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MASHA: When I came back to PCC in 2011,
I had no goals about what I was going to do with my education yet.
I didn't graduate high school.
I was moving in and out of my parents' house.
Then I got married and had a baby.
JONATHAN: In 1990, I dropped out of college
after having gone to CalArts, Otis Parsons, and The Art
Center, at which point I became a makeup
artist in New York and Paris.
I worked in graphic design in LA as dot com creative director and art
director.
I went to culinary school, had a catering company,
taught cooking, sold electrics, worked in property management,
was a barista.
I was obviously searching for something.
And--
SAMUEL: I didn't finish school, and so the sixth grade education
was pretty much where I was at.
And so I left the house at 12.
I had a run in with the law at age 18,
and I almost ended up in prison.
In 2005, I started trying to find some things online to get a GED
or figure out how to get a diploma, because I was trying
to get a better job, and everywhere wanted
to have an employee with either a high school education or a GED.
And so--
MASHA: For seven years, as soon as I realized
that I was going to have to pick a career eventually,
I was trying to decide what I was going to do.
And I was changing my mind a lot.
It was difficult, because I'm indecisive,
and because I have too many choices open for me,
and because there's too much hanging on that decision.
JEANNIE LAFRANCE: You know, so the image
of Masha when she first came into the project
might have been someone standing at a crossroads
where there were many, many, many different paths.
And she was there by herself, and she wasn't sure where to go.
And the image I have of Masha now is her walking clearly and strongly
down one of those paths, but with lots of people with her.
MASHA: I feel like education and school isn't just
learning the things in the books.
There's a lot of other educational aspects in class
that I totally was missing.
JEANNIE LAFRANCE: And so, you know, I
think about how hard college is for so many people.
And then add on top of that all of those other issues
that Masha and so many of our students have gone through.
And I think it's amazing that they're here at all.
MASHA: Jeannie did not have to do that.
That wasn't part of the class, and that wasn't part of the program,
and not even really part of her job.
It was just something she did that was super special to me
and that affected my entire life.
RICCI ELIZABETH: Masha often had a look of what the?
That look is inviting to me.
And so that look offered me a chance to call on her often,
to have her point of view brought into the classroom,
to speak to her after class, to engage her more.
And that link there I think opened up a relationship with her
where perhaps she felt seen by it, which tends to happen, heard.
MASHA: The mentoring that I got from Ricci and Jeannie
gave me a reason to go to school outside of just getting my diploma.
And Jeannie helped me figure out what I wanted to do with my career
and where I want to go from here in that 15 to 20 minutes of time she
didn't have to spend with me.
JONATHAN: I was missing a career that
satisfied different aspects of my personality.
Each one of the careers that I had tried would satisfy the creative,
it would satisfy the food, it would satisfy the office worker in me.
I mean, there's so many different parts that make me,
and I would get bored with any one thing
if it didn't encompass too many things.
RACHEL MCMILLEN: So when I first met Jonathan,
and we first started to work together,
he had many different interests that he was trying out.
He had had many jobs in the past that he excelled in.
He has a lot of talents, has a lot of skills, and a lot of interests,
so it can be really hard to focus on, well,
where do I go next with all of this-- with all
these different pieces that I have?
JONATHAN: In 2010, I came to PCC wanting to study Chinese medicine.
It was challenging.
It was hard.
Ultimately, Chinese medicine wasn't the path that I wanted.
SARAH ELSASSER: He can do anything.
And with Jonathan, every time I saw him, it was feet to the fire.
Jonathan, you have to make a choice.
This choice isn't going to satisfy all of your needs,
but you have to make a choice, because no particular thing
is going to do that.
JONATHAN: I mean, so Sarah really kept me on track academically
and talked me, as I said, down from many a ledge.
And Sarah was able to laugh at me when
I was being absolutely ridiculous.
For the one hour that I contemplated welding,
I mean, she found that hilarious, and she was not quiet about that.
RACHEL MCMILLEN: It was really a process.
OK, here's what I'm thinking about now, and we'd chat about it.
He'd share where he was coming from, what he was thinking.
Sometimes it would entail taking a class
and spending some time with it to figure out
is this where I want to go?
JONATHAN: I think that the epiphany I had while talking with Rachel
was that the business was what I was pursuing.
She suggested to me, when I was thinking about business,
that I look into the PCC Climb Center,
where they have a small business development program.
And through that, I found out about their getting your recipe
to market program, which is for small food entrepreneurship.
And it was something that could satisfy all these different aspects
of what I needed in order to be successful.
RACHEL MCMILLEN: I still have to remind
him, do you have any sense of how far you've
come in terms of what you've actually accomplished?
He's had huge accomplishments.
And so I know he knows it, but it's still good to remind him at times,
hey, look what you've done.
JONATHAN: I am now a small business owner.
I developed during the 13 week program
a caramel corn using organic butter and Oregon sea
salt that is now starting to do well,
which is mind boggling that in 13 weeks,
I developed something that is now on market shelves.
Rachel and Sarah both gave me tons of perspective
that you can only give to somebody when you have seen them grow
and are watching them look for their path.
They both, from different angles, have pointed out to me
that I am a success.
SAMUEL: My whole childhood growing up and throughout my teenage years
and even into adulthood, I felt like I was intellectually unequal
from other people, because they had a different life than I had.
I felt like they had something better, you know?
I didn't know what that was.
I just thought that it had to be better.
They got an education, and so I felt like I
was lacking some kind of smarts.
And so when I came to PCC, it was pretty much the same thing.
The only thing I had was the desire to want more for myself,
but that's it.
SARAH ELSASSER: I first met Sam about two years ago
when he joined the ROOTS program.
He struck me as a person who was very capable, but also unsure
of his abilities.
