Let's Get Ready

Let’s Get Ready provides high school students from underrepresented communities with free SAT preparation, admissions counseling and other support services needed to gain admission to and graduate from college. Services are provided by college students who also serve as role models and mentors.

Let’s Get Ready (LGR) envisions a future when students from all socioeconomic backgrounds have the s

Goal One: Well-supported and highly-engaged near-peer coaches

Goal Two: Relevant and student-centered content

Goal Three: Sustained and collaborative partnerships

LGR invests in Professional Development for all staff, through departmental & individual budgets. Each staff member develops professional development goals with their manager at the start of the year & outlines the way they will invest in these areas, whether experiential, through others, or through formal education. Staff & managers are held accountable to meaningful attention to these goals. We also host trainings throughout the year on topics identified as critical to supporting our students with the highest competency & quality. This year, for example, all program staff participated in trainings on supporting undocumented students & on supporting the mental health of students of color. This year, we invested in leadership development for the Executive Team through a partnership with America's Promise Alliance to provide training & peer coaching to all new executives as well as training on issues, such as using data & evidence effectively & supporting equity in the workplace.

This year was one of profound growth and learning for LGR. We expanded our reach and impact, and continue to reflect on and improve the ways we work together as a community. Most specifically, our particular attention to critical areas of investment for this year were: partnerships and student leadership. 2021 was another incredibly difficult year for our students, who come from communities and backgrounds that have dealt with disproportionately negative impacts of the pandemic. We are so proud of the hard work and perseverance of our students and near-peer coaches - with support from the LGR team - to overcome these ongoing obstacles. LGR’s program has helped these young people stay on track, and our students continue to enroll in and graduate from college at significantly higher rates than their peers from similar backgrounds. As we entered the first year of a four-year strategic growth plan, we knew there was a deep need for our model of near-peer coaching across the country, but we didn’t know how it would be received by new partners. The response has been swift and powerful; partners, communities, and students are eager to integrate LGR’s near-peer coaching model into their efforts to ensure all students reach their college aspirations. We have expanded to serve cohorts of students for the first time in California, Texas, Wyoming, and deepened our reach in Maine, Boston, New York City, and Philadelphia. We are steadfast in our job to provide culturally-responsive resources and training, increasingly sophisticated technology, and timely information to equip young people, but then get out of their way. Our students will provide models for each other, break down historical barriers, set a new course, and show us all the path to true equity.