Walking down the hallways of Carrollton School of the Sacred Heart, I was embraced by the morning warmth and the salty scent of the bay right behind the main building known as El Jardin. The familiar peacock walked into the building at 7:30 in the morning, and the staff had our usual coffee ritual to keep us attentive. As the students began entering the building, I could not help but smile and think of how bright these girls were, and I began reminiscing about my own experience as a Breakthrough Miami scholar/student.

But now I am a Teaching Fellow in the program widening my perspective on  Breakthrough and what an impact it has had on my life.

I received the privilege of working at the all-girls Carrollton campus teaching fifth grade English. I became involved with the program in fourth grade. Breakthrough Miami came to my elementary school, Citrus Grove, and gave out information about the program and shared personal stories from alumni.

Personally, I wasn’t thrilled about going to school for six weeks in the summer and doing homework during my free time. I thought to myself, “If it’s my summer vacation, I will spend my time relaxing and take a break.” However, my aunt was so enthusiastic for my sister and I to join the program that she eventually signed us up and we were admitted. I was nervous at first, meeting new girls from different schools, and I thought I wouldn’t fit in. After my first summer, I began feeling comfortable with my peers and the students there, so I continued in the program as a scholar through my ninth grade year.

Breakthrough Miami is a non-profit organization that provides motivated middle-school students from disadvantaged backgrounds with the resources to achieve in school. The program uses a students-teaching-students model to motivate the youth to achieve academic success. The program, once known as Summerbridge Miami, switched its name to Breakthrough Miami when the Breakthrough Collaborative program began to expand throughout the United States.

The eight-year program begins accepting students in fifth grade and supports them with a plan to graduate from college-prep high schools and then attend four-year colleges or universities. The program currently has 7 sites in Miami including Ransom Everglades, Carrollton School of the Sacred Heart, Miami Country Day School, Gulliver Preparatory School, Palmer Trinity School, International Studies Charter High School, and the University of Miami.

I never imagined myself becoming a Teaching Fellow at such a young age. Many of the teachers I had when I was in the program were college students, and I hardly ever saw high school seniors on campus unless they were teacher aides or volunteers, so I created a plan when I was young that I’d volunteer with the program first and then transition into becoming a teacher.

In January of 2016, I read a flyer announcing that Breakthrough Miami was coming to Miami High to recruit students interested in the summer teaching internship. As soon as I heard the news, I immediately sprang to my feet and talked to F.E.A. advisor Ms. Berrios about how I should go about applying to the program.

I worked on my application for about two weeks, making sure my essay responses were perfect and all my information was correct. Once I sent it in, I was very anxious, thinking to myself, “What if I don’t get in?” Three weeks after sending in my application, I received an e-mail to schedule my interview, and on my birthday, I received the news that I was admitted to teach at Carrollton School of the Sacred Heart.

At first, I was a bit nervous. Just thinking about how I was going to be working along side students from prestigious colleges was enough to give me goosebumps. One of my co-workers even came from Johns Hopkins University. My biggest fear was that my co-workers would see me as a child like the students in the program due to my energetic and child-like personality, and that they would treat me like one.

After one week of training, however, I got to know my nineteen co-workers and realized that I was overreacting. We all had each other’s backs, and we cared about one another like a huge family. Whenever someone was having a rough day or a difficult time completing a weekly lesson plan, there was always someone there to help save the day.

My second fear was that my students wouldn’t like me, that they wouldn’t respect me as a teacher, and that they would treat me more as a friend. Luckily, my fifth graders, who came from schools such as Coral Way, Shenandoah, and Mater, proved me wrong, and they showed me they could balance having me as their teacher and as a friend. They knew the difference between Ms. Danaize inside the classroom and outside, and they would never cross the line with me or any of their other teachers.

I feel like the best part of my summer was getting to know each of my little scholars and learning to identify their studying techniques. Through experience, I was able to absorb thirty different perspectives from my scholars on how they learn and what makes it easier for the information to stick with them. We also had many fun activities with them such as a water balloon fight, Olympics, and Sisterhood Day.

According to the Breakthrough Miami webpage for teaching fellows (http://www.breakthroughmiami.org/portal/teaching-fellows), the internship has been featured repeatedly in The Princeton Review’s Top 10 Internships for teen and college students. Having this program under your wing can take you a long way. I applied to colleges and universities while I was working with Breakthrough, mentioning my job and role as a teacher, and I was accepted into two private universities out-of-state, Harding University and Wingate University, and offered presidential scholarships.

For many scholarships, there’s a section that will ask you if you were involved with any college-prep programs, and Breakthrough will always be on that list for me. Whether you were a Scholar or Teaching Fellow, if you mention that you worked with Breakthrough Miami, you’re likely to have a higher chance of receiving an award.

My work as a Teaching Fellow was a paid internship, and I received $1,500 at the end of the summer for working with the program. To apply for the internship, you must be 17 years of age with a minimum of a 3.5 weighted or unweighted GPA. Applications to become a Teaching Fellow usually open up around November for early deadline and in December for regular deadline. On your application you will be adding in your personal information, answering 3 essay prompts, and get the chance to choose your academic area of interest. The summer program for Teaching Fellows lasts 8 weeks, including your training and evaluation week.