12:15pm | Long Beach BLAST, a program aimed to help Long Beach students that are struggling with academic and social challenges, received a big boost this week in the form of a $25,000 contribution from Southern California Edison. The money will help BLAST establish a Bridge To College program that assists at-risk youth with individual tutoring and college mentoring.
“Our specialty is taking college students from Long Beach State and Long Beach City College and matching them up with inner city kids,” said BLAST executive director Ray Thomson. “Most of them are problematic, significantly behind or have had behavior problems, they need extra curricular attention.”
Thomson sends college students in to work with the students, mostly at Jordan and Cabrillo high schools as well as Reid Continuation School. He says the program is effective because it teaches students that they can make it to college and treats their sessions like a college course, which instills a sense of pride in them, many of whom have never considered college an option. It also helps that the college student mentors are only a few years older than the high school students, which makes it easier for them to relate and see themselves in that position one day.
“We’re trying to help bridge them into college because many of these kids will end up not graduating and then basically end up on the street corner,” says Thomson. “They are often the smartest, and the rebels and the ones who do things creatively and differently.”
Thomson would know, a former high school dropout himself who went on to earn two Master’s degrees. He now leads the BLAST program that works extensively in several Long Beach schools and housing complexes like Carmelitos and North Pointe.
“We’re in all the places you would hope that we would be,” he says.
The donation from Edison will help BLAST extend its services by hiring some of their best student mentors, and it allows them to reach more students than ever before.