When TCNJ’s Bonner Community Scholars Program launched 20 years ago, it started with just 12 Bonner Scholars — students who commit to 300 hours of community service annually in exchange for needs-based scholarships. Now, with close to 100 participants each year, the TCNJ program is one of the largest and most successful in a nationwide network of Bonner college programs.

TCNJ’s success makes it a national model, but it isn’t easy to replicate. It derives from a combination of its robust student engagement; strong ties to community partners locally, nationally, and internationally; and unwavering financial support from both the TCNJ Foundation and the Corella & Bertram F. Bonner Foundation.

By the time Bonners graduate, they have service infused in their DNA, and many go on to careers that change lives. Here, we share the stories of just a few of the people and partnerships that have made up the fabric of the Bonner Program the past two decades.

 

Althia Muse: Director, TCNJ Bonner Institute

The Beauty of Bonner: Scholars develop real-world skills while helping our partner organizations to address pressing needs of the community. Their commitment to making a difference inspires hope and drives lasting change.

Baptism by Fire: “When Bonners go out with eight peers in a van and feed people in a soup kitchen, they learn to communicate clearly and solve some problems on the spot.”

Pride Point: A whopping one-third of TCNJ’s Bonner Scholars are first-generation students.

Local Perspective: “I live in Trenton, and when community partners find out I am the director at TCNJ, they immediately ask for a team of Bonner Scholars.”

 

Jazmine Barrera-Recinos ’25: Current Bonner Scholar
Volunteer Site: Academic Sports Academy in Trenton, New Jersey

When Jazmine Barrera-Recinos ’25 was in elementary school, she attended the Academic Sports Academy, an after-school program that teamed students in Trenton public schools with TCNJ Bonner Scholars for homework help and participation in recreational activities.

“I thought the Bonners were the coolest people on earth,” she says. When she was in fourth grade, one mentor even signed her iPod case with a note encouraging her to work hard. “Being in the program cemented the idea that I wanted to go to college and earn a degree.”

Now a psychology major and a Bonner Scholar herself, Barrera-Recinos serves as site leader at ASA. It’s not lost on her that she’s currently the one inspiring a younger generation as 60 to 80 students arrive at Hedgepeth-Williams Intermediate School each afternoon for tutoring and to burn off energy in the gym. “Our interactions help them become more ambitious,” Barrera-Recinos says.

Recently, she and other Bonners organized a field trip where ASA students attended a sports event at TCNJ, toured the campus, and met professors. “One kindergartner told me, ‘Miss Jazmine, I want to go to TCNJ because you go there.’ It was a full-circle moment for me.”

 

Horacio Hernandez ’19: Fellow, Office of Population Health at Rutgers University

Former Bonner volunteer in TCNJ’s Campus Garden

The Seed: In 2010, Bonners started a campus garden to grow produce to distribute to local food banks.

What They Grow: Fruits, veggies, and herbs. And citizens with deep affinity for sustainability and food security. “I owe who I am now to this program,” says Hernandez.

The Harvest: An average of 350 pounds of produce per year

Who Gets the Bounty: Trenton Area Soup Kitchen and Mercer Street Friends food bank

 

Eduardo Pardo-Shontz: Laboratory technician

Benefitted from Bonner partner program and received pre-college mentoring from Bonner Scholars

Where He Started: Trenton Central High School, unsure he’d go to college

The Bonner Partner That Changed His Mind: Bridge to Employment, a college and career readiness program supported by Johnson & Johnson Foundation

TCNJ Connection: Through BTE, Pardo-Shontz met weekly with Bonner Scholars and J&J mentors for SAT preparation, college essay writing, and immersive experiences in science and health care.

First Time He Felt Like a Scientist: At a BTE global conference with Bonners, he and his team had to develop a new product. “We came up with a biodegradable Band-Aid.”

End Goal: First-generation college grad with a degree in biology from Farleigh Dickinson University, May 2024. “Bonners showed me science was doable.”

On Being a Lab Tech: “I like the fast-paced environment and being able to help people.”

 

Hailey Weiss ’19: Special education teacher

TCNJ Bonner alum

Hailey Weiss ’19 had known since they were 9 years old that they wanted to be a special education teacher. “I’m a very out-there kind of person. And I grew up in a very small, conservative town,” they say. “I experienced a lot of bullying as a child because I was different.”

One of Weiss’ elementary school teachers recommended they join a “gym buddy program,” and so Weiss then spent recesses with peers in an adaptive physical education group. “I made some of the best friends I have ever had in that program.” it was also how Weiss discovered a knack for interacting with people with special needs.

By 13, Weiss decided TCNJ — with its stellar School of Education — was the college to aim to attend. And after completing the Bonner summer program for high schoolers at 16, Weiss was determined to be a Bonner Scholar, too.

So it seems it was kismet when, in 2016, as a first-year Bonner, Weiss led a new program called Unified Learning in which residents from The Arc Mercer came to the college for weekly, inclusive classes with TCNJ students. Weiss and other Bonners taught a range of topics from mindfulness to STEM, all with the goal of the two groups getting to know each other and learning together.

