In Need of Volunteers, PCC Mentorship Program Soldiers On

Danielle Torres thought about quitting school more than once. And she had her reasons.

“I considered dropping out several times because I was supporting myself and I needed to work to make ends meet,” said the PCC sophomore.

Almost a decade ago, Torres also got into a car wreck that only compounded her problems. Due to complications from the accident, she acquired a learning disability that made it even harder for her to keep up in the classroom.

“It took triple the time to do regular homework – sometimes 10 hours,” said Torres, a business economics major.

Then, on a regular school day last spring semester, she had a heart-to-heart discussion with her accounting instructor. Torres told him the class was confusing to her and she was having trouble with some of the classwork.

That was when her instructor suggested Project LEAP, PCC’s mentorship program that aims to steer underrepresented, disadvantaged, and academically at-risk students on the path to achieving academic success. It matches students one-on-one with a mentor – either a volunteer faculty or staff member – who will listen to, care for, and motivate them.

“He was very supportive and encouraging,” Torres said of Bennet Tchaikovsky, an adjunct instructor who served as her Project LEAP mentor. “I told him it was very difficult for me and it was easy for me to shut down.

“But by him relating to my story and helping me to see that I’m not alone in adversity and people work through their problems – that helped a lot,” she added.

Tchaikovsky has since moved on from the college. So Torres this semester teamed up with Kathleen Meehan, a professor in PCC’s Business and Computer Technology division. That mentor-student pairing, in addition to her previous one, has so far paid dividends.

Today, Torres has a sparkling 3.9 GPA and is planning on transferring to a university next fall. She said she’s also gotten a letter of recommendation from Meehan for a PCC scholarship that she hopes to get in the next few months.

“Just knowing that there is someone on campus whom I could go to for help or encouragement was one of the big reasons that kept me going,” she said.

Torres’ is one of many success stories mined from PCC’s Project LEAP program. But those stories wouldn’t have come to fruition if it wasn’t for the help of dedicated PCC faculty and staff members who volunteered their own personal time to help Project LEAP’s students.

Today, however, the program faces a shortage of mentors that it’s rarely seen since its inception more than two decades ago.

According to Evan Sotelo, the program’s coordinator, Project LEAP currently has only eight mentors to serve 14 students this semester.

The program is funded by a Community Development Block Grant and the City of Pasadena Assistance Fund. The grants are meant to subsidize 50 students per semester.

Ideally, Project LEAP aims to pair up students with mentors on a one-on-one basis. But because of the shortage of mentors, some volunteers often see two or three students at a time.

“We need help,” said Sotelo, who has worked at the college for seven years. This is his first semester as coordinator of the program. Previously, he had worked at the college’s Extended Opportunity Programs & Services (EOP&S) Office.

“The shortage of mentors means I am not able to begin group activities between the students and mentors that I would like,” he said. “Possible group meet-and-greets for both students and mentors getting to know the other people in the program is on hold until I have more mentors.”

Sotelo believes one of the issues is that Project LEAP has been vastly under-promoted over the years. In fact, he said some staffers and students didn’t even know something like this existed on campus.

“I was shocked that a resourceful mentoring program had little promotion among faculty/staff and students,” he said. “Upon being introduced to it, I knew it was a student support service that should be utilized and would be beneficial for both parties. Students can rely on a mentor to guide them through the PCC process and mentors can get to know the student perspective through one-on-one mentoring.”

Whatever the reason, Sotelo hopes to reverse course and increase its pool of mentors, and in turn, hopefully increase the retention of students engaged in the program.

Sotelo said a mentor usually meets with a student on a weekly or bi-weekly basis, or however often it’s agreed upon. The partnership usually runs for a semester.

Richshell Allen, a PCC digital media technician who has volunteered as a mentor for Project LEAP in the past, calls the experience “eye-opening and rewarding.”

“I am very happy and excited about this semester,” said Allen, who recently got paired up with a student for the spring semester. “I got to meet someone I’ve never met before and to be able to make a difference in their life is an incredible experience.”

Patricia Carrillo, a 20-year-old sophomore majoring in linguistics, is currently in her second semester in the Project LEAP program.

“I’ve been on my own since I was 18, so I didn’t know what the ropes of life were,” Carrillo said. “All I knew was school and work and didn’t know anything other than that. I was constantly stressed and didn’t know who to talk to.”

That was until she found out about Project LEAP last semester. “It helped me de-stress and helped me be more focused and more motivated in class.”

She fondly recalled her first mentor and likened it to a “big-sister” relationship. “We met weekly and always went out to eat. It helped me loosen up a bit and not be so overwhelmed with life.”

This fall, Carrillo is paired up with a mentor in the same field she’s majoring in. “Right now, we’re going through the college application process together. My parents didn’t know anything about the process, so finding someone on campus to help one-on-one was great.”

Carrillo plans to transfer to a UC in the fall of 2015.

For more information about Project LEAP or to become a mentor, contact Sotelo at (626) 585-7981 or email at essotelo@pasadena.edu. Visit the website at www.pasadena.edu/studentservices/LEAP/.