For more than a decade, an academic mentorship program run by the department of student life at the University of Toronto Scarborough, known as Imani, has been pairing black U of T student mentors with black youth in the community.
Since 2005, more than 1,000 students between Grades 1 and 12 have taken part in the after-school program. In that same time, more than 500 students from the university have volunteered as mentors, facilitators and co-coordinators.
Imani is important because it’s a one-of-a-kind program that directly helps youth in racialized and underserved communities in Scarborough, says Dorian Grey, a fourth-year U of T Scarborough student and volunteer in the program.
“There aren’t many programs that overwhelmingly show black leaders in a university setting, so having this is important for black youth in our community,” says Grey.
