U-Lead

Every Thursday from 6-8 p.m., Oconee Street United Methodist Church transforms into U-Lead Athens, a center where their goal is to provide higher education resources for students with different immigration statuses and immigrant families.

U-Lead Athens started back in 2014, with the help of Jobeth Allen and Melissa Perez Rhym and their drive to help high school students.

Melissa Perez Rhym works as a high school teacher at Cedar Shoals and came up with the idea of U-Lead with other teachers when she saw her students not taking interest in college.

Most teachers and counselors were unaware of how common this was, and many undocumented students did not think they had a chance to even consider college.

With the help of Jobeth Allen, a leader in the Oconee Street United Methodist Church, she donated a small space right next to The Flats at Carrs Hill apartment complex where high school seniors could get help with college related materials.

As word spread among different schools and through friends, the small group of 10 students slowly grew into something more.

With the group slowly growing, Allen donated more space and U-Lead was born. More and more students of all ages started attending and different resources were being added into the program.

The resources that U-Lead provides range from tutoring sessions, graduation tips, FAFSA and scholarship essay help, SAT/ACT prep, therapy sessions, English classes for parents, and more.

U-Lead begins around 6 p.m. where students, volunteers and directors gather together to eat before the different resources start. Students sit chattering and eating  amongst their peers waiting for U-Lead to begin. As everyone finishes up eating, one of the directors, JoBeth Allen, makes announcements, and students that have been accepted into colleges or receive scholarships share their accomplishments with the rest of the group.

The environment of U-Lead as a whole correlates to a close-knit family pushing each other to strive, regardless of their immigration status.

Elif Yildirim, a volunteer at U-Lead, said “it helps you realize that there is a lot of hope and I think it’s easy to feel hopeless.”

While U-Lead does provide educational and college resources to help students, they also provide various events like PeaceJam and DreamFest.

PeaceJam is geared towards making U-Lead students leaders and having positive changes towards themselves and the community. It is based on different high school students presenting projects to each other, and getting involved in different workshops.

Unlike PeaceJam, Dreamfest is a festival in Athens, GA, that helps raise scholarship money for students of U-Lead.

According to the article “Clarke Central students raise awareness about discriminatory policies facing under-documented students,” the event is organized  by “Clarke Central High School Interact Club, and focuses on raising awareness about discriminatory policies.”

Different programs like U-Lead, PeaceJam and Dreamfest, impact not only the students, but also the teachers and parents.

Perez Ryhm said, “It’s shaped the way I’ve taught after I was involved with U-Lead. It shaped the type of lessons I did in class. I became much more aware of the need for students to advocate for themselves and to be aware of these issues” when speaking about the impact U-Lead has had on her life.

While there might be some challenges for students with varying immigration statues, U-Lead has given various students hope and ways to overcome their education hurdles faced in the future.

Students, parents, and directors of U-Lead gather at the Oconee Street United Methodist Church on Feb. 14 from 6 p.m.- 8 p.m. to tutor and provided services to students with varying immigration statuses.