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Miami Palmetto High School rising senior Jacob Albert has his own non-profit organization called Geared for Greatness. He tutors and mentors children in foster care.
He started the program last summer and says it works like a buddy system.
“We work with kids who need help in certain subjects,” he says. “We specialize in STEM subjects. We mentor them and tutor them. We teach science, math, and then we also try to teach them certain things that aren’t taught in school like financial literacy.”
They also help the kids with some technology – such as how to use Word and Excel effectively.
He deals with 30 foster care children with the help of 10 teens and another six teens are on his board.
“I tutor on my own, too,” he says. “Being able to explain it at the student’s level. It’s a fun thing for me to do.”
Albert is now working on starting a scholarship fund for the non-profit. He particularly wants to help others because he knows what it’s like to fall behind.
“Over the pandemic I did get behind in school,” he says. “I was wondering how I would get back on track. I used tutors.”
Because tutoring helped him, he started reaching out to different programs asking if they needed tutoring help.
One group, Educate Tomorrow, led them to one of their sectors that needed help. His mom was a mentor for Educate Tomorrow about 15-20 years ago when she was in college.
“She told me to reach out to them,” he said. “I’m starting out. I don’t have any experience in anything, I didn’t have anything to show for it, except for tutoring on my own.”
Throughout the process, Albert learned how to run an organization including reaching out to people and how to choose a board to run the organization.
Working with the kids, they try to teach the budgeting strategies. They also bring in guest speakers who talk to them about how to get a job, open investment accounts and bank accounts.
Foster children age out of the system at 18 and the kids will have to function on their own.
The sessions were done over Zoom because it was the most efficient method.
“I feel like the group sessions are easier,” he says. “In the future we look to do one on one sessions. I try to keep it as interactive as I can. But as the summer comes, I’ll do more in person.”
The tutors go through background checks and have to become approved Miami-Dade Schools volunteers.
Albert teaches computer classes and has himself taken the Advanced Placement Computer Science Principles and other computer science classes.
At Palmetto, he’s the incoming president of the Finance Club. He’s been a member of the Finance Club going on four years now. This past year he coordinated the guest speakers.
He’s taken a class on financial literacy.
“I’m very interested in financial markets and cryptocurrencies,” he says. “I like reading the markets, my father does work in real estate. He introduced me to the idea. I like cryptocurrency because I like the technological aspect of it, I feel like it ties into various things I am interested in.”
He’s a member of the Science National Honor Society, Mu Alpha Theta, Debate Club and the Palmetto Jewish Student Union. He was a member of the Student Cabinet for the Class of ’23.
Albert has played varsity lacrosse for three years and club lacrosse for 10 years.
Outside of school he volunteers at Achieve Miami. He’s been a volunteer since the summer of eighth grade.
Linda Rodriguez Bernfeld
