In 2023, Better Wiser Stronger, received a two-year $50,000 grant to support Teach Me 2 Tie, an eight-week program for young men in grades 6-8 who live in the 49507 zip code which equips participants with skills, education, and resources to become BETTER problem solvers, to make WISER decisions, and to become a STRONGER person for successful life outcomes. Hear from executive director and co-founder Henry Sapp as he shares his insights into the work.
Name and role with the organization.
Henry Sapp, Executive Director and Co-Founder of Better Wiser Stronger, Inc.
Brief overview of your organization and what you do.
Our organization provides guidance, support, and development opportunities to young boys of color in the Grand Rapids area. We teach life and social skills, and emotional management, and provide literacy support, career exploration, and cultural enrichment to our participants.
Please provide an overview of Teach Me 2 Tie and how the program came to be.
This is what we like to call our “flagship program” as it has been around since the very beginning. Our organization and initial ideas all came from conversations with me and the co-founders about how instrumental positive male mentors were to shaping who we are today. We wanted to teach many of the things young men often miss out on when they don’t have a strong father figure in the home on a day-to-day basis. People forget how important it is to guide young men through things like dealing with anger, work ethic, hygiene and grooming, appropriate attire, and other life skills. So, we created this program that teaches young boys many of these things and cultivated it around the ritual of learning to properly wear and tie a necktie.
What are the primary goals?
The primary goals of Teach Me 2 Tie are to develop self-awareness, build healthy relationships, and learn emotional management. Along the way, the students also learn how to tie various knots in a necktie, a cherished tradition symbolizing a transition from childhood to adulthood.
How does this program support children and families?
This specific program is targeted for young men in grades 6 through 8. In addition to lessons and activities, we also connect parents/guardians, and families to community resources, and help in emergencies or times of hardship through donations of household items, groceries, appliances, etc.
How has youth/parent voice shaped this project?
In addition to taking feedback from post-class evaluations, we have a student advisory board comprised of students who have completed our programs in the past. They keep us informed of changes they’d like to see in our programs and skills and activities they believe kids their age would benefit from. We will start a similar advisory board for parents this fall meeting quarterly. In addition, we try to connect with parents as much as possible at drop-off and pick up times to get better understanding of what’s going on with our kids and things they might benefit from.
Please describe the work that you’ve engaged in so far and your hopes for the work through the remainder of the grant period.
We have had cohorts of students go through our program each semester learning more about themselves and how they fit into the world, how to manage and regulate their emotions, and how to create and maintain healthy relationships with friends and family through lessons, games, and other activities. They also participate in community service activities and a camping trip. This past school year, we volunteered with Kids Food Basket and the students really enjoyed directly impacting other kids their age. During their camping trip, they learned various outdoor skills like shelter and fire building while also testing their team building skills.
We are currently running our first summer day camps where we are combining our Teach Me 2 Tie curriculum with our literacy program in order to keep our students engaged and sharp over the summer.
What have you learned and what might you share with others who are engaged in similar efforts to serve youth in our community?
It is so important to have ongoing programs to keep young people engaged, but it can be challenging when you are competing with other after school activities and programs. We have been trying to offer more incentives for participation and getting more engaged with our parents to understand how we can increase participation among all our programs. Parents and kids are busy, so we have learned it’s important to keep constant communication going and bundle different programs together when possible. Parents would rather be able to drop their children off for longer periods of time versus coming to multiple programs in one week, so we try to do that whenever possible.
How does this work impact the Steelcase Foundation’s overarching mission of cultivating communities where children can thrive?
Our young black males face a lot of unique obstacles in our community. Beyond the stress that can be brought on by racial discrimination, there can be huge educational disparities, lack of access to quality resources, disproportionate disciplinary actions in schools, expectations to not show emotions, and higher exposure to violence, among so many other things. We provide a space where these young men can come and be kids, have fun in a safe environment, and learn to be confident in who they are while learning how to navigate and express themselves in a healthy and productive way. We tie literacy and group tutoring opportunities to our Teach Me 2 Tie program whenever possible to provide additional academic support and connect students with more intensive academic needs to 1:1 tutoring. We also partner with a licensed professional counselor to provide free 1:1 therapy to students who have more intensive mental, emotional, or behavioral needs.
To learn more about Better Wiser Strong, Inc. and its Teach Me 2 Tie Programming, check out its website here.
