In 2002, Tracy Baynes founded STEP, a nonprofit organization dedicated to educating and empowering low-income high school students in Arizona to enroll and graduate from college. Baynes, who has years of experience teaching experiential programs like Outward Bound and Semester at Sea, says 96 percent of STEP students are in college or have earned a college degree. “It’s a comprehensive college prep program that not only takes the students through the college prep and application process, but takes the parents through the whole financial aid process,” Baynes says. The program offers the Alaskan Wilderness Leadership Expedition, a multi-week trip that fosters self-confidence and self-sufficiency.
How do you identify potential STEP students?
We have been working with local high schools both in Phoenix and Tucson for 20 years. We identify a counselor at each school who can identify the students that are a good fit for STEP, and then we do outreach. Anyone who is a sophomore in high school and comes from a low-income background, who is the first generation of their family to be seeking a four-year college degree and doing well in school and taking hard courses can apply to our program.
How does the program work?
When students get accepted to our program, we do an orientation with students and parents to let them know what their kids are getting involved in. The families really need to be invested in this. You have to come to the workshops. You have to do the work. You have to be engaged. We really set the bar high in the beginning. We educate students about the schools out there that will meet their full financial needs. We work with the Arizona institutions and only schools outside of Arizona that will guarantee full financial needs. Often when the parents walk in, they say, ‘I can’t afford college.’ They walk out knowing they absolutely can afford college if their student does the hard work.
What are admissions directors looking for?
Schools are looking for students who are going to contribute to their campus and contribute to their community, so when admission directors are looking at applications, they are certainly looking at the performance of a student in school because they need to know that they can handle the rigor at that school, but they’re also really looking at how is this person involved in their community? How are they involved in their family? What responsibilities do they have? What initiative have they taken? What are their passions? It’s that whole person that admission directors are looking at and we work with students to help them navigate that process.
What are some of the schools STEP students attend?
Princeton, Harvard, Yale, Stanford, Smith College, Duke, Williams, Bowdoin, Wesleyan University and Pomona College are on the list.
Can you talk about the Alaska Expedition?
We just had 36 students go to Alaska between their junior and senior year. It was an extremely rainy and stormy summer, but it’s never been about a nice trip to Alaska. We’re not just throwing them out in the wilderness. They have three instructors out there that are incredibly experienced guiding them. This is a very structured situation, and by the third week, they’re thriving and leading their peers. And literally, a transformation happens. [The experience] allows them to understand that they have abilities to meet unfamiliar challenges going forward, which is a beautiful analogy of going away to college. They don’t take their phones. They’re actually talking to each other. They’re singing, they’re interacting and having this powerful experience together. When the students come back, the parents say, “What happened? My kid left as a child and came back as an adult.” When they see their child come back so positively transformed, it makes them more willing to take the next step and let them go away to college.
How is STEP funded?
We are completely funded by individuals and family foundations. We’re also a qualifying organization for Arizona Tax Credit. Arizona residents that have Arizona income tax can literally decide where their tax dollars go and it’s like a free donation up to the limits that you can give to a qualifying charitable organization, which in our category is $400 per individual and $800 for a married couple. That’s a huge support for us. We get no government funding.
