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Teen ‘rebounds’ and ‘jumpstarts’ feted
By Beth Brogan, Times Record Staff
FREEPORT — Seeds of Independence, a Freeport-based nonprofit organization designed to match mentors with at-risk youth, celebrated participants and graduates of the organization’s programs Thursday evening during an outdoor benefit on Church Road in South Freeport.
Thursday’s fete also was designed to introduce community members to the programs now under the Seeds of Independence umbrella, and encourage attendees to volunteer to mentor other young people.
Programs like Jumpstart, which brings first-time juvenile offenders together with mentors to work on decision-making skills, and Rebound, for repeat offenders, benefit kids who “either through some choice of their own, or a group of circumstances they had no control over … have become disenfranchised,” said Seeds of Independence board president Tom Wright of Freeport, who founded the organization with his wife, Willo Wright. “We’re trying to get them back.”
To a crowd of more than 150 Thursday night, Tom Wright spoke of a disappointing 1-in-4 overall graduation rate in the United States, including just more than 50 percent of minority students.
“Just in our local area, we’ll have about 600 kids who will not graduate this year,” he said. “What are we going to do with those kids? What we’re trying to do is affect that rate in the best way we can.”
Freeport High School senior Josh Sturtevant, 17, is a graduate of Jumpstart, the oldest of the programs that are now part of Seeds of Independence. The eight-week mentoring program meets each Monday night at the Freeport Police Station, “really just to talk,” Sturtevant said Thursday.
Meeting his mentor, Eric Horne of Freeport, and participating in Jumpstart “just brought me back on track,” Sturtevant said prior to a speech before Thursday’s crowd. “It just sort of reiterated the things I already knew — to be open and accepting, to laugh at yourself and to talk ownership for your actions.”
Horne, for his part, said he likely got more from the mentoring experience than he gave, noting that “After the first couple of weeks, I thought, ‘This is a real pleasure.’”
Seventeen-year-old Abby Rega, also of Freeport, attended Jumpstart and then the Rebound program after “getting into trouble doing teenage things.”
As she passed trays of hors’ d’oeuvres with other participants Thursday night, Rega said the programs taught her “a lot of life lessons and to straighten up.” These days, she’s working at Buck’s Naked BBQ after school; during the day, she’s a senior at Deering High School in Portland.
“I’m graduating, and I’m doing really well,” she said.
“It’s relationship-based work,” said David Reardon, a Seeds of Independence board member and mentor. Reardon currently mentors 18-year-old Derek Williams of Portland, who is in the midst of the Long Creek to Rebound program, in which mentors work with juveniles incarcerated at the Portland youth center both before and after their release.
Following “multiple assaults and disorderly conduct charges,” Williams was incarcerated at Long Creek for more than a year before the program was suggested as a way to ease his transition “back to the real world,” he said.
Williams said he most appreciates the one-on-one conversations with Reardon on the drive to and from the Brunswick meetings each Thursday night, when Reardon picks Williams up in Portland and then returns Williams to his Portland home.
Williams, now a senior at Deering High School, hopes to attend college someday, possibly after serving in the military.
Mentors in the Rebound program try to meet with kids outside the weekly meetings as well, and Reardon said graduates of the program often continue to attend meetings long after their requirement is met.
About 50 mentors currently volunteer with Seeds of Independence, but Tom Wright encouraged others gathered under the tent on Thursday to sign up to work with the kids. Wright was quick to point out that mentoring with the organization is not the same as with, for example, Big Brothers/Big Sisters.
“It may be as simple as me asking you to call a kid every morning at 7 to make sure he got out of bed,” Wright said.
Other programs under the Seeds of Independence umbrella include a teen parenting class and trips to locations including the Dominican Republic, during which youth and other volunteers work, among other projects, on a Good Samaritan hospital.
“Youth is really our future,” Wright said to the enthusiastic crowd. “If we have a generation of disenfranchised kids, our democracy is not going to work … (mentoring) is easy stuff, and we can help with all these kids.”
