The NEED Podcast

Breaking Barriers: How Mentorship Transforms College Access for Underserved Youth

• Dr. Marcia Sturdivant • Episode 2

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How Does Mentoring Impact College Access For Underserved Youth?

The transformative power of mentorship stands at the heart of educational equity. When underserved students connect with mentors who share their lived experiences, something remarkable happens – confidence blossoms, academic performance improves, and pathways to higher education become clearer.

Dr. Marcia Sturdivant, President and CEO of NEED, reveals how representation in mentoring creates immediate trust and understanding. "Students who have personalized attention from people that look like them tend to fare better than their peers," she explains. This connection isn't just comfortable – it's foundational. When mentors have navigated similar challenges, they validate students' experiences while simultaneously showing that barriers can be overcome.

Much of NEED's mentorship work focuses on dismantling harmful stereotypes that unconsciously limit how students view their own potential. Through open conversations about the origins and falsehoods of racial stereotyping, mentors help students develop critical thinking skills to reject limiting beliefs. "When you instill that in students, they have a confidence so high," notes Dr. Sturdivant. This confidence directly translates to improved academic outcomes and higher education success.

The organization thoughtfully matches mentors with students based on shared experiences and community connections. For those interested in becoming mentors themselves, Dr. Sturdivant emphasizes key qualities: genuine care for minority students, patience, and a consistently positive outlook. The selection process maintains high standards because, as she puts it, mentors must "treat our kids as if they were your own."

Ready to support educational equity through mentorship? Connect with NEED today to discover how you can help transform a student's educational journey and future possibilities.

To learn more about NEED visit:
https://www.NEEDLD.org
NEED
429 Fourth Avenue, 20th FL, Suite 2000
Pittsburgh, PA 15219
412-566-2760



Speaker 1:

Welcome to the NEED Podcast highlighting students, partners and advocates Presented by NEED and hosted by Dr Marcia Sturtevant, president and CEO. This series highlights the impact of mentoring, philanthropy and collaborative partnerships that empower students' triumphant entry into, and progression through higher education. Whether you're applying for scholarships or supporting the mission, you'll find insights that inform, inspire and empower.

Speaker 2:

Behind every college acceptance letter is a story and often a mentor. In this episode, dr Marcia Sturdivant explores how mentorship opens doors, builds confidence and helps underserved students navigate the path to higher education. Welcome back everyone. I am Millie M, co-host and producer in the studio with Dr Marcia Sturdivant, president and CEO of NEED. How are you? I'med, how are you? I'm great, how are you Doing? Quite well, excited about this conversation. I'm so glad we're talking about mentorship today. It's one of those quiet forces that can truly change a student's life. So how does mentoring impact college access for underserved youth?

Speaker 3:

Well. It helps students see themselves in the future. Mentoring, particularly for minoritized children, benefits not just the student but it also benefits the mentor. We have found that students who have personalized attention from people that look like them tend to fare better than their peers. They tend to have future outlooks that are brighter, they tend to be more confident in their abilities and overall their academic performance is enhanced. They get better academically. They do better because they have more motivation as a result of that mentoring process, those mentoring activities to engage with these students, the engagement levels are higher. And they're higher because when someone walks into the room to help you that looks like you, students have these complex perceptions, but they're accurate perceptions that maybe not always, but more than likely your experience is the same as my experience and that begins a very warm and engaging kind of relationship between the mentor and the students.

Speaker 3:

Students are well aware that your experience has been similar to mine and sometimes our students can't navigate through some of the difficult challenges of being a minority in a school setting, and that's no fault of their own. It doesn't happen to every student, but many times we forget that they are children you know they're not adults who have gone through particular kinds of experiences that sometimes aren't always positive. And that's why we're there. We're there to help them to understand, to not dismiss or negate their experience, but validate. Yes, we understand Because let me tell you what happened to me when something similar like that happened. And that's the real benefit of mentoring minority students with people who come from the same communities or have lived their experience. It helps validate their beliefs and many times our students are not able to verbalize like, well, I feel a little funny about this or I don't want to be negative. Children are just so resilient and positive about things so sometimes they'll think, well, maybe it's me, what did I do wrong? And we're there to reassure them that you're not out of pocket by thinking that or having that perception. But, more importantly, it's critical that we helped them to say and to believe that those barriers aren't there permanently, they're not going to stop you from moving forward.

Speaker 3:

We've all had those challenges. We've all had those experiences. But how do you navigate through things like racial stereotypes or the belief that you can't achieve? And we are sitting here today because we have achieved? We've had those similar kinds of conversations or those similar kinds of reactions by educators, whether or not. They know they're doing certain things, or have you, but we are standing here today as college educated African-Americans, and you too can do that that. You just have to understand how to address those challenges. We don't accept any kind of excuses or give up attitude. While we're also acknowledging and validating their experiences, we're also training and teaching our students how to best handle those situations to their benefit.

