Eagle Academy Foundation Announces Morehouse, Spelman College Collaboration

Morehouse College and Spelman College to financially empower young men of color.

Photos: Robert F. Smith\Eagle Academy Foundation

New York, NY – April 15, 2022 – The Eagle Academy Foundation, a non-profit school support organization with a mission to educate and mentor young men of color, has partnered with Morehouse College and Spelman College to financially empower young men of color. Morehouse and Spelman students are leading an extracurricular financial education program for students enrolled at the Eagle Academy schools, a game-changing network of six traditional public schools serving young men grades 6-12 in under-resourced communities in all five boroughs of New York City and Newark, N.J.

“Young men of color deserve access to financial education and the tools necessary to achieve financial autonomy and success,” said Donald M. Ruff Jr., interim president and CEO of The Eagle Academy Foundation. “To break generational cycles of poverty and debt, students must learn how to open bank accounts, invest in the stock market, budget and manage their finances and more. Programs like the one Morehouse and Spelman students have been leading with young men from the Eagle Academy schools, can transform the lives of young people of color, and in turn, our communities overall. I greatly look forward to continuing to work with Morehouse and Spelman to find additional opportunities to expand this critical work.”

The semester-long program known as REACH was designed by the HBCU students. As part of the program, Morehouse, Spelman and Eagle students, and various Eagle parents, participate in the Stock Market Game, which simulates real-world investment in the stock market to strengthen participants’ understanding of finances and investing. The program meets virtually on Wednesdays and Saturdays.

Currently, communities of color are facing a staggering wealth gap in the U.S.–Black households hold less than seven cents on the dollar compared to white households, according to a study from Northwestern University, and only 34% of Black households owned equity investments in 2019, compared to 61% of white families, per the Federal Reserve Board.

The Eagle Academy Foundation supports programming across the Eagle network and recently facilitated a gift of five shares of stock to every Eagle Academy student and staff member from Robert F. Smith and the Morehouse College Class of 2019. During one of Robert F. Smith’s monthly check-ins with the Morehouse College Class of 2019, whose college debts he paid off, Smith and the Morehouse alumni chose to further extend their support to Eagle Academy students through a financial literacy program.

The Eagle Academy Foundation is a non-profit school support organization with a mission to educate and mentor young men of color into future leaders committed to excellence in character, scholastic achievement and community service and to promote these principles nationally. The foundation developed and supports the Eagle Academy schools—a network of six public college-preparatory schools serving 3,000 young men in challenged urban communities in all five boroughs of New York City and Newark, New Jersey.

For more information, visit eafny.org and follow The Eagle Academy Foundation on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and LinkedIn.

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