Mentoring the Future of Naples

by Tyler Stamerro

The Fernandez Stamerro Foundation for At Risk Students was founded by Hector Fernandez and myself, Tyler Stamerro.

As current Juniors attending St. John Neumann High School, Hector and I have discovered our passions in serving our community through volunteering, especially within the realm of children. As a result, we decided to begin a foundation that focuses on assisting children who come from lower income families and are more “at risk”.

We consider at risk students as those who struggle academically due to economic background or family issues.

What causes our foundation to be so unique is that it stems from the idea of children helping children. This is an organization founded by two high school students and is filled with volunteers that are also high school students.

As many of you know or can assume, starting any type of business or nonprofit is no simple task. To accompany us along our exciting journey of service, we have partnered with our school’s Key Club, which is overseen by Naples on the Gulf Kiwanis Club. Our foundation utilizes the amazing members found in our school’s Key Club to staff our operations.

During the month of November, we trained students to become tutors by working with Royal Palm Academy’s dedicated staff and extraordinary students.

We assisted with Royal Palm’s afterschool program by playing with the children and offering academic support. This was a noteworthy milestone for our foundation as it gave us the opportunity to develop our skills as mentors.

Looking towards the future, we have long term plans of establishing a tutoring program with another well-known community organization that prioritizes helping children at risk. The program will eventually be fully staffed by students who will have been trained to be tutors and educated on how to be positive mentors.

If you have any questions regarding our foundation and what we do, feel free to contact us at: hector@fernandezstamerrofoundation.org or tyler@fernandezstamerrofoundation.org.