Sometimes great staff members and great benefactors come together to make remarkable difference at Georgetown. That is clearly the case of Charlene Brown-McKenzie (C ’95) and the Meyers Institute for College Preparation.

As an undergraduate sociology major, Charlene Brown-McKenzie spent one summer serving as a Resident Assistant for a group of Washington, D.C. public high-school students studying on the Georgetown campus. Those students were part of a young GU program then called Schiff Scholars that adopted a group of local seventh-graders from one of the most disadvantaged neighborhoods of the city and prepared them for college with six years of Saturday Academies and 5-week summer academic programs on the Georgetown campus.

“I was engaged in numerous community service projects, with Schiff Scholars and what is now our Center for Social Justice, where I was able to experience how service to others can affect change not just in individuals but in communities,” McKenzie says. Largely as a result of this work, she went on to obtain a Master of Social Work degree from Columbia University and returned to D.C. to work with families and children.

In 1999 she returned to the Hilltop as a program coordinator for Schiff Scholars, adding a crucial family-outreach component to the academic emphasis of the program. A first-generation college student from Jamaica by way of Bridgeport, Connecticut, McKenzie brought a special empathy to her work. With her help, 98%of students in the program graduate from high school and go on to enroll in post-secondary education, including colleges such as Temple, Howard, Lehigh, North Carolina A&T and Georgetown, where 85% have graduated within five years. In addition to the academic rigor of the program, the difference is often in the other connections McKenzie makes, from calling families at home to visiting program alumni in college with “care packages” and an open ear to any issues that might hinder a student’s continuing success.

Now, McKenzie’s challenges—and success—are about to multiply. Director of the pre-college program in our Center for Multicultural Equity and Access since 2004, she recently added a new title and role. In October 2007, the University announced receipt of the third-largest individual gift in its history, a $10million commitment over 10 years to the newly renamed Meyers Institute for College Preparation (MICP). As the Executive Director of MICP, McKenzie oversees an operation that will now add a new seventh-grade class of 50 students each year, marching from DC’s Ward 7 to college and beyond. For her, it is a life come full circle. “I have come to truly realize the full impact of my Jesuit education at Georgetown,” she says. “My involvement in the educational outreach programs to under resourced communities in the District of Columbia is my truest example of how the spirit of Georgetown has changed the lives of students and families.” This would not have been possible but for the $10million gift from Daniel Meyers that will now open many doors. Charlene and her many supporters on campus and beyond are tremendously grateful for this opportunity.


Photo: Charlene Brown-McKenzie with some of her students on a study abroad trip to Costa Rica and Panama