SAMUEL: I think that sometimes you really
don't know what you're capable of.
And so when I came in, I wasn't sure what I was capable of.
I felt like I was intellectually inadequate-- like completing
school was a thought, but I didn't know if it was really a reality.
JAN JUST: I learned from Sam about his life and the dynamic life
that he had had-- the very different educational background, very
little educational background that he
had had over a long period of time.
SAMUEL: She saw that I was working hard, trying to be a good dad.
And there was times where I didn't have daycare.
And she sat outside with my daughter so I
could run inside and take a quiz.
I mean, like, what if I'd had to miss that quiz?
Guess what.
Then I miss two or three quizzes, and I end up getting a B or a C.
And then over the course of two years,
my grades aren't good enough to get into the radiography program,
and then my dreams of helping to give my kid something better--
those start to fall apart, you know?
SARAH ELSASSER: Sam has a history that I
think caused him to frequently doubt his ability.
Not doubt his goal, but doubt his ability to actually get there.
I always felt that I could see his ability,
and that's part of what I give him.
SAMUEL: She helped me with what I thought I could achieve.
So she helped me realize that I do have potential
beyond just my prerequisites beyond the radiography program,
and she's helped me gather my thoughts and what I wanted to do
and where I want to go, and helped me streamline that.
I mean, obviously an adviser.
She helps me plan out all my stuff.
And then if anything changes throughout the term,
throughout those meetings, we make adjustments.
And it's like having somebody there constantly
with their hand around you saying, hey, look.
Is this house still looking like you envisioned
it when we started building it?
There's not words to describe that kind of support.
You know what I mean?
There's not.
SARAH ELSASSER: I became the person who had faith in him
and was able to simply say to him, Sam,
this is what I see of who you are.
SAMUEL: Any of these things that come up on a day to day basis
for any student-- all of these concerns are real and valid,
and the kind of emotion that can come from those
can shut the student down to where they give up.
So it's important to have people like that.
MASHA: I don't think that a mentor goes into a conversation thinking,
I'm going to change this person's life right now.
But I think that just the sounding board and having
someone's opinion who you respect, even the 5, 10, 15 minutes
can really change everything.
JONATHAN: Having somebody take interest in your life
and what you're doing as a student makes a huge impact.
Without developing these relationships
with Sarah and Rachel and more, I don't
think that I would be where I am right now.
They made such a huge difference in helping keep me on track
and helping me to ultimately carve out what it is I want to be doing.
SAMUEL: There's been so many times over the past three years
that either the workload was just overwhelming,
but I've had so much stuff on my plate the past three years.
Without these people in my life supporting me and helping me,
like--
LYNN MONTOYA QUINN: Mentoring is important not just to students,
but I think to anyone who comes from a background of a life
where perhaps they weren't acknowledged
in some ways for the good things that they can do--
for their personal strengths and characteristics.
Mentoring is that outside voice that helps
them recognize what they have within.
PATTIE HILL: Without the mentoring element in the educational process,
education is really just the acquisition of knowledge.
With that mentoring process, education
can become a process during which you learn how to live your life
and how to make a positive contribution to your community.
JEANNIE LAFRANCE: You know, when you're not
used to higher education, it's so huge
and confusing and overwhelming.
And it's nice to have someone to just sit down with you
and say, OK, let's just talk about it.
Let's talk about what are you interested in?
Where do you want to go?
RICCI ELIZABETH: I think I've learned
to keep myself open-- to try to listen to be sensitive to what's
happening in my classroom, to see how students are responding or not
responding, and then put myself forward
as people have put themselves forward for me.
It's more one on one.
It's more personal.
I think that students and me as a teacher
get to further our understanding of what we're talking about.
We get to make different connections that can't possibly
happen in the classroom, because the constraints are gone.
JAN JUST: I believe that the mentoring aspect of it
is going to help the people that otherwise would not
become instructed, because they have other things going
on in their lives that are too difficult
and end up taking priority.
So you're going to reach more students,
and you're going to become extremely meaningful in their lives
if you can begin to know them as individuals.
PATTIE HILL: You get to intervene.
You get to support.
You get to shape decisions and self concepts that students make
and have.
It's very exciting.
I mean, transformation is not too strong a word.
JEANNIE LAFRANCE: I value mentoring, and I
value being able to make those connections with students.
And I've seen it make a huge difference.
It's made a huge difference in my life when I've had that in my life,
and so I would love to be able to pass that on to students
that I work with as well.
LYNN MONTOYA QUINN: I've talked with students
before their experience of mentoring and after their experience
of mentoring, and many times, it's an open door
into realizing either more about themselves
or more about resources at PCC or more about potential in the future.
So if students don't get that connection, they may go to class,
get a grade, but they won't have the richness
that an education can bring to someone's life.
SARAH ELSASSER: I believe that anyone
can mentor, regardless of their position.
Anyone can mentor, because the most valuable thing that I believe
a mentor gives to an individual is the ability to see them.
Really see the whole person and say, I see who you are.
Because a part of that-- the next step is,
then, I see what you can do.
JEANNIE LAFRANCE: Being able to get that email back, or get
that phone call, or text, these days, that says, hey,
I'm doing this thing.
Thank you so much.
They're doing this wonderful thing in their community,
and they're doing this wonderful thing in their life,
and they think that you've been a part
of helping make that come true for them.
MASHA: Jeannie and Ricci definitely changed my life.
They changed my future.
They changed how I think.
They changed everything about my life.
JONATHAN: I would not be where I am today with Pinkleton's
without Rachel and Sarah's input by a long shot.
SAMUEL: You know what I realized through this whole experience
is that by people doing that for me, I feel so
compelled to do the same for others.