Back in 2023, I spearheaded the launch of a student-to-student mentorship program at Clayton-Bradley Academy called Student Success. Since then, I have been building the program from the ground up. I have just passed on my leadership role, and I am proud of the organization we have built.
The idea for student success began when former CBA principal Brad Rasmussen gave the school's National Honor Society chapter the objective of building a platform that fostered student-to-student mentorship opportunities. I worked behind the scenes to get the new organization's first website up and running, and I quickly became the face of the program, getting the privilege of announcing its launch to the CBA community. I have had passion for the project because I have seen it as an opportunity to give something back to the school community that has done so much for me and my life trajectory. Building that initial website required collecting and organizing information from NHS mentors about what subjects they could work with students on and their availability. Launching the program took a lot of communication with administrators.
Student Success's first year saw reasonable success. As a brand new program, usership was predictably low. Despite our best efforts to market the initiative, it reached only an estimated 11 students, still a substantial improvement upon the program it replaced, but certainly not up to the level of adoption we felt we could achieve. I was elected president of the National Honor Society chapter the following year, and the Student Success program became further ingrained in the chapter's mission. I made it a goal to grow the program as much as possible in the coming year and build a structure that would make it sustainable in the long term. You can read more about my takeaways from my time as NHS president here.
The first checkpoint in attaining that goal was to revamp the website. Based on faculty feedback collected between operating years, we made the interface more intuitive. Additionally, I had the opportunity to improve my graphic design skills as we adjusted the website's cosmetics to better fit the school's branding.
The website was not all we changed for the new year, though. Upon faculty request, we introduced workshop sessions where NHS mentors attended 45 minute workshops hosted by faculty members to work with students on coursework for the instructor's class. Additionally, interest from lower school families prompted us to launch out lower school program, which met once per week after school for an hour. These moves were an astounding success and a key reason why the program has reached the usership rate it has today. Building Student Success has been a constant journey of iteration. And there have been plenty of failures along the way. At the time of writing, online resources, a key goal we set for the program, are lacking. Our marketing efforts have improved substantially, but still are not as effective as they could be. Some of my own strategic (or so I thought) wording choices on our official materials have at times made it difficult for people to learn about the program at a glance. We learn from mistakes like these, and we move forward. The way to grow a successful program is to respond to feedback from both consumers and program members.
Persistence has been key to building Student Success. But thanks to a great team applying consistent effort and persevering, at the end of my term as president, Student Success's userbase grew from 11 to 41 students, and our annual session count grew from 11 to 195. At a small school, I could not be more pleased with those numbers. It would not have been possible without all of my colleagues who served as mentors for the program and the tremendous support the program has received from faculty, administrators, and families. The program now has much broader recognition, and it has a bright future. I am delighted to have been able to contribute to my school community in this lasting way. Below, you can see the final report issued to administrators during my time as Student Success Chairperson.
Student Success's 2024-2025 Final Report