I hope this letter finds you healthy and feeling a renewed sense of optimism about the future. Although the ongoing pandemic and near-constant racialized violence continue to make this a uniquely challenging time, the last few months have also brought countless opportunities for learning, growth and fresh hope to our community. As you’ll see below, Enroot students contributed to public discourse on equity in STEM, explored careers across all sectors alongside several dozen professionals in our Virtual Career Fair, and shared their visions of success in a must-watch ‘What Does Success Mean to You’ video project. Our Alumni gathered for a heartwarming mini-reunion, filled with equal parts laughter and tears. Our Volunteers leaned into challenging conversations during Parts 3 and 4 of our year-long Unconscious Bias trainings, and shared their hidden talents in the first ever “Enroot’s Got Talent” talent show. Enroot’s staff and Board continue to push their own boundaries as antiracist leaders through trainings, action-oriented conversations, and the creation of our Strategic Plan for advancing equity at Enroot. As our high school seniors continue to get good news from colleges and other post-high school opportunities, we focus on our shared future, which is brighter than ever before.
Thank you for continuing to be a part of the Enroot family, and of the movement to advance educational equity for immigrant students!
Ben Clark
Executive Director
Ben Clark
Executive Director
Honoring Women’s History Beyond March
As we celebrated the beginning of spring in March, we also had the space and time to reflect on the importance of women in not only our culture and society, but also in breaking down boundaries and constraints that have been unjustly projected onto women. As an organization dedicated to equity, we believe it is important to recognize the bravery and resiliency of women not only during Women’s History Month, but throughout our lives, and remain committed to fighting for women’s empowerment by addressing the wage gap and underrepresentation in so many areas.
The Enroot team honored Women’s History Month by using our time together as a team to watch videos and have discussions on women voices and empowerment. We explored the United Nations’ video highlighting International Women's Day, which discusses the history of women’s rights and march for a more equal future. We also spent time exploring Oprah Magazine US's video that focuses on uplifting the voices and perspectives of women of color. Last but not least, we celebrated the important accomplishments and values of the incredible women on our Enroot team. We deeply value Enroot's mostly female-led staff and their work advancing our organization's important mission.
STEM Partnerships
A Virtual STEM Panel with Broad Institute
This spring, we partnered with Broad Institute to host an informative virtual STEM panel for our students. The Broad Institute panelists talked to our students about crafting a path in the STEM field. It was amazing to listen to a group of professionals that represented our students’ backgrounds, languages and ethnicities share their experiences in the STEM field with our students!
Our students were thoroughly engaged throughout and after the panel. We are so grateful for our partnership and time with Broad Institute and we believe we have some future scientists in our group after this thoughtful panel.
Boston Globe Panel Discussion with Biogen
Our amazing Enroot Somerville High School student Emily, and Executive Director Ben Clark, participated in a panel hosted by The Boston Globe and Biogen that addressed racial inequality in STEM education.
In an era where STEM education and opportunities aren’t accessible for so many individuals of marginalized backgrounds, we are thankful that conversations like this one are being held so we can push the envelope to include immigrant student voices in STEM education! We are incredibly proud of Emily for sharing her experiences and being a voice for her peers. We are honored to have partners like Biogen who are committed to advancing racial equity in STEM education.
Virtual Career Fair
We had the incredible opportunity to host a Virtual Career fair featuring Enroot partners Amgen, Google, First Republic Bank, Bunker Hill Community College, Boys and Girls Club of Boston, Mathematica, City of Somerville Summer Programs, Boston Museum of Science, Cambridge Mayor’s Program, and the Rian Immigrant Center! Our students interacted with a panel of professionals who shared their experiences and advice related to the fields of technology, medicine, financial services, sciences and the nonprofit sector.
A few important quotes from the Career Fair include:
“Don’t stop applying to get the position you want! A lot of it is luck and timing. I applied to my position several times before getting the role!”
“The policy world needs people with different views. Policies impact people’s lives and there is so much value in bringing your voice and experience into those settings and speaking for people who may not be able to speak on their own behalf.”
The Virtual Career Fair was a huge success with very active participation from our students. We hope that some of our students will be able to trace their future career decisions to the exposure that this Virtual Career Fair provided.
We LOVE our Alumni!
Moments like THESE remind us why we work so hard and stay committed to the passionate work we do on a daily basis.
We recently hosted an Enroot Alumni happy hour to reconnect, reminisce on past memories, and have some fun together! Let’s just say our alumni did NOT disappoint. We played fun icebreakers, reflected on the importance of Enroot in our lives, and went down memory lane dating all the way back to 1993. We are so grateful for our alumni network and their dedicated passion to remain engaged with Enroot in the capacity that they can. We can’t wait for our next alumni reunion!
What Does Success Mean To You?
Our wonderful Tufts University Tisch Scholar, Shariqa Rahman, created a heartwarming video titled “What Does Success Mean To You?” Over the past few months, Shariqa spent time interviewing our students on their own versions of “success”, and our students gave incredibly thoughtful responses that embody their own personal experiences as well as Enroot's mission. Please take a few minutes to check out the video!
Enroot’s Got Talent
If you read our last newsletter, you probably saw that we were looking forward to an exciting event planned by our Volunteer Committee. Our Volunteer Committee organized an Enroot’s Got Talent event and it was a huge success! In an hour-long spectacular headed by two MCs and a wonderful judge panel, our volunteers showcased their talents ranging from origami to poetry reading to singing and much more! We had a lot of fun and we hope you all stay tuned for our next Enroot’s Got Talent!
Unconscious Bias Trainings
For our Unconscious Bias Trainings 3 and 4, that happened in March and May, we focused on Trauma Informed care and how Enroot mentors and tutors can best apply trauma informed practices to their student support.. Our volunteers were very engaged and were so brave in absorbing information while self-reflecting and advancing the conversation. In training #4 we utilized Racial Affinity Groups to deepen the conversation and reduce the incidence of harm that can be an unintended by product of this type of learning in a multi-racial setting. Through sharing and hearing our stories, we hope to continue working actively against the implicit, explicit, institutional and internalized racism that affects BIPOC/immigrant communities.
Join Enroot as a Volunteer!
We are currently recruiting mentors and tutors to work with our students inside and outside the classroom for the upcoming academic year! If you are interested in providing academic and leadership support, college preparation support, English practice, and partnering with high school immigrant youth to maximize their potential, please consider applying!
Over the past year, we have focused on expanding and advancing our work in the areas of Diversity, Belonging, Inclusion and Equity across our entire Enroot community. Out of a group of hundreds of applicants, Enroot was selected as one of the three organizations to participate in the “Essential Community Practices for Racial Equity Cohort” which will be led by Trinity Boston Connects over the next 6 months. We are excited for this multi-month learning opportunity and consulting engagement, which will include deep exploration and action planning around Racial Equity, Trauma Inclusion, and Restorative Practices. These sessions are coming at a critical time for Enroot and we are so thankful to be in a position to make this important work a priority.
Contribute to our Spring Giving Campaign
Advancing educational equity with and for immigrant students is more important than ever before. In an unprecedented year of obstacles and adversity, our students not only persisted but handled this year with incredible grace in a mostly virtual school year. Additionally, we are excited to announce that several of the college sophomores who enrolled in our first College Success Program Cohort in 2018 are graduating right now!
Your generous support is making a difference and we hope you can contribute to the brighter days ahead! We could not have accomplished so much over the past year without generous contributions from individuals like you. We hope you continue to invest in our students’ success by contributing to our Spring Giving Campaign.
