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Suffolk County Sheriff Ste-ven W. Tompkins recently at-tended Boston Mayor Martin Walsh’s "My Brother’s Keep-er Community Summit," held at the James P. Timilty Middle School in Roxbury.

At the summit, Sheriff Tompkins -- along with oth-er law enforcement officials, community leaders, clergy, youth and other City of Bos-ton officials -- joined with Mayor Walsh, the City of Bos-ton's Chief of Health and Hu-man Services Felix Arroyo, the Boston Foundation’s Tra-vis McCready and Michael Smith, Special Assistant to President Barack Obama on the national initiative of My Brother’s Keeper.

With this new program, the City of Boston strives to reach milestones across programs, policies and practices that will deliver positive results for residents. The city relies on communities to work collab-oratively across government, academia, private and public sectors, clergy, families and neighborhoods to close op-portunity gaps and strengthen outcomes for all Bostonians, especially Black and Latino boys and men, to achieve their full potential.

Mayor Walsh established, a My Brother’s Keeper Boston Advisory Committee in Sep-tember 2014, tapping over 40 committee members - includ-ing Sheriff Tompkins. The committee’s focus is directed towards the areas of Educa-tion, Economic Development, Health and Human Services, Civic Engagement and Public

Safety. “I am honored to have been chosen to serve on the My Brother’s Keeper Advi-sory Committee. There needs to be strong community, civic and elected leadership to offer the potential for positive out-comes for our youth, especial-ly Black and Latino boys and men,” said Sheriff Tompkins. “I see first-hand the results of not having this kind of posi-tive support to help our young people – especially men of color. Roughly 75% of my population on any given day is made up of Latino and Black men. This has to change and this initiative is a good first step in that process.”

After participating in break-out brainstorming sessions, Sheriff Tompkins addressed the merits of the My Brother’s Keeper initiative within the City of Boston.

“Care is a very important element of this initiative," said Sheriff Tompkins. "In the absence of care, kids can go off the tracks. So, what you

have here with My Brother’s Keeper is an initiative to show that people really do care -- adults really do care. Kids can feel that. They need to know that somebody is going to be there, particularly when things are at their worst. When they get into trouble, they need to know that there is going to be a caring adult who is not just looking to be punitive, but to really be that shoulder to lean on – to really care for and about them.”

“Again, this is a great ob-jective," Sheriff Tompkins continued, "but it will mean nothing if it’s not sustainable. This cannot happen one time -- there has to be consistent action for this to work.”

Public participation is needed for this process to be fully realized. The advisory board is encouraging every-one to share their ideas and feedback to help shape the future of Boston’s youth at: www.boston.gov/mbk.

The Winthrop Sun Transcript • Thursday, December 18, 2014Phone: 617-846-3700 Fax: 781-485-1403 Page 3

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On Nov. 10, Emily Walker, of Winthrop, a violinist and a third grader at Gorman Fort Banks Elementary school, is one of 44 Project STEP mu-sic students who were recent-ly honored with the National Arts and Humanities Youth Program Award. The award is the signature program of the President’s Committee on the Arts and the Humanities. at the White House, First Lady Michelle Obama presented Project STEP (Strings Train-ing and Education Program) with the prestigious National Arts and Humanities Youth Program Award. Mary Jaffee, Project STEP executive direc-tor, and student Ajani Boyd, 11, of Dorchester, were on hand to accept the award on behalf of the music program.

Project STEP strikes a chord with students like Boyd, a double string bass player who never missed a session or performance, despite his mother’s battle with breast cancer, and Njeri Grevious who went from living in her family’s car to becoming a Yale student, and with alum-ni who are now critically ac-claimed musicians. Music has enriched their lives and changed their worlds by pro-viding them with a compre-hensive education that opened their hearts and minds to all music has to offer.

Chosen from a national pool of more than 350 nomina-tions and 50 finalists, Project STEP is one of 12 programs across the country to receive the award, which is the high-est honor for such programs in the United States. The award is administered by the Presi-dent’s Committee on the Arts and Humanities.

Project STEP was recog-nized for its rigorous, year-round classical string training program for under-represent-ed minorities that invites them into a world of classical mu-sic that might not otherwise be available to them. Project STEP, like programs that re-ceive the award, exemplifies how in-depth, long term music (and arts) programs increase academic achievement, grad-uation rates, and college en-rollment, as well as improve literacy and language abili-ties, communication and per-formance skills, and cultural awareness.

