Growing up in Portland, De La Salle high school senior Amina Elliott had a hard time picturing life anywhere else. She’d never been east of Montana and, when it came time to think about college, wasn’t sure if she’d be comfortable in another state.
So a weeklong trip last June, to historically Black colleges and other universities near Atlanta, felt like it opened a world of possibilities.
“It was just something you don’t feel in a lot of places. It was a lot of hospitality. People made you feel acknowledged,” said Elliott, 17.
Random people greeted her with his and hellos as she explored eight campuses and Elliott said she began to see how she might fit in at the universities – and in the medical career she had aspired to since elementary school.
“It was an experience that I will hold on forever, for sure,” Elliott said.
The nonprofit organization that arranged the trip, Building Blocks 2 Success, works to introduce students from underrepresented groups around Portland to careers in the sciences. It’s worked for a decade with Portland elementary schools and Oregon universities to place students in robotics clubs, college readiness events and medical training programs.
Now it’s connecting with schools across the country, broadening the geographic horizons of Portland kids and introducing them to students and faculty who look like they do.
“To have the ability to travel outside the state and then be in an environment where it’s a little bit more diverse, it helps set and plant a seed for our young people to see that they can do this,” said Antonio Jackson, BB2S’ cofounder and executive director.
June’s trip to Georgia took 10 Black students from the Portland area to eight universities: Georgia Tech and the University of Georgia and a group of historically Black colleges and universities, including Morehouse College, Clark Atlanta University, Spelman College and Morris Brown College.
The cross-country trip comes as the Oregon Legislature is pushing the private sector, particularly chipmakers receiving state subsidies, to diversify their hiring programs. The state wants companies to incorporate out-of-state HBCUs – Oregon has none – in their workforce development plans in hopes of building a pipeline and deepening the hiring base.
Programs like BB2S aim to ensure Oregon students, too, pursue STEM education and access to careers in Oregon’s tech and engineering industries, even if they have to leave the state for a while first.
With Oregon facing a prolonged labor shortage, especially in technical jobs, Daimler Truck North America, Intel and other employers work with BB2S, too, to build a reservoir of students with a science education. Funding for chipmakers that Oregon lawmakers approved last spring encourages the companies to use their state money on workforce development efforts at HBCUs and other universities.
A high school sports coach and former purchasing manager at Daimler and Banfield Pet Hospital, Jackson started BB2S about 15 years ago as an after-school program at Portland’s Bethel A.M.E. Church. Jackson said the program is designed to help students envision life beyond high school.
“Athletics ends at a certain point for everybody,” Jackson said. “So I wanted to give our young people a chance to get into career fields they can do for the rest of their lives.”
Manny Dempsey, a 16-year-old De La Salle junior, has been with BB2S for several years. A budding artist, Dempsey said robotics programs connected with his innate creativity. While he had envisioned going to college at Morehouse or another historically Black college, Dempsey said June’s trip to Georgia made the possibility seem real.
“It was kind of everything I imagined it to be, but a little bit more,” he said.
Especially powerful was the opportunity to connect with students there, Dempsey said, to learn about their path and hear tips about keeping up with classes, choosing a major and getting to know professors.
“They’re real strict about getting work done,” Dempsey said, “making sure that everything’s all good, taking advantage of opportunities that are given.”
BB2S’ annual contributions shot up in 2022 to more than $600,000 – a fivefold increase over what it had raised in each of the prior two years, according to the nonprofit’s annual tax filing. Jackson said the boost in funding resulted from renewed attention to diversity and equity programs in the aftermath of the killings of George Floyd, Ahmaud Arbery and Breonna Taylor.
Foundations including Meyer Memorial Trust, the Oregon Community Foundation and the Collins Foundation are supporting BB2S’ work, Jackson said. The nonprofit typically serves about 350 students annually but with the added funding it worked with 400 last year.
If the money keeps flowing in, Jackson said it will enable BB2S to reach more students, add staff and new programs like this year’s trip to Georgia. Jackson said he plans another trip to take Oregon students to HBCUs next year but hasn’t settled on a destination yet.
BB2S has been working with Oregon universities for years, including science and engineering camps at Oregon State University and at the University of Portland.
“This is something that we love doing. This is something that is a passion of mine, and of the faculty and staff,” said University of Portland engineering Dean Brian Fabien. He said a weeklong camp at the North Portland university aims to give middle-schoolers a sense of what college life is like, living in the dorms, eating in the cafeteria and interacting with college students.
The goal, Fabien said, is “giving students the sense and the identity of belonging in this place.” Many didn’t have any close family who went to college so the week at the University of Portland helps BB2S students visualize themselves on campus.
“We have observed that it’s crucial that we give these students that sense of belonging,” Fabien said. “And not only these students – their parents as well.”
Amiri Horn has been in BB2S programs since he was 5. Horn and his parents have always expected he would attend college, but he said it was eye-opening to see so many other Black students pursuing science degrees during the trip to Georgia.
“I felt more like a community, people that looked like me that had a similar interest,” said Horn, 17, a senior attending McDaniel High School in Portland. He plans to study mechanical engineering in college. He’s interested in prosthetics manufacturing, or perhaps teaching engineering himself.
Horn is considering several different colleges around the country and if he leaves Oregon for school, he said he anticipates returning for graduate school. But Horn said the Georgia trip exposed him to a wider world and helped him picture himself in a more diverse educational setting.
“It was nice to see people that look like me. It was really cool,” Horn said. “It helped me put in perspective where I am on the map, the demographic of the area that I live in.”
— Mike Rogoway | [email protected] |
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