the way.”
Throughout the school year, the mentors and mentees will use the time connecting with each other to learn how to make positive differences in the community through their in-class activities and listening to each other. The mentors also use the weekly meeting to address their mentee’s needs.
Dow says each week his classroom fills with excitement for learning when the Bigs and Littles get together.
“The positives outweigh the negatives. It’s just a lot of fun. I like the high school kids being here. It gives them the opportunity to see ‘look at what I will be’ seven, eight years from now because they’re all sophomores. All the high school kids. One of the kids in this group I had as a student in here seven or eight years ago so yeah, it’s cute.”
Lea Montalto-Rook is the Chief Executive Officer of Big Brothers Big Sisters of the Capital Region. She says this initiative encourages one-to-one conversations to focus on individual potential.
“Frequently with high schoolers, the high achieving students are the ones that will reach out, right. So, this program is designed to catch all high schoolers independent of where they are with their progress, with their, schooling with their social skills,” Montalto-Rook said. “So, it's designed to mentor the high schoolers and take all of the students and pair them as mentors, so enabling the high schoolers to establish their leadership skills, to help them with their own social skills, to help them with their empathy, with their listening, with their communication.”
Montalto-Rook says feedback from Bigs and Littles has been positive. She says it’s about meeting children where they’re at and working to build a positive future for everyone.
