‘A Few Good Men’ – BCTC program aims to help Black men succeed

LEXINGTON, Ky. (WTVQ) – More Black men have been graduating college in the last several years, according to the National Center of Education Statistics, but graduation rates for Black men are still below the national average.

In Lexington, Bluegrass Community and Technical College is running a program designed to change that on a smaller, but significant scale.

“We’re here for each other – to build each other,” Abraham Collum, second-year student at BCTC, said.

Collum remembers when he first joined the school’s program for Black male students, ‘A Few Good Men.’

“People asked me to join, maybe, this program and I was like ‘wait, what is it about?’ I went for the first time and I got – it caught my interest,” Collum recalled.

The program has meetings twice a month and members discuss daily life challenges – important things like academics, social justice and healthy relationships.

It also exposes them to internships with real world job experience. Members even got hooked up with new suits in December.

Collum was immediately paired with mentors who kept him on track.

“Stuff like that is very encouraging, ya know? You don’t get that at every school,” Collum said.

Associate Dean of Admissions, Shelbie Hugle, started the program in 2015 after seeing her own son not get the support he needed at his college.

“I felt like he was falling through the cracks,” Hugle said. “I felt that a program at BCTC would be so beneficial to our students of color.”

Hugle said BCTC has a 12-percent overall Black student population, and only 4-percent of those students are men. The chances of them being in a class together, or even walking along campus and seeing someone who looks like them, is slim.

“It’s a place for healing,” Hugle said. “It’s a place for venting. It’s a safe space.”

“To push on, you know, to get that advice to not give up – that matters,” Collum said.

Hugle says the retention rate of Black men at BCTC has increased since the start of the program and is now 76%.

if you’re a student, she encourages you to sign up.