“Studying classical music teaches Project STEP students about discipline, commitment, analysis and attention to de-tail,” says Mary Jaffee, Proj-ect STEP executive director. “They become astute citizens of the world. More than any-thing, it teaches them the joy and satisfaction that comes from hard work and achieve-ment.”

Boyd is a gifted musician and student. As a seventh grader at Boston Latin School, ranked number one of 27 high schools in the Boston Public School System, he balances schoolwork, countless hours of music lessons during the

Tompkins lends support to “My Brother’s Keeper”

Sheriff Steven W. Tompkins put his thoughts down on a poster where participants at the summit wrote about the importance of Boston's My Brother’s Keeper.

Local student honored at White Housewith National Arts and Humanities Award

week and all day every Satur-day at Project STEP. “I love playing the bass,” Boyd says. “It’s big, loud and cool,” he says. “What I love most about Project STEP is that the teach-ers were once students and they show me that musicians can make a living.”

For Njeri Grevious, 19, Project STEP helped her find a path to success during a child-hood of obstacles. Growing up in a divorced household, sometimes living with her sin-gle mother and two younger siblings out of their car, she poured herself into her mu-sic studies at Project STEP. Grevious is academically and musically accomplished with special strengths in mathemat-ics, violin/viola performance and music theory. She is now a freshman at Yale, mostly on scholarship, studying applied math. Music has been a life-saver for Grevious and her siblings who have also bene-fited from the program and to-gether they have formed a trio.

“Through Project STEP, I have become a better mu-sician and without the pro-gram’s education and financial support, I would not be where I am today and I would not be in love with classical music,” says Grevious. “The program opened doors to experiences I would not have had otherwise. My Project STEP teacher taught me how to play the vio-lin well, but he also taught me about life, and how discipline is needed to become a produc-tive member of society. I real-ize that whatever I do in life, I can’t stop playing music. It’s a beautiful part of being alive.” In addition, Grevious founded Music Theory Haven, a tutor-ing program designed to pro-vide extra help in music the-ory to Project STEP students and other musically talented elementary through graduate age students living in Boston and New Haven.

"I am extremely proud to see Project STEP receive the National Arts and Human-ities Youth Program Award,” says Boston Mayor Martin J. Walsh. “By targeting and serv-ing populations that have been typically under-represented in classical music, Project STEP is evening the playing field, changing lives, and showcas-ing the great talent of our chil-dren. I am thrilled to see them recognized on a national level and offer my sincerest con-gratulations and wishes for continued success."

Prompted by concern over the historic underrepresen-tation of minority classical musicians, Project STEP was founded in 1982 by William Moyer, retired Boston Sym-phony Orchestra (BSO) per-sonnel manager. As the first program of its kind, STEP’s founders have assisted oth-er organizations nationwide as they set-up similar pro-grams. As of 2012, just five percent of orchestra musi-cians in the United States are African-American or Latino.

Project STEP’s mission is to address this imbalance by identifying talented, motivated young minority students and providing them with access to the best training available. As part of its commitment to en-couraging musically educated minorities to attend concerts, the BSO offers tickets to Proj-ect STEP families, providing them with an opportunity to listen to high-quality classical music. The BSO also provides office and performance space to Project STEP.

Annually, the 44 students in Project STEP’s core divi-sion receive private, weekly one-hour music lessons by the finest teachers from the New England Conservatory, Boston Symphony Orches-tra, Boston Conservatory, and Boston University, as well as theory and/or solfege classes. They are provided with instru-ments and tickets to concerts at Boston’s prestigious con-cert halls and they actively participate in chamber music ensembles and orchestras. Students are evaluated twice a year, and are required to participate in community ser-vice, performances and master classes. The program’s reten-tion rate is 98 percent.

One hundred percent of the students who graduate from the program also grad-uate from high school and go on to college or conserva-tory. Project STEP students are recruited into some of the best private high schools in and around Boston. Half of the students go on to study at prestigious conservato-ries, including The Juilliard School and the New England Conservatory, and the oth-ers go on to study music and other disciplines at top tier and Ivy League universities. Sixty percent of graduates are now professionally involved in music, including the New Haven, Oregon, Pacific, San Francisco, Minnesota, and Akron Symphony Orchestras. Others work as music teach-ers in Boston, New Haven, Philadelphia, North Carolina and Arizona. Several have come back to teach at Project STEP, and others are starting programs modeled on Proj-ect STEP around the country. In addition to music and the arts, alumni have successful careers in medicine, finance, education and architecture.

Emily Walker