SAFE MN provides mentorship to young Black men in the Twin Cities to help them become contributing members of their communities. I created a series of photo stories about their founder, mentors, and mentees about how they got involved and why their work is so vitally important.
Alfonso, founder
“I'm originally from Milwaukee. Like other inner cities, there was a lot of drugs, violence, and homelessness. A lot of people living below the poverty line. My dad wasn't present like I would have liked him to be and there were no other males reaching down to pull me along and help me.
Growing up, the player life was acceptable. It was expected and even forced upon you. And with that comes a lack of respect for women. You got made fun of if you didn't have a lot of girlfriends, and that's by family members, friends, the neighborhood. I wasn’t seeing healthy marriages and relationships.
I got a basketball scholarship to play in Mankato at Bethany Lutheran College and I started to see a completely different world. The thing that stuck out to me the most was my idea of what a man was. I saw men who were taking care of their wives and their kids, who were gainfully employed. Who were respected in the community and trying to live healthy lives; mentally, spiritually, and physically. That was new to me.
But the men that I was seeing were all white. It led me to question my own neighborhood and community. I was like, ‘Where are all the black men displaying these positive influences and lifestyles?’ Right then I decided I wanted to become that example for the youth in my community. I wanted to set the bar.
After graduating with a business degree, I moved back to Milwaukee and started working with the Boys and Girls Club. I fell in love with youth work right away. I moved to Minneapolis in 2012 and worked with a few nonprofits who were doing great things here. But most of the work was with adults and I wanted to get back to working with youth.
In 2016, I created SAFE, which is a mentorship network for black males in the Twin Cities between the ages of twelve and seventeen. Right now we're focused on boys because it's a very specific problem. A lot of them don't aspire to be much because they're not seeing much. And what they do see are the rappers, the sports figures, and then the guys on the streets. But there's so much more the world has to offer. So, we recruit black men throughout the city to be mentors. We currently have two cohorts and each cohort has five mentors and five mentees. Our motto is ‘You need to see it to be it.’
The idea is that we bring our boys with us. So we bring them into our households. We want them to see us interacting with our wives and our kids. We bring them to work. We want them to see us interacting with our coworkers. And then we want them to start asking questions, like, ‘How did you get this job? Did you have to go to school? How many hours did you put in?’ That really opens up their whole world.
This is a long-term game. I'm not doing this just to make sure that they’re getting good grades this year. I’m looking forward to five or ten years from now when they’re in college, or whatever they’ve decided to do after high school, and they come back as mentors. I'm excited for that. That's what this is about.”
HOM: “How can people support you?”
“We’re looking for sponsorships for our cohorts to cover the costs incurred throughout the year. We try to create different activities for our mentor-mentee relationships, so even donating Minnesota Timberwolves tickets or movie tickets would help. We also want to show our boys different professions, so if there are people who have the opportunity to invite our mentees to do some job shadowing, we're definitely looking for that.
Transportation is another thing. Sometimes it's difficult to get the mentees and mentors around, so a van would be helpful. Or gas cards for our mentors. They’re all volunteers, so my ideal situation would be that they wouldn't have to pay for anything out of their own pockets.”
Mentor Donzell,
with mentee David
“I grew up with my father, but there are some things you don't want to share with your parents. I struggled finding role models, especially ones that looked like me. I needed an outside source; somebody who was younger and who I thought was cooler. Who I could relate to and aspire to be. So now that I'm in the position where I can give back, I want to be that to whoever needs it.
A lot of things that we experience as black males, we don't really share with people. Especially emotions and different issues that you're going through. You try to figure it out by yourself and then you get to a point where you can't figure it out anymore. With my SAFE mentee David, my goal is not to tell him what to do or not do, but more so to listen to him and see how I can help make his path smoother.”
HOM: “What have you guys done together?”
“Recently we went to an event called Photography 101 at New Rules. I'm not into photography and David wasn't either, but it was a good way to spark some interest. And then we found out that even though David had never done photography, he was actually really good at it. He got into it, standing on top of chairs, getting good angles. So it seemed like he was gaining a lot from that. And that's my whole goal, just to introduce him to different opportunities and see which ones stick.”
Younin, with her son Xavier
“Xavier participated in another mentorship program starting in fifth grade, but it wasn't culturally congruent for us. SAFE specifically meets our needs with him being a young black man coming into adulthood and being raised single-handedly by a woman. Having that niche of men who look like you, who have experienced what you will experience, and who are doing amazing and positive things in the community, I really wanted him to be a part of that.
No matter how much I love him, no matter how much I want the best for him, I am not a man. I can teach him how to be a good human being. I can teach him how to make good choices. But I cannot teach him how to legit be a man. I don't know what it feels like to move through this world that we're in right now as a black man. I can empathize, but I can't really break that down for him.
He'll be sixteen in December, so this is that time that can make or break you. He's a great kid and I just want him to continue on that track.”
Ricky, Xavier’s mentor
“I raised my kids and they moved out, so I felt like being a SAFE mentor was a great opportunity for me. Now I have the time and energy I can put into another child and guide them in the right direction and be a role model to them. That's something I always wanted to do.
I'm loving it. I don't think it's good just for Xavier, I also feel like it's good for myself. It's helping me fill some type of emotional void that’s always been there because I never had a father. And I don't have to do anything big, it’s just being there.
I check in on him. I text him, ‘How was your day at school?’ I tell him he can call me anytime he has questions, whether it’s ten o’clock at night, or five in the morning. It doesn't matter if it's about sports or a girl, just call me.
It’s a good feeling for me and I hope it's a good feeling for him as well.”