NSTS September Newsletter

Through mentoring and coaching others, we fulfill the divine injunction to love our neighbors as ourselves. In doing so, we also find our own motivation and means for self-improvement, building both competence and confidence in our personal efforts to achieve success as we help others to do likewise.

TowneBank has very generously committed $1,000,000 to support our Next Step to Success construction project on the former DePaul Hospital campus. Now TowneBank challenges businesses, non-profits, and individuals to match this gift through the TowneBank Million Dollar Mentorship Challenge.

Please support Next Step to Success students, Success Coaches, staff, and volunteers as they perform a million minutes of mentorship over the next 12 months (i.e., during the upcoming 2024-25 academic year and the 2025 summer program). Starting September 3, 2024 (the first day of the 2024-25 afterschool program), each minute spent by an NSTS student, success coach, staff member, or volunteer in mentoring others will count as one dollar!

Click here to learn more

How does it Work?

Our Success Coaches will review with their student teams (Teams Grit, Growth Mindset, Optimism, Success, Confidence and Personal Agency) what their members did as mentors each week, logging these efforts in each team’s “Mentor Mark’s” notebook (e.g., Helping a younger sibling with homework – 1 hour, teaching an athletic skill to younger kids – 2 hours). With their Success Coaches’ help, our NSTS student mentors will begin to appreciate how little things they do each day can make a big difference in the lives of others, all while building greater competence, self-confidence, and decision-making skills on their part. The teams will engage in a friendly competition for the quality and quantity of Mentorship Minutes each week, all as recorded on a visual tracker located on our campus and reported to you in the NSTS Monthly Newsletter. Sponsorship

Become a Mentor/Volunteer

If you would like to become a mentor/volunteer, please reach out to info@nextsteptosuccess.org or click here to fill out a Contact Us form.