The mission of Young Executives of Color (YEOC) is to cultivate the academic and professional potential of underrepresented high school student leaders in Washington State through college preparation, powerful mentorship, and the development of real life business skills.
YEOC is a free nine-month college pipeline program hosted by the University of Washington Foster School of Business. YEOC hosts one Saturday session each month from 8 A.M. – 5 P.M. YEOC is committed to increasing access among historically underrepresented groups, including African American, Hispanic/Latinx, American Indian/Alaskan Native, Pacific Islander and Southeast Asian students. To reach these populations, YEOC focuses most of their outreach and recruitment in Tacoma, South Seattle and Eastern Washington high schools.
The OYPC had the pleasure of interviewing Damariz, Vanessa and a current YEOC mentee about their experiences, goals and outlook within YEOC.
Interviewees:
Damariz Ibáñez: YEOC Program Manager
Vanessa Buenrostro: YEOC Business Operations Intern, Third year Business Student at UW Foster School of Business
YEOC Mentee: Edmonds Woodway High School Senior finishing up an Associate’s Degree through Running Start, and planning to to major in Marketing and Information Systems at the UW Foster School of Business through the Freshman Direct program
“No barrier should be the reason why our students are not getting college access and professional development” – Damariz Ibáñez
The Start – How did YEOC begin?
Years ago, Jai-Anana Elliot saw the need for programming tailored to the recruitment, admission and retention of students of color in Foster School of Business. In 2006, Elliott launched the first YEOC program with 36 students.
Today, Damariz continues Elliott’s legacy of exposing diverse and talented students (up to 180 a year now!) to the world of business and the opportunities available to them at the Foster School or other higher education institutions.
As the program manager, Damariz oversees the entirety of the YEOC program – from recruitment, logistics and admissions to hiring mentors and planning and coordinating what each Saturday session entails. Damariz has spent the past 5 years growing and strengthening the program to where it is now, sharing that “[I] couldn’t do a lot of the work I do without all the mentors and student employees.”
Another important member of the YEOC team is Vanessa, the business operations intern. Vanessa works closely with Damariz, mentors and volunteers to help coordinate and plan all the program sessions, manage session logistics, and oversee the volunteers. In addition, Vanessa lead YEOC’s career fair as an MiT for the 2020-2021 school year alongside the EY Program Management team, who offer sponsorship and support to YEOC.
The Importance of Mentorship at YEOC
YEOC is committed to always leading with intentionality, purpose and a community focus. Damariz explains that “Everything has a purpose in the Saturday session. YEOC doesn’t want to waste time with students who spend a whole Saturday once a month with us.” Additionally, YEOC does not sell students a dream about one day making it. YEOC is intentionally transparent and honest about the reality of being a person of color in the business world and provides the support and resources to make sure students feel prepared when they finish high school.
Mentors and interns play one of the most important roles at YEOC because of their ability to honestly share their experiences and lead by example. Mentors and interns prove to mentees that representation does exist and that young students of color have a college-aged peer to look up to. Mentees can look up to undergraduate students like Vanessa, who are successfully navigating college and internship experiences, and see that these corporate opportunities are just as accessible and possible to them: as Damariz says, “Mentors are living breathing examples that mentees can do it too!”
There are currently 17 undergraduate mentors who help lead lectures for each Saturday session. Mentors are assigned to lead sessions based on their major; for example, last month’s topic was Finance, so Finance majors took the lead in presenting. Each mentor has complete autonomy for their 45 minute presentations, but beforehand, mentors connect with Foster faculty to go over their planned lecture and receive feedback and suggestions. During these sessions, mentors speak to areas they feel would be most beneficial for a high school student to get an introduction to the business subject.
Although mentor-led lectures are an important part of a mentee’s session, this is just one eighth of the day! Each Saturday also includes a keynote speaker from YEOC’s EY partner or alumni network, a hands-on workshop related to the session’s subject, college prep to help with financial aid or college choice, and most importantly, a personal check-in. YEOC’s “real talks” at the end of each Saturday session allow mentors to check in with their mentees to get feedback about the session and to see how YEOC mentees are feeling moving forward.
The 2021-22 cohort includes 155 students, about 8-10 students per mentor. By grouping students with an assigned mentor, it allows students to just have more intimate conversations, mentorship and community among one another in a smaller space in addition to the larger group session activities. It’s important for YEOC to make mentees know that they aren’t just a number and that each mentee’s experience is prioritized and special – YEOC goes beyond just providing resources for them.
