Giving Back | written by: PAMELA DEY VOSSLER
There’s something about courage. It draws us in—inspiring us, daring us, instructing us. And universally, as we applaud the brave, we cheer them on, rooting for their success. We want to know them, to be near them and the boldness of their drive.
The high-achieving young scholars of A Better Chance (ABC) in Darien give us that opportunity, as they pursue the opportunity ABC presents to them for a better education than they may be able to receive in their home communities …a chance for a life more in keeping with their gifts …a chance they’re willing to work for …a chance for which they’re willing to leave their families and their comfort zone.
A Better Chance (ABC) is a national program in which academically promising, motivated students of color are recruited from urban areas and placed on scholarship in high schools that cultivate their talent. ABC in Darien is one of 20 community residential programs nationwide. It is a community-supported 501c3 launched in 1981. Two girls enter the program as freshmen each year. They join the two sophomores, two juniors, and two seniors already in it. The eight girls live in the ABC House on Tokeneke Road with resident directors during the school year and attend Darien High School (DHS). They are mentored, tutored and nurtured by a volunteer board of directors and other caring community members as committed to their success as the scholars themselves. One weekend a month, they live with their host family. These are families with students at DHS who invite the girls to become part of their family for the four years they are in Darien.
ABC scholars become part of the Darien community through volunteerism, their host family, extracurricular activities and the friends they make / / Photographs courtesy: Yvette Eenkema van Dijk
They go on to schools such as Columbia, Amherst, Boston College, Loyola Marymount, and Yale. They pursue careers in medicine, law, architecture, the arts, education, and finance, to name just a few. They are doctors, deans, directors and more.
But it starts with guts. Think about it. They leave home at just 14 years old for a place with little in common with where they grew up. They move in with strangers and enter a school where they know no one other than those strangers with whom they’ve just taken up residence. No parents, siblings or friends since kindergarten. And few who even look like them. There’s nothing familiar—and no place to hide. They have academic standards they must maintain, volunteer hours they must fulfill, chores to do, clubs and sports to pursue and if they’re caught at a party, they don’t get grounded, they can be asked to leave the program. The girls hold themselves to a higher standard. They are accountable. They know the value of what they’re working for, what they traded to take their shot and they aren’t about to squander it.
While at Darien High School, they start things, join things, lead things, make things happen. They volunteer at P2P and area hospitals, work at local businesses, spend a weekend a month during the school year with their host family and find friends in sports, clubs and other extracurriculars—
assimilating into the community, giving us perspective and their view of things. Giving us the chance to know them. Giving as much as they get, as we get so much more than we give. We learn from each other, get comfortable with each other and grow close. We learn how lucky we are to have the schools that we have just outside our door and what an incredible thing it is to make sure others who, but for the circumstances of their beginnings, would have them too. They could go anywhere. They come here.
We long for a day when we won’t need programs like A Better Chance. Until then, we have these brave girls, and we are all better for their courage.
For more information about A Better Chance in Darien, including how to become a host family or join the board of directors, visit abcdarien.org.
About ABC Darien
- 8 scholars
- 2 Resident Directors—both Middlesex Middle School teachers
- 23 volunteer Board Members, 10 drivers for afterschool activities
- # of host families: 8
- Year launched: 1981
- 100% of graduates attend competitive four-year colleges
- # of student body presidents: 2
- # of volunteer hours/semester: 15
- Founders of the DHS Black Student Union
- Founders of the DHS rugby team
- Needed for 2023/2024: one more host family. Contact abcdarienhostfamily@gmail.com or call 203-253-9640 if interested.
Editor’s Note: Special thanks to long-time board members and supporters of A Better Chance Yvette Eenkema van Dijk, Jackie Scott, Carolyn Brook, and Sandy Filmer for providing the insights and information for this column.
