Malibu Non-profit Provides Mentoring for At-risk Students
“We’ve talked about eating disorders and we’ve talked about making enough money and struggling financially,” Taylor Nam, a SEA mentor and student at Pepperdine, said of her experience with her Malibu Middle School student. “We’ve talked about religion and boys and just about everything that would go through a middle school girl’s mind.”
For Nam, the feeling she gets from watching her student prosper has inspired her to work even harder at her own education.
“From the very beginning she wanted to be better and that inspired me to be better,” Nam said. “Watching her progress from not even wanting to do a problem by herself to, now, owning her academics, owning her schoolwork and owning who she is as a student and a person has been incredible for me to watch.”
The SEA Program is free to all students involved, but, in honor of Emily’s caring spirit, the program requires that all of its students complete one good deed in order to participate. Students “pass it forward” by submitting their good deeds on the Emily Shane Foundation’s website, where others can read from the “Deed Wall” and become inspired.
“It would’ve made her really happy, seeing all the people helped through this program and in her memory,” Ellen said. “Doing this is one of the things that helps me go on every day and heal from the loss.”
In June, the senior class that Emily would’ve been a part of will be graduating from Malibu High School. Bream can imagine Emily’s story being carried across the stage as 200 students who knew and loved Emily continue on with their own stories.
