This year, more than any other, is especially tough for those Hartford Public Schools’ seniors without plans for college or military service after graduating. School guidance counselors had to work harder to reach students learning remotely, and even in the best years, the student-to-staff ratio stretches guidance counselors thin. What support is there for seniors who aren’t pursuing the traditional college route?

In February, the ALL IN! Coalition partners, with financial support from its Funder Advisory Committee, launched the Hartford Student Internship Program (HSIP) & Class of 2021 program with the goal of reaching up to 300 of those seniors to place them in a post-secondary program. Capital Workforce Partners (CWP,) which has historically led the HSIP, took the lead and received carry-over financial support from the Hartford Foundation for Public Giving and the City of Hartford. Other funders stepped in to help launch the program, including The Travelers Foundation, The Hartford, Social Venture Partners, Liberty Bank and Lincoln Financial.

With CWP coordinating the effort, staff from Blue Hills Civic Association and Center for Latino Progress have knocked on doors and reached out to seniors to enroll them in the program; it offers up to 13 content modules, where students receive $35 stipends for each module attended, as well as 60-hour internships that pay students $12 an hour. Modules offer a mix of career competency training, employment management training and post-secondary program exposure and placement.

Many students have to work to help support their families, so to encourage students to participate and stay engaged throughout the final marking period of their senior year, the program prioritized financial incentives for students and their families.

In total, students in the program will receive:

• $35 per content module completed at their own pace done in live workshops, recorded webinars, small-group meetings or 1:1 sessions with community-based organization staff, for up to $505 in earnings.
• Eligibility for internships in the spring, which pay $12/hour for up to 60 hours of work, up to $720 in earnings.
• Eligibility for early application for Summer Youth Employment, up to $1,500 in earnings.
• Placement in other paid career pathway programs after high school such as apprenticeship, trade skills, industry certificate and job-training programs.
• Career Readiness Training on key topics such as time- and self-management, professional communications, resume writing, interviewing and more.

By graduation, the participating students will have gained skills, experiences and connections to prepare them for work, on-the-job training and the possibilities beyond low-wage, low-growth jobs. This effort would not have been possible without the support of the program’s funders and partners.

The Hartford Public Schools students served by peer mentors in our summer transition and college retention programs showed promising results, despite starting college during a pandemic. In the spring of 2020, we targeted 308 prospective college students from Hartford, up 67% from 185 targeted in 2019. Our peer mentors contact all the HPS students who have applied to either Capital or Manchester Community Colleges, (CCC) and (MCC,) and offer to help them throughout the summer with the college matriculation process.

With our college persistence program, peer mentors work with students throughout the first semester to help them find campus resources such as academic support or financial aid; they answer questions, provide support; and remind them of deadlines for class registration. This spring, the number of first-year CCC and MCC students who persisted into a second semester reached 71%, or 92 students out of 129 enrolled, compared to the estimated average of 68% in recent years at CCC and MCC.

The charts below give further data.

Saraya Torres has wanted to go to college since she was a little kid. When starting at Manchester Community College during a pandemic meant classes would be online, she didn’t love the idea but decided to go for it anyway. She planned to take four classes while working 32 hours a week at two part-time jobs.

She’s used to being self-sufficient – she is independent from her parents and lives on her own in an apartment – but when a fellow MCC student contacted her toward the end of her senior year of high school to offer to help her through the summer with the college transition process, she accepted his offer. Her mentor helped her complete the process of filling out the FAFSA and reassured her when she was waiting to hear back on her financial aid package. When she didn’t receive financial aid, her mentor put her in touch with the Financial Aid office. Unfortunately, despite three faculty members from her high school vouching for her status as fully financially independent, Torres says, she wasn’t able to attend her first semester tuition-free as she had hoped. She was only able to afford to take two classes.

Throughout the fall semester, her mentor, Stefan Hall, continued to text her to check in, asking about how her classes were going and how she was doing. When she told Hall she was struggling with her online math course, he told her about the academic support center and gave her a link to the center’s website so she could request a tutor. Torres didn’t have a working printer, something she needed for a class, and Hall told her who to reach out to at the college to access a printer. He also sent her the department co-chairs’ emails should she want to appeal the professor’s requirement; and, he offered to advocate for her so she wouldn’t be forced to print material or suffer academically, but she declined those offers.

Not having a printer or internet are just the kinds of obstacles that cause students to fall behind and drop out, says T.J. Barber, director for outreach and student life at MCC. Because of budget cuts, MCC’s academic advisors have a caseload of 700 students each, he says. He’s grateful for the Achieve Hartford mentors who serve as resources to first-year students, the large percentage of whom are first-generation and low-income students who don’t have anyone in their life to guide them through getting into and through college.

“We really try to make it possible for students to be paying attention to what’s happening in the classroom. If you’re sleeping on a bench in Bushnell Park, solving for X is the least of your problems,” says Barber. “Having a partner like Achieve Hartford makes all the difference. We know a significant number of students would not be on our campus if not for Achieve Hartford mentors helping them.”

As the fall semester progressed, Torres’ mentor reminder her when it was time to fill out the FAFSA and register for spring classes. She appreciates both the information and the support she receives from Hall, she says, especially going to school during a pandemic.

“Just hearing from someone checking in to make sure I’m OK really helps. Stefan emailed me saying, ‘Your mental health is important too.’ He kept giving me information that he thought that I may need to help me along the way. He’s been very open about that stuff,” she says. “He says, ‘I’m not the person who knows everything. I know some stuff.’ He told me he doesn’t like having to take courses all online. That put me at ease; I’m not the only person struggling with the material. He’s ahead of me [in college.] He has more experience than I do. It’s good to know there are people who are the same age as I am who are here to help new college students.”

“Peer mentorship is at the heart of Achieve Hartford’s summer transition and college persistence programs because it works,” says Paul Diego Holzer, executive director of Achieve Hartford. “Let us know if you want more information on college-level peer mentorship.”