SACMEN Wins Award at Leadership Summit

The San Antonio College Program was recognized for excellence by the Texas Education Consortium for Male Students of Color.

The San Antonio College Men Empowerment Network (SACMEN) received an outstanding program award at the 5^th Annual Texas Male Student Leadership Summit held at the University of Texas at Austin.

The award, given for the first time by the Texas Education Consortium for Male Students of Color, recognized SACMEN’s achievements in mentoring African American and Latino males into becoming the next generation of college graduates and community leaders.

“I was proud of us,” said Gregory Lamar Torres, a SAC student who participated in the summit. “Just to see that our program was making an impact was amazing.”

According to Domingo Figueroa, senior student success specialist, students in SACMEN program have an 80 percent retention rate. Overall they are more likely to have a higher than average GPA and graduate.

Mona Aldana-Ramirez, director of student success, said the accomplishments of SACMEN can be attributed to collaboration. “This program is an example of what can happen when we bring faculty and staff into the same fold along with students so that the impact is authentic student success.”

More than 400 young men of color and professionals attended the summit representing school districts, community colleges, and universities from across the state. The summit also had the highest concentration of African American and Latino PhDs in one conference. The purpose for the summit was to give students, staff and faculty a chance to network and collaborate on strategies to encourage men of color to be successful in both academics and life.