Posted by Communications Staff on 5/12/2022
This fall, Natreven Dickerson will head into his senior year as Shadle Park High School’s starting quarterback for the second season in a row. He’s also an accomplished track athlete with plenty of prospects ahead.
But when Dickerson heard about the Young Men Achieving Destiny (YMAD) program, he saw another kind of opportunity: to better himself and help others.
“Me personally, I just want to make a living for myself, kind of make a good name for my family as well,” he said. “I thought it would be a good idea just to do it and learn something new and also teach people in the group.”
Dickerson, who has dreams of playing football beyond high school and college, as well as becoming a real estate agent or motivational speaker, was one of 15 Shadle students to complete this social-emotional program, which helps young men address anger issues and become responsible adults.
Shon Davis—commonly known as Pastor Shon— runs the program through the SPS Office of Family and Community Engagement. The 15 Shadle students celebrated last week during a lunchtime graduation where they heard from Pastor Shon’s son, former NFL cornerback and Spokane native Will Davis. Each student also received a YMAD diploma and shirt from Shadle administrators.
The program welcomed all grade levels. Andre Jones is finishing up his freshman year and found himself in the group after an invite from Pastor Shon.
“The program taught me about how some of the people you surround yourself with can affect your future, and how you need to think before you do,” Jones said. “The things that you do now can affect you in the long run.”
Before joining YMAD, Jones didn’t feel comfortable speaking to upperclassmen. But after being with them for 10 weeks, he’s connected with juniors and seniors.
“Now, it feels like I can say anything to them and if I feel down, I can come to them about it,” he said.
Jones is the kind of person Dickerson wants to help after completing the YMAD program.
“You know, I got one more year in school and I'm going to miss my young guys. I'll miss them,” he said. “But I want to import something in their heads first before I leave the school so they have those life lessons that I learned from other people that I can bring to them now.”
Another YMAD graduate, sophomore Jonathan Logan, has dreams of running track at the University of Oregon. While he says he was essentially volun-told to join, “it ended up being very helpful,” he said, adding, “I’m going to try and train harder and make sure all my decisions that I make go toward my goal and not away from it.
LaVae Tate, who will graduate this June, said choosing to join helped him confront some anger issues.
“I felt like this program would help me a bit on not letting anger in and not bottling up emotions and being straight up with everything that happens,” he said.
YMAD helped him focus on the goals he has after getting a diploma.
“One goal I really set for myself was to stay on task and work every day this summer so that I can literally get to where I want to go, which is own my own home and my own business,” he said. “As soon as I graduate, that’s what I’m going to do.”
The program also helped Tate and others in the group get vulnerable and share with each other.
“You know how it’s called like a ‘bro code’ or ‘bro circle’? We made that pact the first day we came in,” he said. “Ever since that day we’ve been able to open up and speak on whatever we wanted to without anyone laughing or any other problems.”
Instead, Tate, Dickerson, Jones, and Logan found a new group of brothers to rely on and check in with as they make their way toward accomplishing their goals.
