The next phase of uCANRise’s work is just getting started, but already I’m eager to see how students can thrive when college success organizations give them the space and strategies to lead the way.
– April Yee, Founding Program Officer, uCANRise
Purpose, Passion, and Collaborative Action: uCANRise and Educational Equity
In the spring of 2017, The James Irvine Foundation provided multi-year funding to three California-based nonprofit organizations—Southern California College Access Network (SoCal CAN), Students Rising Above (SRA), and uAspire. Along with generous funding to invest in our student-facing advising programs for college students, the Foundation offered support for the development and ongoing work of a community of practice.
Laurie Jones Neighbors was tasked by Irvine to design and lead the community of practice, which met quarterly in 2018 to find synergy and uncover new approaches for moving the field of college access and success forward.
Through our uCANRise community convenings, we spoke with many students who encounter obstacles as they move through the educational pipeline. We talked to students who almost left school due to their frustrations with bureaucracies and inequities. And we engaged students who came together in campus and community organizations in order to strengthen student action in the fight for educational equity.
It’s fair to say that the expertise students brought to the table has been the defining feature of our model and approach moving forward. While our initial, broad goal was to determine how college access and success direct-service organizations can best support underrepresented students, our time with community college and university students in this project led us to a powerful, exciting narrowed focus.
The Opportunity
Students are in the best position to enact change in the communities where they live, work, and learn. As college access and success organizations, it is our responsibility to shift our power to students by equipping them with skills to advocate for themselves.
Together, California college access and success direct-service organizations have relationships with thousands of students, working with and learning from those already building advocacy skills on their own or through on-campus organizations.
When we increase student confidence, they will transform the institutions and systems to work for them.
And, engaging students in advocacy gives them skills to succeed in their careers and be civically engaged throughout their lives.
April Yee
uCANRise Founding Program Officer
April Yee is dedicated to advancing equity in college and career opportunities for low-income, first generation to college young people. She is a former Program Officer at The James Irvine Foundation, where she partnered with non-profit organizations, colleges and universities, and postsecondary system offices to help smooth students’ transitions between high school and college in California. Prior to her work at Irvine, April conducted research at UC Davis’ Center for Poverty Research and the University of Pennsylvania that investigated how college students choose majors and careers, with a particular focus on the ways that class, culture, and institutional structures and policies shape students’ pathways. April started her career providing direct support to students as an academic advisor at Prep for Prep and LaGuardia Community College’s Accelerated Study in Associate Programs (ASAP). She currently serves as Senior Program Officer at the Colleges Futures Foundation.
Laurie Jones Neighbors
uCANRise Program Manager
Laurie Jones Neighbors specializes in developing and evaluating programs that transform systemic barriers impacting low-income communities and communities of color. She is the former Senior Director of Strategic Initiatives at Urban Habitat, where she served on the organization’s management team and was the architect of the Boards and Commissions Leadership Institute (BCLI). Prior to her work at Urban Habitat, Laurie taught in and directed a number of academic programs for under-represented students at universities and colleges in Texas, Oregon, and California. When her schedule permits, she still enjoys teaching, most recently in the Health Education Department of San Francisco State University, where she has taught courses on structural inequalities and social movements in public health. In 2016, Laurie was proud to be included on the Living Cities list of 25 Disruptive Leaders working to improve economic outcomes for low-income people in America's cities. She currently sits on the board of TransForm, a California policy and advocacy organization that promotes walkable communities with excellent transportation choices in order to connect people of all incomes to opportunity and help solve our climate crisis.
The Leaders We’ve Been Looking For
If we support underrepresented college students to become systems thinkers and doers, they will transform the systems of institutionalized racism, classism, sexism, and xenophobia - the root causes of educational barriers to success.
