When Eugene Williams was a cadet at the Virginia Military Institute, he had an idea that bringing poor kids like himself into a boot camp style program could prepare them for college and life. Today, it’s his full-time job – raising money and recruiting students who have great potential but are struggling in high school.
“And the reason they’re struggling is because of attitude," he explains. "What we’re looking for is to teach these young fellas how to work outside of their comfort zone, especially when they are mad, tired or scared. Sometimes life will make you mad, tired and scared, but you still have to produce. Don’t complain, don’t whine. Just get it done!”
He hopes to inspire students to achieve more than they thought possible.
“This is four weeks on a college campus, being taught by college professors, and being pushed like college students will be pushed.”
Each day, they get up early for a long run, calisthenics or an especially tough workout which Williams calls Eat the Bear.
“The bear is any challenge, any fear, any obstacle, any hesitation or reluctance that causes us to be less than our best, so what you do is you have to learn how to eat that sucker!” Williams says.
Next they shower, eat breakfast and get ready for classroom instruction in math, English and public speaking. After lunch there are programs in money management, career options and outdoor adventures.
“We climbed House Mountain, camped out in the saddle, canoed the James River, kayaked the Maury River," he recalls. "We do those things to expose them to experiences that they’re not going to have for those kids who come from urban centers. They’re not kayaking anyplace. We had a geologist come and talk about the land and the fact that these mountain ranges are the oldest in the world.”
Marcellus Johnson, who came from Alabama, loved learning about new places and people.
“I got to make a lot of new friends – people with different types of backgrounds. I’ve never met somebody from Maine, never met somebody from Ohio. I’m from the South,” says Johnson.
For the first couple of weeks, Williams says, many kids – rising sophomores, juniors and seniors in high school – are unhappy, and if they can’t adjust, the program could send them home. Here again is Marcellus Johnson.
“At first when I came here I really didn’t want to be coached," he admits. "I didn’t want to take advice from the staff members, counselors. By the end of the second week I had redeemed myself and got myself together.”
The program imparts confidence and work ethics that could save these students from a dangerous future and help to assure their success. Anthony Gonzalez says he’s a different man as a result of the College Orientation Workshop.
“Whenever I have extra time to do it I can sit down and pull out a book and start writing my journal and everything I need to do, so whenever it’s time to turn in my work I already have it, instead of before I’d wait until the last second or not turn it in."
He adds that fellow students were also influential. "Especially whenever I struggled they would step in and help me," he says.
While VMI hosts this summer program, it’s funded by donations and grants and is not designed to attract students of color to Lexington in the fall. Very few of these guys even apply, but the school believes in what graduate Eugene Williams is doing and the numbers speak for themselves. Seventy-five percent of those who take part in the program will enroll in college and almost all of them will graduate.
