graduating sentinels at party in newark

With joy, laughter, music, great stories, good company, immense pride and all sorts of deliciousness, the Sentinels Community Leadership Academy celebrated the graduation for its 5th Cohort on October 20, 2022 with 17 students.

Thanks to the broad support of the community and our NCST outreach team we were able to recruit and graduate the most diverse and enthusiastic cohort of citizen leaders we have learned with to date (over 120 students) in civics, leadership skills, self-efficacy, conflict resolution, professional development, and the history of our great city.

Our organization-wide and community-wide push continues to yield great results. We continue to add partnerships with foundations and federal agencies and city service departments and other important community organizations (like OVP and NSA) committed to social justice and equity. Most exciting was the increase in participation among young people under 24 and the strong leadership of past graduates like Sharon Reading and Nafeesah Loyal, and Fahkeria Bradley.

Further, new grant support has helped with improvements with the virtual learning platform enhancement and the utilization of our exciting New U library, (in partnership with Newark’s Source of Knowledge Bookstore), of over 100 great books on social justice, African American History, public safety, trauma informed social science, leadership, and children’s books, and cutting-edge titles on personal and professional development. We achieved our highest levels of weekly attendance so far with over 70% of participants graduating with their certificates including our second highest levels of participation of teenagers (9 out of 17) in a cohort to date.

The graduation was a grand celebration of the merits of this transformative educational experience. Great food and great company: Wisdom and smoked salmon and garlic chicken, shrimp and chef salad and green beans, sweet potatoes, dressing, Swedish meatballs and sweet cream strawberry cake­—what a feast! Like the wonderful meal, we greatly appreciated the contributions of presenters like super entrepreneur and Newark native Kaleef Souels and local visionary educational heroes like Principal Naseed Gifted. We had our best intergenerational conversations and we reaped powerful insights from our young people, like Outstanding Junior Sentinel Award recipients, Omari Loyal and Tyvon Smith.

Our future as a community is in good hands. Sentinels are making a difference.