Speaker 2:

Such empowering work that you do in shaping those young minds and letting them know that they can overcome anything. You touched on so many points. I don't prefer the term, you know, when we tell kids, wait until you get into the real world, because their world is very real to them.

Speaker 2:

Things that they're going through are very real to them, and a lot of the situations that they find themselves in are not due to any choice that they made, but the choices that the adults in their lives have made. So I love that you are meeting them where they are and validating their feelings, while letting them know that they can overcome those situations. So how do you all match, I guess, your students and your mentors?

Speaker 3:

Well, we all have our own set of skills. You know our skill sets, and while mentoring boosters the skills of the professionals, so to speak, we have to recognize that some of us are just a little bit better with certain populations, age groups, gender orientations and so on and experiences. So, as much as we can, we will match a mentor, one of our staff, with a student who may have similar challenges, for instance, students who might have physical barriers that influence how they learn or where they learn and what kind of environment they learn, and we help those students navigate through that by attaching them to someone on our staff that has, you know, had that similar problem. The fact that we are a pretty small community, that many times our mentors live in the same neighborhoods or go to the same schools as these students, and that is a big bonus for us because they can talk to the student about oh yes, I had, or I had, that teacher or I, that teacher or I belong to that group.

Speaker 3:

Immediate common bonds, immediate common bond, yeah, and, like you said, I think it's so important for us not to negate the student's experiences. Now they may have a perception that isn't as mature as someone who is, you know a little bit older and so on, but their reality, their perception, is the reality because they're living in it day to day. And oftentimes it can be very heartbreaking to see a student give up because they internalize it, thinking that it's me and you know that's from adults telling them well, don't let anything stop you, don't. You know those are very nice words and we say that, but you have to tell them how do you get through those experiences?

Speaker 3:

What did I do in that particular time? And I think we do a pretty good job with that, because there is a close-knit community here that can enable students to match with someone that understands their plight.

Speaker 2:

I bet it develops and blossoms into this beautiful relationship. So you started off by mentioning confidence. How does that confidence building translate into real college outcomes?

Speaker 3:

Right, we do a lot of work. Much of our work is research based and it came out of a professor from the University of Pittsburgh that looks at, has looked at over the years, how minoritized students perceive themselves, their abilities, because of social forces outside of them that impact like their viewpoint, their perceptions, that impact like their viewpoint, their perceptions. We do a lot of work on stereotyping, eradicating stereotypes, because it sounds, you know, very simplistic but it can be very complex when the student begins to believe those stereotypes and that, of course, has a negative impact on their perceptions of what's possible for them, what they can do, their achievement and so on. And when we just have these really raw, honest and open conversations about racial stereotyping, the light bulb comes on that you know, stereotypes are always false, whether or not they're said in a positive way. Oh, you're really good at athletics. You're just so gifted physically.

Speaker 2:

That's a stereotype.

Speaker 3:

Well, it's a stereotype, and stereotypes are always wrong because it's You're taking a cookie cutter approach to defining someone just upon their physical appearance. Our students grow up in the same world that everyone else has, so it's not like it just rolls off their back. When you hear or see it so many times, you start to believe it. It. And what we do is we go through a series of lessons that what are the origins of some of these stereotypes about African-Americans? How do you know? How did they come about and why they're all false and what is the real truth and the real reality? And when you instill that in students, they have a confidence so high because they know. No, that doesn't explain everyone. When they build that confidence, they're unstoppable.

Speaker 2:

And that's a skill that can follow them into the working world and personal relationships in some of these corporate settings for sure. Quickly, for our listeners who want to become mentors, what's the first step?

Speaker 3:

Well, the first step is to contact us, and you can contact us at the number below. I think it's on your screen. Yeah, contact us. And of course, it's a rigorous process because we don't just let anyone have access to our kids, and that's part of our role as adults, as the mentors we have to protect the children in our community. So we want people who one like Black kids okay, like all kids, because we provide services to everyone but particularly understand African-American children, like African-American children, are patient, loving and treat our kids as if they were your own. What would you want for your own child? We want motivated individuals, people who are going to have a stick-to-it-ness, are going to have a positive outlook about these children. Everyone has something negative to say all the time about minority children. We don't want to hear that. We want to hear what do you think? Positive, because it's positive things that change behaviors, not negative.

Speaker 2:

Because it's positive things that change behaviors, not negative, absolutely. Thank you, dr Sturdivant. Mentorship isn't just guidance, it's transformation. Grateful for your insights and we'll see you next time.

Speaker 3:

Okay.

Speaker 1:

Thank you so much and have a great day. Thank you for listening to the Need Podcast. To apply for scholarships, access support or learn how you or your organization can get involved, visit wwwneedldorg, email needpgh at gmailcom or call 412-566-2760. Need unlocking the power of education for students, families and the future of our region.