Beyond Talent

“Beyond talent lie all the usual words: discipline, love, luck – and, above all, endurance."                                                                                                                    – James Baldwin

 

Mission

The mission of Beyond Talent is to create a cycle of empowerment in Washington, DC, neighborhoods by mobilizing grassroots leaders with the skills, education, and relationships they need to make a difference. 

Programs

Community- and faith-based partner organizations recommend participants who have shown leadership potential for the Beyond Talent program.  Beyond Talent recruits these emergent leaders as “mentors” to their peers.  Beyond Talent mentors volunteer at least five hours a week in the organizations that recommended them.  In return, Beyond Talent empowers these mentors to meet financial, practical, intellectual, and emotional barriers to higher education.  Beyond Talent mentors, who are often recent GED graduates, transition to college (or other postsecondary settings) with guidance from Beyond Talent.  We set them up for success and follow through with them until they have completed one or more semesters of college.  We also train them to continue their success and, best of all, to become a support network for each other and for those who come after them.

Beyond Talent sponsors mentors in Living Wages GED and EDP programs in Southeast; Friendship House Association in Southwest; Academy of Hope in Northwest; and Notre Dame Education Center in Northeast.  We have also partnered with The Social Venture Capital Foundation, the Religious of the Sacred Heart, SERVE DC, Youth Venture, and Youth Service America.  Through our mentors, Beyond Talent serves hundreds of youth and adults.  Beyond Talent supports mentors’ service with monthly site visits and trainings.

Vision

Our goal is to create a network of grassroots leaders throughout the District.  These leaders will come together regularly for trainings, meetings, leadership development, and group projects.  We aim to equip emerging leaders, loaded with talent, to transform their own lives, as well as the lives of their children – and to transform communities from the inside out.  The Beyond Talent system is an innovative, win-win, capacity-building strategy for literacy programs.  Recruiting grassroots, community role models as volunteers just makes sense.  Partner organizations are already expanding upon the Beyond Talent model.

Major Achievements/Success Stories

In this, our first fiscal year, Beyond Talent has sponsored five mentors, each with an inspiring success  story. 

 

One of our mentors, a young single mother and GED graduate, struggled with an Algebra class in her first semester of college.  She worked faithfully, week after week, with a Beyond Talent tutor who met with her in her own neighborhood, and passed the class. 

She is majoring in social work now so she can one day work with troubled teens.  Hearing one of her peers remark, “I’m not college material,” she shouted back, “I never thought I was, either! Now look at me!”  

Another mentor told us, “No matter what happens to me, I know I want to keep volunteering, helping others.”            

          Meeka & Destiny: "Start the Cycle"

Click here for more Beyond Talent Success Stories 

Beyond Talent Website Last Updated: 4-15-05

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PO Box 1412 * Washington, DC 20013 * Phone (202) 494-7629 * Fax (202) 574-3968

www.seedsofchange.org/beyondtalent.htm * beyond_talent@yahoo.com* EIN 20-0411403

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