UCLA doctoral student forges path to college for girls of color

Nyambi Maecely Ford had been rejected by two college mentorship programs before she found JANRAH.

At View Park High School, she wasn’t receiving the college guidance she thought she needed, she said. A friend convinced her to apply to JANRAH, a mentorship program that aims to help young women of color get into the colleges of their choice.

“Without this program I honestly believe I wouldn’t be here at UCLA,” said Ford, who is now a second-year psychobiology student.

Samarah Blackmon, a doctoral candidate at the UCLA Graduate School of Education and Information Studies, founded the program in 2011. She said she started the program because she thinks many mentorship programs focus on helping young men of color and that not enough serve young women.

“Educational programs seek males of color,” she said. “It became really obvious that girls of color are being overlooked.”

On Wednesday, 14 students from City Honors High School, Morningside High School and View Park High School visited UCLA to shadow university students enrolled in a class Blackmon co-teaches called “Sister to Sister.” The course focuses on the experience of women of color in college.

As part of the program, the high school students meet for a six-week session at UCLA over the summer. The program instructors go over students’ personal statements and offer advice and resources for testing and financial aid applications.

The young women bus for four hours to get to the UCLA campus and back each day over the summer. Though the rides are tedious, some of the girls said they think the hours commuting have helped them develop strong friendships.

During the school year, the students meet once or twice a month in addition to the optional weekly math tutoring session. Blackmon said she chose to partner with most of the high schools in the program because of her personal connections with staff at the schools.

Several high school students in JANRAH said they receive some college counseling at school, but they participate in JANRAH because of its added support.

“I thought it would get me on the right track to getting into college,” said Denecia Fernandes, a sophomore JANRAH student at View Park High School.

Cheyenne Grimes, a JANRAH student and sophomore in high school, said, before the program, she didn’t think she had a good chance of getting into UCLA.

“I don’t see it as being impossible anymore,” she said.

Every three years, the JANRAH girls graduate from high school and a new group is selected. An informal alumna program keeps JANRAH in touch with its graduates, Blackmon said.

The program costs about $12,500 per year at the minimum to operate, Blackmon said. About $6,000 comes out of Blackmon’s and her husband’s pockets, and the rest comes from a UCLA RIDE grant and the Education Council in the Graduate Students Association. She said she also gets help from support from family, friends and colleagues.

At JANRAH, all staff members volunteer, serving 15 to 20 hours a month during the year and full-time during the summer.

Blackmon’s interest in education started while she was at college at the University of Washington. There, she said she became heavily involved in the student movement against Initiative 200, a state proposition that banned affirmative action at public colleges and other state-run institutions in Washington.

“I never thought of (college) as ‘I’m going to get a job,’ I thought of it as I’m going to make a better life for myself,” she said. “I see (education) as the great equalizer.”

Blackmon is the first person in her family to graduate from college. Growing up with a single mother in a blue-collar family, she said she saw education as a way to change her life.

“My mom wanted something different for me and I wanted something different for me,” she said.

After college, being an educator became her priority. She earned a master’s degree in public policy from the UCLA Luskin School of Public Affairs and went to Chicago and other U.S. cities to work at various nonprofits and public schools.

Of the seven girls in the program’s first cycle, six are at four-year colleges, including two at UCLA.

In the future, Blackmon said she hopes to emphasize journalism education in the program and create a monthly magazine filled with content that her students produce. And, if funding and resources increase, she hopes to expand her program to include other high schools.

“My ultimate goal is for girls of color to control their own destinies,” Blackmon said.