Four of the 11 students accepted into the Kaplan Leadership Program, which provides scholarships, training and mentorship to help community college students transfer to prestigious four-year colleges, are from the Bronx.
Of the Bronx contingency, Minerva Ramirez Sencion and Marco Alvarez attend Hostos Community College, Emily Blanco and Shaheim Kellum are students at Borough of Manhattan Community College and Melanie Jerez is from Queensborough Community College. All are first-generation college students with promising futures as they prepare to apply to their dream schools.
Since the Kaplan Leadership Program was established in 2006, participants have been accepted to the country’s most competitive schools, including Yale, Stanford, Princeton, Brown, Amherst and more. Almost all Kaplan participants, 92%, go on to earn a bachelor’s degree under the program.
‘I get to dream again’
Alvarez and Ramirez Sencion spoke with the Bronx Times about being Kaplan Scholars and each of their unique pathways into the rigorous program.
Alvarez, 37, was born in Mexico, moved to the U.S. as a baby and grew up in the foster care system starting at age nine. He said he had a “fractured education experience,” and when he first tried college in his 20s, he found himself unprepared.
But his experience as an older student, and now a Kaplan scholar, has been a complete turnaround. Attending Hostos was an important first step, but now, he’s preparing for more, in a way that is both exciting and nerve-wracking.
“These opportunities are asking me to change my life in a way that I don’t know where the future might lead me,” Alvarez said.
At Hostos, he is majoring in liberal arts and science with a concentration in psychology, and he plans to use that background to open socially-conscious businesses that serve and employ youth ages 18 to 25 to “address some of the ugliness that exists in our communities.”
Alvarez credits Kaplan with helping him achieve his goal of earning his two-year degree while also expanding his ideas of what he can do.
“It’s a supportive community,” he said. “It’s allowing me to dream again.”
Ramirez Sencion, from Kingsbridge, comes from a low-income background but said her single mother pushed her to become the only woman in the family to attend college. She started at Lehman upon high school graduation in 2020 but then had to take two years due to the pandemic and for financial reasons.
One day, as she was unhappily working at a T-Mobile store, a customer said she seemed miserable there. Ramirez Sencion said she was just working to save up for college, and he encouraged her, “Go now! You would be perfect for my company.”
She transferred to Hostos and soon had a goal in mind: to learn the business and marketing side of video gaming, her biggest passion. Ramirez Sencion said she wants to “create pathways for women in gaming” and create gaming forums for women and nonbinary people, given the prevalence of harassment and sexism in the industry.
Coming back to college, Ramirez Sencion realized she had “a very small vision” for her academics and her future. But with the support of others, she is now thinking bigger.
“Kaplan is here to remove those potential obstacles we would’ve undergone if we didn’t have their support,” she said.
Upwards and onwards
The 11 Kaplan Scholars will have much to think about over the holidays, as they soon start applications for admissions and scholarships.
“January, we are hard-hitting all our applications and essays,” said Ramirez Sencion.
Alvarez said his Kaplan advisors are pushing him to look beyond the familiar when it comes to choosing a four-year school to transfer into. At first, he thought, “All I know is New York, so I wanted to stay home,” but he is now researching Brown University in Rhode Island and Amherst College in Massachusetts as his top options.
Alvarez said he needed the push to unlock his potential. Now, “I get to go back to being that young individual that wanted to do these big things.”
Ramirez Sencion said she also felt both hesitation and curiosity about leaving the city. She has not traveled much throughout the U.S. but realized that other places may be better for her chosen career path. “I have a very unique interest that is not well-accommodated here at CUNY,” she said.
As it turned out, Ramirez Sencion found her top choice within New York: Cornell University in Ithaca, which she said offers the diverse campus culture she wanted, along with a strong business program and gaming/e-sports club.
Both Alvarez and Ramirez Sencion will soon finish their two-year degrees and figure out where they will land next. For the many Bronxites who are in their position — facing obstacles to their education and in need of support — Ramirez Sencion had one piece of advice learned from her encounter with the T-Mobile customer years ago. “If you’re in a space when you’re not happy, seek help from people who are wiser.”
This story was updated Dec. 26 at 4:16 p.m. to correct the name of the Kaplan program.
Reach Emily Swanson at eswanson@schnepsmedia.com or (646) 717-0015. For more coverage, follow us on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram @bronxtimes
