Citizen alumna Naiara Souto helps Somerville High School students

Tisch College Bulletin, Tufts University, Vol. 7, No. 10, October 2010

After graduating from Tufts, citizen alumna Naiara Souto ’10 began working at Somerville High School as a College Advising Corps member. A graduate of Somerville High School herself, Souto was eager to work side by side with the school’s guidance councilors, helping students through every step of the college process.

“I was excited about being able to work with Somerville High School students,” she explained. “I was there before the College Advising Corps began and I felt like students needed more intensive support in throughout the complicated college process.”

The program, started in 2007 through a $1 million grant that Tisch College and Massachusetts Campus Compact (MACC) received from the Jack Kent Cooke Foundation, is in its third year at Somerville High School.

Souto, who taking the reins from Lillian O’Donnell ’07, credits O’Donnell with fostering a nurturing environment at Somerville High School.  

“After my interview with Lil, she gave me her contact information so that I could contact her if I needed to,” Souto said.  “She gave me tips and information on the job, but more importantly, she established a good reputation for the College Advising Corps program at Somerville High School.”

Now several months in to the role, Souto says her work is a critical complement to the traditional role of guidance councilors.

 “What I enjoy the most is being able to sit and talk with students for an hour or more if they need to,” the international relations major said.  “Guidance counselors are great and are very busy because they handle a lot of different things. In my role, I have the time and skills to sit with students one-on-one for as long as they need.”

In addition to her work directly with students, Souto collaborates with Tufts – Somerville High School’s university partner in the program - to provide high schoolers with opportunities to visit campus and to meet Tufts students.

Working with Walker Coppedge, Associate Director of Enrollment in the Office of Undergraduate Admissions, Souto has arranged for all Somerville High School freshmen to visit the Tufts campus. So far, three visits of 50 students each are scheduled for November. Coppedge, who also organizes annual campus visits for high school students from the Josiah Quincy Upper School (JQUS) in Boston’s Chinatown, has been an invaluable asset to strengthening connections between Somerville High School and Tufts.

Additionally, Souto collaborates with Let's Get Ready, helping with advertising, student inquiries, and coordination with the high school. Organized and taught by Tufts students, this program offers free SAT classes to low-income students.

With all the resources available to help students, Souto says that it’s important to support students without doing their work for them.

“The most challenging piece of this work is finding a good fit between how much you should do for students and how much they should be doing for themselves,” she explained. “Finding a balance between helping students and encouraging them to be independent is critical.”