A Letter From NCAN's New Program Fellow, Stephanie Breen
Friday, October 1, 2021
Posted by: Stephanie Breen, Program Fellow
Reading time: 2 min.
Greetings, NCAN Community,
It is with great enthusiasm that I introduce myself to you all. My name is Stephanie Breen, and I have joined the NCAN team this fall as a program fellow. My responsibilities will be to support our director of data and evaluation, Bill DeBaun, in writing
and researching effective college access and success practices at the state and local levels.
I come to NCAN with an extensive background in college access and career counseling. Before joining NCAN, I worked with iMentor and Harlem Children's Zone, providing high school students college and career counseling services.
My journey into the college access world began during my undergraduate studies at Suffolk University in Boston. While at Suffolk, I had the opportunity to participate in an access and opportunity program geared towards supporting low-income, first-generation
students of color known as the McNair Scholars Program. As a unique staple of my experience in the program, I left my undergraduate institution with a handful of mentors whose guidance, investment, and a plethora of resources had paved the way for
my higher ed journey into Columbia University.
I received my master's at Teacher's College at Columbia University. I used every research opportunity to explore how historically underrepresented student populations engaged in college choice and decision-making about life after high school graduation.
At this time, I began working as a college access practitioner for several years in Harlem, the Bronx, and Baltimore to support students in their postsecondary schooling journeys.
From these experiences, I continued my love for research and practice at the University of Maryland, where I am currently a doctoral candidate. As a graduate student and research assistant on campus, my research agenda focuses on access, opportunity,
and equity in higher education, emphasizing the amplification of student, practitioner, faculty, and administrator voices.
Each thread of my journey has informed my commitment and passion to supporting the success of historically underrepresented student populations into and through college. As a proud alumnus of an access program, my accomplishments in my professional and
personal life are a direct result of the high-quality programming and holistic guidance I received during my tenure with the McNair program.
Thus, I find it a great privilege to work alongside a team dedicated to this work as well as a community of members who are thoughtful and intentional about supporting our next generation. My goal is to contribute to the wealth of knowledge and expertise
that our member community offers. I look forward to interacting and being in thought-partnership with many of you in the coming months.
With warm regards,
Stephanie M. Breen
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