Non-traditional Excellence: Two BMCC Students Win Vanguard Award

Two Borough of Manhattan Community College (BMCC/CUNY) students are among eight students statewide to receive the Vanguard Award, which highlights outstanding college students enrolled in career and technical education programs that are not traditional for their gender.

The winners are animation and motion graphics major Jan Iverson, nominated by Professor Susan Stratton, and human services major Nico Tyndale, nominated by Professor Keith Carter.

Iverson and Tyndale are among eight Vanguard award winners across New York State, and will be recognized at a ceremony in Albany this spring.

The Vanguard Award is administered by the New York State Nontraditional Employment & Training (NET) Program, and sponsored by the New York State Education Department through a Carl D. Perkins grant.

According to the NET Program, non-traditional professions are those in which one gender represents fewer than 25% of the individuals employed in that field.

For example, non-traditional occupations for women include forest management, architecture, radio broadcasting, computer systems networking, civil engineering, geographic information science and hundreds of others.

Non-traditional occupations for men include special education, elementary education, social work, respiratory therapy, registered nursing, tourism marketing and more.

The powerful role of social services

Professor Keith Carter, who nominated Vanguard awardee Nico Tyndale, has served on the faculty at BMCC for three years, teaching human services courses and advising the human services club. He is also a clinical social worker and therapist in private practice, where he supervises BMCC interns who assist in case management and help connect clients to services.

“That’s how I met Nico,” says Carter. “I supervised him as an intern, and realized right away that he is thorough, committed and an over-achiever. He shines as a student leader and wanting to do for others. He went on to be elected president of the human services club at BMCC, and organized events for students at BMCC, such as child abuse certification training.

Tyndale also coordinated BMCC student participation in events externally, Carter says, like the Eco City Pageant, a community parade on the lower east side of Manhattan. “Nico brought more than 25 BMCC students together as volunteers to work with families as they made costumes to raise awareness and celebrate the earth.”

Tydndale graduated from BMCC in December 2018 with an associate degree in human services. “Graduates in that area often go on to earn degrees in social work, a profession dominated by women, which makes it a non-traditional career area for men,” Carter says. “Numbers are increasing but Nico has been one of the few male students that we have had as a human service major at BMCC.”

The field of human services was a natural career choice for him, Tyndale says. Raised in Jamaica by his grandmother, he found himself at age 11 orchestrating the social services she needed, when she was diagnosed with a brain tumor. As a teen and young man, Tyndale experienced adversity because of his sexual orientation, and his work with the Red Cross in Jamaica further reinforced his awareness of the powerful role of social work in helping the disenfranchised in a society.

Once he obtained a Safety VISA to the United States, Tyndale enrolled at BMCC and worked with social service agencies in New York, including Housing Works. “I guided individuals who are HIV positive or have AIDS, helping them connect with resources. I also helped families become more aware of how to support a relative who has been diagnosed with HIV or AIDS,” he says. “I knew social service in some form, would be my life’s work.”

Opening doors for women

Vanguard awardee Jan Iverson, an animation and motion graphics major, was nominated by Professor Susan Stratton, who has taught in the media arts and technology department at BMCC for four years.

“Jan was a student in my Introduction to Contemporary Media class in Spring 2018, and she stood out because of her leadership qualities and empathy when she worked with fellow students on their projects,” says Stratton. “Students with Jan’s creative maturity are rare, so it’s been a real privilege to watch her grow as a media artist and share what she is learning with others.”

In Fall 2018, Iverson worked as a supplemental instructional leader in Stratton’s class, serving as both a support for other students and a role model, helping to offset perceptions they might have, given the industry’s underrepresentation of women.

The industry also lacks Native American story lines, and Native Americans make up only .09 percent of video game characters, says Iverson, who strongly identifies with her Kiowa-Apache heritage.

“I’ve combined our traditional art forms with technology in my pursuit of a career telling stories in new ways, specifically through animated shorts and games,” she says. “For me, visibility is a prime motivator—not only to challenge unfavorable Native narratives, but to take a leadership role in digital production, where indigenous women are barely visible.”

Iverson’s Native American heritage is something she began to investigate as an adult.

“In violation of The Indian Children Welfare Act of 1978, I became a ward of the court in Oklahoma as a toddler and was adopted and raised in England,” she says. “I then fought for my Native birthright as an adult in an Oklahoma court and won. I continue to use my determination to open doors for all women to be visible in careers in motion art.”

Iverson sought her birth family by hiring a private investigator. “She was able to track down my birth father, who was in federal prison. My birth mother was dying at that time but I was able to reunite with her on the Today Show in 2003,” Iverson says.

That first-hand experience of the media’s role in telling a story, had an impact on Iverson’s education and career goals.

“My hands were created to draw,” she says. “As the Apache proverb states, ‘It is better to have less thunder in the mouth and more lightning in the hand!’ It is my passion and in my blood to be a great storyteller through visual art.”

Staff, faculty and program support for nontraditional students

“It’s exciting that two of our students and faculty are spotlighted for this honor,” says Antonette McKain, director of evening, weekend and off-site programs at BMCC. “For our students to be two of the eight Vanguard award winners statewide is pretty phenomenal!”

Students in nontraditional fields face particular challenges, McKain says. “They need support that other students may not need, in order to excel. By recognizing students and their needs, we’re able to break down some of the barriers they might face in the industries they’ve chosen.”

Janice Zummo, assistant dean for academic support services at BMCC points out that the Vanguard Award not only showcases the winning students, “but also the fine work that is being done at BMCC to support non-traditional students who are pursuing a career in a field in which their gender is represented at a rate of 25 percent or less.”

It is also important to recognize the critical support from faculty and the use of grant-funded academic services in making these kinds of awards possible, Zummo says. “Our goal is to have a greater percentage of career and technical education students use academic support services and achieve at the level of Nico and Jan. We are very proud of them and their accomplishments.”