Illuminating opportunity: Start-to-Finish program helps underserved students chart path to academic success

For Edwin Phillips, attending college never felt like a real possibility. 

"Before I graduated high school, I had a daughter already. I had a lot of difficult choices to make," Phillips said. "There weren't a lot of options. Having a child, I wanted to do something different, do something better, and set an example. I chose the military because I didn't know what else to do." 

After more than four years in the U.S. Army, Phillips returned to Benton Harbor, where he bumped into his former Dream Academy English teacher, Brandon Flowers, who was now working at Lake Michigan College. It was Flowers, he said, that convinced him to give LMC a try. 

That's when Phillips heard about Start-to-Finish, LMC's academic support program that serves students from the Benton Harbor Promise Zone, and students who spent time in foster care. 

"It was like this safe zone for students like me to come and do homework or talk about different situations they have faced or get help with assignments and things like that," Phillips said. "They made sure that if we ever had a problem with books or tuition that they would find a solution." 

Start-to-Finish, which started with the graduating class of 2011, is designed to help current and former foster care and underserved students achieve academic success. It was created in response to Benton Harbor Promise, a scholarship fund that provides full tuition to any accredited community college or career technical school in Michigan. All graduating students from the Benton Harbor Promise Zone, which includes Benton Harbor High School, Dream Academy, and Countryside Academy, are eligible to receive the award. 

"The Promise scholarship helped students financially, but as more kids came here, we saw that they were struggling academically," Start-to-Finish Director Charmae Sanders said. "The college wanted to find a way to support these students, and that is how Start-to-Finish came about."  

The program is funded through the college's general fund, LMC's Foundation, as well as a grant from the United Way of Southwest Michigan. It offers students one-on-one life coaching, learning and computer labs, tutoring services, success planning, academic advising and intervention, referrals to internships or job opportunities, and even transportation and snacks.  

"Our life coaches are the students go-to person at LMC," Sanders said. "They help them navigate everything from making sure their admissions paperwork is done correctly, helping them get into classes, and, once they are here, helping them work the different computer systems. We help provide transportation to students. I've even babysat before. We will basically do anything to remove as many barriers as possible so the students can focus on school." 

Chokwe Pitchford, a political science major who graduated from Countryside Academy, is one of 88 LMC students currently enrolled in the program. Pitchford said he was reluctant to participate until friends convinced him to see what it was all about. 

"There's a stigma placed on certain people that you aren't going to be anything," Pitchford said. "At a certain point, you start to internalize it. 'Well, I can't do that, it's way too hard for me.' I think it's especially true in high school where the testing is written in a certain way that you can't understand because you've been using Ebonics your whole life. You think, 'if this is bad, what must college be like?' So, you feel you have to go in a different direction. But this program has been big in opening opportunities up for me." 

One of those opportunities was applying for Organizing Corps 2020, which trains select students on skills needed to work on a political campaign staff. Pitchford, who was one of 300 students selected out of 3,000 applicants nationwide for the summer program, came away with bigger aspirations than he expected.  

"They told me, 'OK, we think you have a future in this, and you should run for office,'" Pitchford said. "I started thinking about all the kids just like me who might be inspired by this, so at 20 years old, I am now the youngest person to ever run for the state legislature. Hopefully, that will show people that there really is no limit." 

Sanders, who spent several years working in the foster care system before joining LMC in 2015, said convincing all her students that lesson isn't always easy, particularly during the transition from high school to college. 

"We reach out to all eligible students and explain what the program is, but they determine how in or out they are going to be," she said. "We have a significant number of students who test into transitional classes. So, we work hard to have them not give up and try to make the most of it by learning all of that foundation. It's hard for students who feel like they've gotten trapped in that transitional studies spiral to stay motivated and keep going on. 

"I tell my students that they are brilliant all the time," she continued. "You may have been under-resourced before, but you have brilliance, and we are going to pull that out of you. Focusing on those positive things can help to change someone's mindset." 

Those students who do stick it out, have made the Start-to-Finish offices their home away from home. Students gather to talk about classes and challenges with not only staff but each other. Sanders said students even hang out in the space over summer and holiday breaks. 

 "It's not just a program; it's a family," she said. "The students know that, and that keeps them coming, that keeps them wanting to do well. They feel accountable to us because you don't want to let down mom and dad."  

Among the services Sanders and her staff have recently adopted has been campus visits to four-year universities, including Western Michigan University, Ferris State, and her alma mater, Michigan State, which is where Phillips is now pursuing his bachelor's degree in sociology after transferring from LMC. 

"After LMC, I thought that was it, but Miss Charmae insisted that I take a tour of Michigan State and apply," Phillips said. "I didn't think I would get in, but I got accepted, and we took that tour, and Miss Charmae even helped me enroll and sign up for classes." 

"On our way there, he looked like a deer in headlights," Sanders said of Phillips. "Then we got there, and we were walking around campus on our tour, and I just saw the moment that it clicked, where he realized 'I can do this. I belong here.' Now he's been on the Dean's List, had internships in Detroit, and he will graduate with his bachelor's degree in December." 

Now, Phillips is thinking about applying for graduate school. 

"Look, I know school is not easy, and it isn't for everybody," he said. "It's up to each person to choose if they want to change, to surround themselves with people who will engage in those conversations. It's about being around people that believe in you and push you. That's what Start-to-Finish helped me realize."