For more information about Seeds of Independence or its programs, or to donate to the nonprofit organization, visit www.seedsofindependence.org, e-mail wsw@suscom-maine.net, or call 865-9267.
bbrogan@timesrecord.com
Thursday’s fete also was designed to introduce community members to the programs now under the Seeds of Independence umbrella, and encourage attendees to volunteer to mentor other young people.
Programs like Jumpstart, which brings first-time juvenile offenders together with mentors to work on decision-making skills, and Rebound, for repeat offenders, benefit kids who “either through some choice of their own, or a group of circumstances they had no control over … have become disenfranchised,” said Seeds of Independence board president Tom Wright of Freeport, who founded the organization with his wife, Willo Wright. “We’re trying to get them back.”
To a crowd of more than 150 Thursday night, Tom Wright spoke of a disappointing 1-in-4 overall graduation rate in the United States, including just more than 50 percent of minority students.
“Just in our local area, we’ll have about 600 kids who will not graduate this year,” he said. “What are we going to do with those kids? What we’re trying to do is affect that rate in the best way we can.”
Freeport High School senior Josh Sturtevant, 17, is a graduate of Jumpstart, the oldest of the programs that are now part of Seeds of Independence. The eight-week mentoring program meets each Monday night at the Freeport Police Station, “really just to talk,” Sturtevant said Thursday.
Meeting his mentor, Eric Horne of Freeport, and participating in Jumpstart “just brought me back on track,” Sturtevant said prior to a speech before Thursday’s crowd. “It just sort of reiterated the things I already knew — to be open and accepting, to laugh at yourself and to talk ownership for your actions.”
Horne, for his part, said he likely got more from the mentoring experience than he gave, noting that “After the first couple of weeks, I thought, ‘This is a real pleasure.’”
Seventeen-year-old Abby Rega, also of Freeport, attended Jumpstart and then the Rebound program after “getting into trouble doing teenage things.”
As she passed trays of hors’ d’oeuvres with other participants Thursday night, Rega said the programs taught her “a lot of life lessons and to straighten up.” These days, she’s working at Buck’s Naked BBQ after school; during the day, she’s a senior at Deering High School in Portland.
“I’m graduating, and I’m doing really well,” she said.
“It’s relationship-based work,” said David Reardon, a Seeds of Independence board member and mentor. Reardon currently mentors 18-year-old Derek Williams of Portland, who is in the midst of the Long Creek to Rebound program, in which mentors work with juveniles incarcerated at the Portland youth center both before and after their release.
Following “multiple assaults and disorderly conduct charges,” Williams was incarcerated at Long Creek for more than a year before the program was suggested as a way to ease his transition “back to the real world,” he said.
Williams said he most appreciates the one-on-one conversations with Reardon on the drive to and from the Brunswick meetings each Thursday night, when Reardon picks Williams up in Portland and then returns Williams to his Portland home.
Williams, now a senior at Deering High School, hopes to attend college someday, possibly after serving in the military.
Mentors in the Rebound program try to meet with kids outside the weekly meetings as well, and Reardon said graduates of the program often continue to attend meetings long after their requirement is met.
About 50 mentors currently volunteer with Seeds of Independence, but Tom Wright encouraged others gathered under the tent on Thursday to sign up to work with the kids. Wright was quick to point out that mentoring with the organization is not the same as with, for example, Big Brothers/Big Sisters.
“It may be as simple as me asking you to call a kid every morning at 7 to make sure he got out of bed,” Wright said.
Other programs under the Seeds of Independence umbrella include a teen parenting class and trips to locations including the Dominican Republic, during which youth and other volunteers work, among other projects, on a Good Samaritan hospital.
“Youth is really our future,” Wright said to the enthusiastic crowd. “If we have a generation of disenfranchised kids, our democracy is not going to work … (mentoring) is easy stuff, and we can help with all these kids.”
For more information about Seeds of Independence or its programs, or to donate to the nonprofit organization, visit www.seedsofindependence.org, e-mail wsw@suscom-maine.net, or call 865-9267.
bbrogan@timesrecord.com
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