The 2017 Shari Prestemon Social Justice Interns have graciously agreed to share their experiences with all of us. From time to time, we’ll be posting ‘journal entries’ from Naiomi Gonzalez and Katy Morton. Below is one of these entries.
Bridges Out of Poverty.
This week, Naiomi and I had the opportunity to attend the Bridges out of Poverty class held at the Micah Day Center on Tuesday evening. I believe I may have touched briefly on the Bridges program in an earlier journal entry, but let me just say again, it truly is an amazing program and having the opportunity to meet some of the participants was an awesome experience.
Bridges out of Poverty is a program based on a book that seeks to explain poverty on both an individual as well as a systemic level. Earlier this summer, I received a copy of the Bridges book in the mail and began reading. While some of the information was similar to what was said in my college textbooks about poverty, the author describes a more personal and individual perspective of poverty through examples that immerse the reader in probable situations. The author then goes on the lay the groundwork for the Bridges program, which has been enthusiastically adopted and put into play by some of the amazing staff of Back Bay. The way it works is that there are mentors and their mentees, which are also referred to as investigators. The mentors each take on one investigator and agrees to be their mentor during the program, and for two years following the end of the program. Many times, however, the participants in the Bridges Program end up forming relationships that last a lifetime.
The entire work day before the Bridges class was held at Back Bay, several members of the staff were busy setting up and preparing to ensure that everything was ready for the class. I couldn’t believe the amount of work and preparation it took to ensure that everything was set up and that everyone would have dinner. When we arrived to the class, each table was set nicely, complete with bowls of candy!
The class was amazing, eye-opening, and informative. Two guest speakers covered the world of finances, savings plans, and how to budget and pay off debts. Through personal stories and examples, the speakers were able to keep the whole room engaged, with ease. Once the speakers had finished, we got to hear from some of the current and past mentors and mentees. Each individual had a unique story to share, but it was particularly interesting to hear the similarities between some of the mentors and their mentees (also referred to as the investigators). Equally as interesting, was hearing from the mentors that they recognized these similarities and were able to share instances where they faced financial and social hardship in the past. One mentor even shared about how his participation in the Bridges program has changed his social and political perspective over the past few years. This mentor shared how he had come into the Bridges program as a conservative Republican who firmly believed that poverty was a choice and happened as a result of people not wanting to work hard. Upon meeting his investigator, hearing her story, and spending only a short time with her, his opinions began to quickly change. As he worked through the program with his fellow mentors and investigators, he started to see that poverty is truly not a choice and that it is an extremely difficult lifestyle cycle to break. Upon seeing his investigator’s successes, and struggles, the mentor was able to see how poverty affects all facets of a person’s life and just how hard it is to get oneself out of poverty.
The Bridges program is an amazing thing, and it was awesome to be able to see firsthand the positive effects it can have on not only the investigators, but also the mentors.