Mentors in YEOC go above and beyond to help their mentees feel supported every step of the way through the program. Mentors are in communication with their mentees to provide guidance and advice as mentees begin applying for internships, scholarships and colleges. Our mentee expressed that she has developed a relationship with other mentors, not just her own, broadening her community and support system at YEOC.
The Impact of YEOC and Power of Community
As these examples illustrate, YEOC recognizes the importance of building community among students – students from different backgrounds, schools and communities come together and are able to bond and understand each other when they come to YEOC. Mentees are respected and valued for their own lived experiences and perspectives, allowing YEOC to continue building an inclusive environment for all students. Additionally, YEOC makes sure to provide a space for students to provide feedback to YEOC leadership and to share their experiences so that YEOC can actually adapt the program to make sure it works for them.
“Community doesn’t work without the students. The better ideas always come from the mentees and mentors. It’s the students who create initiatives at YEOC – for example, the push for being inclusive to religious holidays, celebrating all cultures and identity, the push for using pronouns. We model for our students that it is not always a cold world in business. This is the standard that we expect in our space and we hope that when students walk into other spaces, they can create change so that their new communities are inclusive not just for themselves, but for everyone else coming in.” – Damariz Ibáñez
Vanessa & our YEOC mentees agree that community and the YEOC network has been the most impactful aspect of their experiences. Vanessa shares with that “as a student from Quincy, Washington, I was able to come to YEOC and see other people of color who looked like me and had similar goals as me – it was impactful for me to see the different opportunities in business that I couldn’t get in my high school, but was most impactful was seeing my mentors of similar backgrounds and age get internships and be successful in college.”
Our YEOC mentee expressed how the community has positively impacted her time over the past nine months in the program: “YEOC has been more amazing than what I have ever thought. The amount of community and mentorship that YEOC offers is absolutely incredible and I wouldn’t be where I am in terms of believing in myself and identifying my goals if it weren’t for YEOC.” Additionally, she expressed how the YEOC community has allowed her to go beyond her comfort zone – she’s tried new things that she wouldn’t normally do if she didn’t have the support of her peers and mentors, something she will take away after the program ends.
Just like their mentors, mentees are also role models for others in showing that anything is possible. Through all the adversities YEOC students face – being first generation, first to finish high school, first to learn the English language in their family – YEOC strives to recognize the hard work mentees do to support their own families through their own jobs and education and doing so with no complaints.
COVID-19 – Navigating a Pandemic
Because community is such an integral part of YEOC, returning to the 2021-22 year with in-person programming has been a great reminder to how meaningful building relationships first hand really is. Although in-person programming is preferred, YEOC learned to adapt and leverage their resources for students during virtual programming. There was a great shift in culture when YEOC transitioned virtually during the peak of the pandemic because one of the program’s biggest assets is showing up in-person to build relationships and that community on campus. Damariz explained that “it was difficult at first to capture student engagement compared to being in-person, but now that we’re back in-person, we are seeing that eagerness and students as we begin to go back to normal.”
While convening virtually, conversations surrounding food and housing security became a priority when checking-in with YEOC mentees. It was no longer about whether the students will show up to each session, but how they show up and making sure there are no barriers preventing them from being present.
New Opportunities & Continuing a Legacy
Moving forward, the YEOC team shared with us some new ambitions and goals to strengthen their program. In the future, YEOC hopes to have more involvement at the undergraduate level in the Foster School, allowing for more partnerships with other Foster programs. Additionally, YEOC aims to provide more formal opportunities for their alumni network to come back and mentor YEOC undergraduates when they’ve finished the program.
With positive feedback surrounding the YEOC branding, YEOC hopes to have more universities (Washington State University, Seattle University, etc.) adopt this program statewide so more students are able to participate. Although YEOC is currently at a cap, Vanessa shared that she envisions a future where they will be able to bring on more mentors, mentors in training, volunteers and most importantly, more mentees. As the program continues to grow, our mentee shared that she hopes to one day become a mentor and contribute back to the community that believed in her so much.
Damariz expressed her sincere awe of her mentees and how hard they work to show up and use the space that YEOC has provided them and make the most of what they learned to go back to their own communities and make change. Mentees are more than change makers: they are pillars to the community.
A BIG THANK YOU to the YEOC team for taking the time out of their busy lives to share their stories with all of us as a part of Youth at UW! We thank YEOC in continuing to uphold their mission to make professional development and college preparation accessible and inclusive for students of color in Washington.
Learn more about YEOC’s mentors, schedule and data in 2021-2022 Mid Year Report