Josh Falcone – News Editor
The New Haven Promise Ambassadors is a new group that assists new students who are recipients of the New Haven Promise scholarship.
Promise Ambassador Rachael Whitfield said the new organization is a support to Promise scholarship benefactors.
“We are ambassadors for New Haven Promise, which is a scholarship for students who have been enrolled in New Haven public schools since either the time they first go to school or you can still get the scholarship if you start in high school,” she said.
According to Whitfield, the scholarship program is only a few years old.
“The scholarship program started, oh I want to say, five years ago, but a lot of people didn’t know about it,” Whitfield said. “So what they started doing was advertising it and coming into the schools and saying New Haven pride, we all want you to go to college.”
Whitfield described the scholarship as an opportunity for New Haven public school students to attend a Connecticut college and then return to the community and enhance New Haven.
“Basically what it is, is if you go to a state school or any school in Connecticut, they are going to give you some scholarship money if you get the scholarship,” she said. “And the hope is that when you get older and you graduate, you are going to come back to New Haven and try and make it a better place. And you are going to help the younger generation go off to college too.”
New Haven Promise’s goal, Whitfield said, is to enhance the community and the city’s students to go to college.
“They are trying to improve New Haven and get New Haven kids to go to college and tell them if you need help, this is a way you can get out, this is another outlet of financial aid,” she said, “and you can get some money for school.”
The ambassadors are mentors who are available to New Haven Promise recipients, Whitfield said, no matter the question or issue.
“What my colleagues and I do is, this is the first year they are doing the ambassador program, basically what we it is, the incoming freshman, the 2018 class, we have I think 100 students at Southern who got the scholarship and what we do is we put on programs,” Whitfield said. “And we give them our email so if they are ever nervous about anything or if they need help, they can come to us.”
Whitfield said that many times when students head off to college for the first time, they do not have anyone to assist them with questions or concerns.
“A lot of times when you go off to college you are all alone and you are not going to call your mom to ask her where is this building on campus,” Whitfield said, “or mom, I don’t know how to manage my time in college. So my colleagues and I are older and we have already gone through the freshman year experience, so they can come to us and ask us those questions. We are a resource and are there to help them with anything they need.”
Whitfield said she hopes that her and the rest of the ambassadors can help the new Promise freshman become self-assured Southern students.
“I want to help them break out of their shells a little bit and tell them that it is okay to ask questions and it is okay to collaborate with other students,” she said. “I know it is scary going off to college but that is why we are here, so you don’t feel so alone.”
Whitfield said the first meeting held last week had a small turnout but that she thinks that if the ambassadors have more recreational activities the turnout will increase.
“Some of my ideas that I would like to do are an ice cream social, go apple picking, or carve pumpkins, relate it to the month,” Whitfield said. “Also get public speakers in and try to help them grow as people and as students. I think the other ambassadors feel that way too.”
The group would also like to hear what the scholarship recipients would like to do.
“What we are trying to do right now is we want to know what they want to get out of us,” she said.
Whitfield said that she wished she had something like the ambassadors when she was a freshman.
“I would have been calling all the time,” she said. “I would have been like, what kind of clubs do you join, what kind of activities are good, how do you manage your time,” Whitfield said. “I think it is a really good resource.”
