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The road to college isn’t an easy one. For some students, a great deal of them in Philadelphia, it’s a lot bumpier. Lisa Nutter is well aware of this as president of Philadelphia Academies, Inc., so when director Ben Herold of the award-winning documentary First Person sought her support, he got it. The film follows a group of Philadelphia high school students and their quest to make it to college, one that many of us recognize quite well. Catch the city-wide screening on September 25, whether it’s on WHYY at 7:30 p.m, or at one of the five Free Library of Philadelphia branches that will present it with a post-show discussion.

I’m a high school dropout who graduates from college this year, so interviewing one of the busiest women in Philadelphia, Lisa Nutter, about her advocacy campaign for First Person was another thing I never imagined I’d do.

Tell me about your involvement with the film.

This film is important to get the message out there… I felt in high school that I was pretty much on my own to figure it out and not necessarily supported by a particular counselor… what I recognized by watching the young people in First Person is that schools aren’t set up to address these problems. That hasn’t changed…we have to figure out how we’re going to support kids in these conversations… What we’ve seen is that whenever we set expectations high, kids work their hardest. And if we don’t, they’ll meet us wherever we set the bar. We have not yet established a college-going culture in this city… I think some kids come into the situation with nobody in their family having attended college and so they may not be hearing those messages at home. Then they come to school and they may not be hearing those messages.

And how can we promote the message?

“We’re constantly showing it to teachers…whether it was a parent or not, there was someone in your life, there was an adult who kept your butt on fire…Part of this is financial and we can’t ignore that the cost of a college education is really, really expensive. Once we bring young people to the edge, to buy into this vision for themselves, we have to help them resource it. The question in Philadelphia is, how do you do that?…This is both a mental and financial challenge and part of the heavy lifting needs to happen in schools and part of it needs to happen in our community.

There’s always that one person.

When we look at people who graduated from Harvard with honors and difficult family circumstances…researchers find that they aren’t super people, they are resilient. Resilient people have at least one person in their life, a mentor…another thing they find is that resilient people have a sense of purpose and they establish goals for themselves. That mentor helps them stay focused. Neither one of those things costs money.

It sounds like a truly inspiring film. Does it come off that way?

“It’s an emotionally challenging film. You don’t end feeling great, so we’re having conversations after the film so that people know that something can be done.

What did you think of the young people in First Person?

Most of them are a pretty focused bunch and they haven’t given up hope…We’re trying to say to Philadelphia that we have the power to put positive adults in these kids’ lives so that they can stay on track…that’s pure civic energy. We have to be able to support the ones that can’t afford it. That’s what our work is about and the marriage between First Person and Philadelphia Academies, Inc…These are stories that we see quite often in our work with young people. We were more than happy to collaborate so that we could see real community change.

Thursday, September 25, 7:30 PM
Public Television Broadcast Premiere on WHYY-TV12 Philadelphia and FREE Community Screening Series presented by The United Way of Southeastern Pennsylvania.

Editor’s Note: The film will be screened at seven community locations. Philadelphia City Hall, Kensington High School for Creative & Performing Arts, Temple University, Martin Luther King High School, Fels Community Center, Wooden Shoes Books and The Enterprise Center.