Sweetwater Mentoring Program Has All of the Right Ingredients for Success

For three years, has successfully matched students participating in its mentoring program with mentors that have passion toward teaching, compassion for learning and big hearts for giving back as professionals from all walks of life. In large measure the program’s success is attributed to its creator and director and to the caliber of mentors it has attracted.

After starting Sweetwater’s Saints Advisory Center, SAC, Mary Vaughn, school counselor, wanted to do more. In speaking with students and teachers that used the advisory center, Vaughn set about fulfilling the need for additional influence that would aide both students and teachers. So Vaughn started contacting people in the community to come into the school as mentors.

“People are so willing to help. Take Mr. (Michael) Shirley (Associate Broker with Keller Williams Realty) for instance. I just picked up the phone, called him and asked if he would become a mentor. He said yes and (after becoming a mentor) sent a card that read ‘I came to give back, but I am the one that received the most.’ On a shopping trip to Costco with my husband, I thought someone from here should be a mentor. After speaking with the manager, without hesitation, he became a mentor,” said Vaughn mentor program director.

Former Sweetwater student Don Swift, an attorney with Andersen Tate & Carr, became a mentor last year.  While participating in Leadership Gwinnett’s Principal for a Day event at Sweetwater, Swift was asked to become a mentor. He now mentors Vlad Sozonov a thirteen year old seventh grader born in Moldova.

Since mentoring with Swift, Sozonov has gone from failing to passing in all subjects. Swift plans on staying in Sozonov’s life well beyond his time at Sweetwater. They are already Facebook friends.

“We meet with our student each week for an hour. There is no set curriculum. It is up to the mentor and student as to what is to be accomplished. We can talk to them about any issues they might be experiencing or help with school work. When I was matched with my mentee I was told he had a lot of ability, is very smart, but lacked the focus and motivation needed. So what I did was set him up with a schedule that not only allows for study and play, but includes balance and time management,” said Swift.

In building the foundation for the mentoring program, Vaughn first started with an effective and tested springboard.

 “When my husband and I lived in California, the elementary school that I worked in had an advisory center. After we moved from California to Florida, I started my first advisory center at the elementary school I worked at in Orlando. We then moved from Orlando to Atlanta. At the end of my first year here at Sweetwater I told Ms. (Georgann) Eaton (principal at Sweetwater) that I wouldn’t be returning because I wanted to go to an elementary school to start an advisory center,” said Vaughn.

But Principal Eaton made a counter offer that resulted in retaining and expanding Vaughn’s role at Sweetwater. Once Vaughn explained what an advisory center had to offer, Eaton provided the space and resources to create the center.

“Advisory Centers are incredibly successful; they cut principal referrals by fifty percent. It is a place that teachers can send students anytime for any reason; they (students) can come to make up work, can come because they can’t get their act together in the classroom. We do brief counseling sessions with students that come into the center,” said Vaughn.

Rita Williams, a former teacher at Sweetwater became a mentor in 2010 to provide teachers with what she said is a much needed external support.

“As a teacher I realized that teachers have a great deal of responsibilities. And that I could not reach everyone. As a mentor, I want to offload some of those responsibilities and provide extra support outside of the school system. This is a personal connection, in working with a smaller number of students, that make a big difference,” said Williams, owner of One 2 One Educational Support, Inc.  

Williams is credited by her mentee twelve year old, sixth grader, Brenda Crowder, with helping to curb learning frustrations. Crowder said she was frustrated because she did not know how to do most of the work in school. Through the mentoring process Williams was able to tutor Crowder to bring grades up from C’s to B’s and now approaching A’s.

Reverend James Harrison of is one of the original twenty five mentors when program started in 2008. This year alone mentors have volunteered for a total of 1,300 hours. This year the program has it highest number of mentors with 70 that include police officers, , , and employees; other mentors include comedian Larry Veal and corporate recognition business owner, Bryan James. And this year with mentors helping more students in groups, more than 500 students have participated in the mentoring program.

Although Will Smith, a former semi-pro basketball player and coach has been a mentor for only a month, the experience has already caused a ripple effect. Smith who heads Teamn2, an organization he started ten years ago to teach educational enrichment that includes tap dancing, will start the Tapn2 program at Sweetwater next year as an afterschool program. This program will have activities, lectures and events for entire families.

Vaughn is retiring, on May 31st, to spend more time with her husband, retired pastor Dr. David Vaughn. She leaves as she said with the knowledge that her beloved mentoring program will continue. And she fully expects to return to Sweetwater, some day, as a mentor.