With plan and purpose, some tech-savvy, community-minded Lee County students are putting their peers on a road to success.
Then a Canterbury School eighth-grader, Dylan Moon saw his contemporaries struggling after COVID-19 knocked them off their educational paths, unable to attend school.
With lack of internet resources, Zoom classes weren’t possible or effective, particularly for lower-income students. Advancing in school left them without the foundation to meet their goals.
“They didn’t have computers,” said Moon, now a 17-year-old Canterbury junior. “They weren’t learning. It created this divide in education levels.”
National studies support Moon’s observations.
“The educational impacts of the pandemic were not only historically large, but were disproportionately visited on communities with many low-income and minority students,” said Sean Reardon, professor of poverty and inequality, Stanford Graduate School of Education, quoted in a 2023 Harvard Graduate School of Education report.
The report studied 7,800 U.S. school districts.
A key finding revealed that the average U.S. public school student in grades 3-8 lost the equivalent of a half year of learning in math and a quarter of a year in reading.
COVID-19 left some students struggling; Dylan Moon sees the answer
Moon sought to bridge the gap, creating CRAM, or Creating Role Models and Mentors in 2020.
He rallied his brother, friends and reached out to schools. Led by Moon, younger brother Noah Moon acts as chief executive officer; and Arnav Adi is vice president, Antonino Engelhard is secretary and Gabriel Dahan is treasurer. There is also a full board of directors composed of classmates and friends.
“We’re not just mentors; we’re friends here to support each other and make a positive impact in our community,” Dylan said. The mentors build their rapport with students, providing a healthy snack, playing games and identifying educational gaps.
CRAM quickly gained momentum with others joining as mentors, tutors and volunteers, and the program began to attract participants to improve their skills.
“First we had two, then eight, then 16,” he said of the mentees. “We are just now expanding to other schools.”
On a recent Wednesday afternoon, high fives, greetings and jubilance rose from a Fort Myers Middle Academy classroom as mentors filed in bringing positive vibes and a little extra help for those who need it.
Nine CRAM mentors worked with students along with giving positive reinforcement. They focused on reading as snacks were handed out to aid in concentration.
After 30 minutes of study, the group filed outside to the basketball courts to shoot hoops.
Fort Myers Middle Academy just joined the organization, and there is a Fort Myers High School chapter, with students from Bishop Verot and Bonita Springs High School that help as tutors, Moon said. The Moons hope to expand next to Colonial Elementary school. The organization is working with the United Way as a community partner.
“It’s hard to measure more success, but I see test scores going up,” Moon said. “It’s nice. I like to see the kids confident and happy.”
The Moon family’s passion for community
Calling himself and fellow students at Canterbury “fortunate,” Dylan Moon had encouraged them to sign on as tutors.
“It’s not hard, but it makes a difference,” he said he told them.
His parents, Jason Moon and Lizy Dosoretz, own Elite DNA Behavioral Health, and work to address educational and community needs. Heavily involved at the beginning, Dosoretz said that as a social worker, she had studied the “positive effects of consistent role models on self-esteem, self-efficacy and pro-social behaviors.”
“What began as a small concept to someday make big change rapidly grew and evolved,” she said,
The tutors first gathered at Elite DNA’s conference room and built the program from there.
Scholarship helps develop talent, capitalizes on pickleball popularity
In addition to their work with CRAM, Dylan Moon along with Arnav launched a scholarship fund. The CRAM board had a charity pickleball tournament in November where they raised money for the scholarship.
Between the tournament and their GoFundMe page, they raised more than $13,000. The board awarded a $2,000 check and a laptop to a Fort Myers Middle Academy student, David Perez, whom they had been mentoring for the past two years.
Dylan Moon said Perez will use the scholarship to attend summer camps focused on computer science.
What’s next for peer mentoring program CRAM?
Dylan and Noah plan to continue the scholarship program, expand it to more schools, and then form branches, such as CRAM Sports.
As Dylan Moon prepares for college, Noah plans to transition into leading CRAM.
“I want to make CRAM as large as possible to make sure these kids are given adequate opportunity to succeed,” Dylan Moon said.
