OHIO — Young men in southwest Ohio are taking on the roles of mentors, big brothers and teachers with the help of The Literacy Lab’s Leading Men Fellowship. 

What You Need To Know

  • The Literacy Lab is a 10-month program that aims to close the diversity gap, while tackling the teacher shortage, kindergarten readiness and literacy
  • Paid fellows are placed in classrooms as literacy tutors after undergoing 200+ hours of training to teach the curriculum SEEDS, which is tied to the science of reading
  • A team helps fellows enter college and work toward teaching certifications 

The program focuses on recruiting young men who have finished high school, but not post secondary education.

“A lot of people are shocked that that is the requirement; but we are an early access opportunity. We’ve been able to just design a program that accounts for their current status,” Program Manager Carlton Collins said.

As a result, the program is now a pathway to eliminate barriers that often exist when pursuing a career in education. Oftentimes, those barriers include four years of schooling in order to get certified.

“So now, having young men in classrooms working with kids who aren’t multiple generations away from them helps kids with their learning,” Collins said.

As they place young men as paraprofessionals at different schools, it gives program managers and coaches working with them the opportunity to serve as big brothers, mentors and supervisors. This also opens the door for the organization to walk the young men through the process of entering college.

This academic year, 15 are in school and 12 of them are pursuing degrees in education. Given the teacher shortage, the aim is to help fill the pipeline, especially when it comes to the need for more men of color in classrooms. This is why the organization spends countless hours recruiting young men, not only from high schools.

“From the drive-thru, Family Dollar, warehouse recreation centers. Like we literally pound the pavement,” Collins said. 

Program Associate Kenny Glenn works with many of the young men. As they develop skills for the classroom and outside of the classroom, he gets to show them how they can affect their personal community. For many, that means affecting the lives of those at the high schools they attended, along with the communities they live in currently.

“We’re literally pouring into them to make them stronger professionals,” Glenn said. “For the children that they get to educate, they get to go to class and see a man of color, which is extremely rare in all grades, but especially early childhood education.”

For Glenn, the work that is being done is essential.

“Full circle, be it that these young men of color are pouring into their younger self and this is all the way to preschool,” Glenn said. “And so they’re lighting the spark for these students to be interested in education and, you know, thankfully, it’s from somebody who looks like them.”

That’s all while getting students prepared for kindergarten. 

As new companies like Intel come into the state, Collins sees the work that’s being done now as crucial for the future too.

“The jobs that are going to be here in the next 10 to 15 years, like they’re going to require additional school and education,” Collins said.

So how they help three to five-year-olds in school now will make a world of difference for later.