“Folks in group home or day program systems only interact with the other folks who are in those systems,” says Weiss. “And so it was a really big deal to have a space where all people were treated as equals.”

Weiss credits the Bonner Program for helping develop their values as a person who works with people with disabilities. “I have a really grounded understanding of what people are capable of when we just give them the opportunity to connect, and how important inclusion is,” they say. “I needed that practice at TCNJ to broaden my horizons and to learn what community meant to me,” Weiss says. “And now I feel it every day. It’s what everything I believe in life is about.”

 

Noah Possible ’20: Community-based violence intervention program supervisor at PEI Kids, one of Bonner’s longtime partners that is based in Lawrenceville, New Jersey

TCNJ Bonner alum

Bonner Lifer: Bonner service site was at PEI Kids, an organization that provides crisis and intervention programs to vulnerable children. Possible now works at PEI Kids full time.

Overcoming Challenges: He withdrew from college after a year, feeling ill-equipped to meet the demands of college life. He stayed in touch with Bonner, got an associate degree at Mercer County Community College, and returned to TCNJ and the Bonner Program more prepared for success.

Common Ground: He uses his own experience to connect with teens in the PEI Kids program, helping them understand actions have consequences and encouraging them to make good decisions.

 

Brittany Aydelotte ’09: Director, TCNJ’s Community Engaged Learning Institute

TCNJ Bonner alum

“As part of our student development as Bonners, we’re challenged to think about more than just our local impact,” says Brittany Aydelotte ’09. National and international service trips are built into the program. The longest-running of these, an annual trip to New Orleans, started in the summer of 2006 to help with rebuilding efforts after the devastation from Hurricane Katrina.

Aydelotte was a freshman Bonner when Katrina hit and has participated in TCNJ’s New Orleans trip multiple times. “Early on, it was demolition work, removal of debris,” she says. Working with local partners, Bonners have done everything from helping lay foundations to framing houses. “I put up a lot of drywall and have done a lot of painting.”

Almost 20 years out, there is still a need, so the Bonners still go. “That was part of the commitment,” says Aydelotte. “Places that have a natural disaster like this get a lot of attention for six months to a year maybe. But the need is much longer than that. So until our partner organizations stop taking volunteers, we’re going to keep helping.”

 

Jessica Damanski ’24: TCNJ Bonner alum

Created a music therapy program for people with dementia

Bonner Volunteer Site: Meals on Wheels, a national organization that delivers meals to senior citizens

Previous Work with the Elderly: She volunteered at a veterans home in Edison, New Jersey, where seniors listened to music to help improve their memory.

Lightbulb Moment: Many of the participants in Meals on Wheels program had dementia. What if they delivered personalized music playlists with the meals?

How She Did It: Requested TCNJ funding, bought MP3 players, talked with caregivers about participants’ music interests, downloaded music, and dropped MP3s off along with meals.

The Playlists: A song from a first wedding dance, popular songs from the person’s prom, songs the person sang to their children. “Any music to invoke sweet memories.”

The Feedback: “Overwhelmingly positive,” and caregivers reported the music put the participants at ease.

 

Alex Berger ’11: Senior federal affairs adviser at the Urban Institute

TCNJ Bonner alum

Creating legions of students for whom service is like breathing is a key goal of the Bonner Program. Alex Berger ’11 has taken that aspiration to heart, and with the skills he honed as a Bonner Scholar, he’s crafted a career around social justice.

He started with a stint at Teach for America, where 90% of his fourth graders had a relative behind bars. “I saw how the criminal justice system not only takes away someone’s freedom but also impacts the family, children, and communities,” Berger says. “The ripple effects are tremendous.”

Seeing the disproportionate effect of a broken criminal justice system on people of color led Berger to focus on issues such as prison reform, anti-hunger initiatives, and equitable housing. He’s done advocacy and policy work in his various roles with the American Civil Liberties Union, the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, and the Urban Institute.

“My Bonner training gave me a broader hope that there is a place to improve the world,” says Berger. “For some people, it is easier to turn away from these issues. I want to roll up my sleeves and help people.”

 

Tamara Ibezim ’12: First-year law student at Drexel University

TCNJ Bonner alum

“I give full credit to what I was exposed to as a Bonner Scholar for helping me to now understand how I fit into the broader ecosystem of service,” says Tamara Ibezim ’12.

An analyst at Bank of America for more than a decade, Ibezim noticed a lack of diversity in the workplace, especially when it came to women and people of color. So she joined a Black professional group at BOA and went to human resources with ideas for how to source candidates from different places to ensure better representation within the company.

“That’s what Bonner really teaches you,” she says. “We are trained to take it a step further. We look at institutions and advocate for policies that will improve people’s lives.”

It’s the difference, she says, “between you going to the soup kitchen to help for a day and going to your city council meeting in support of more resources to keep the soup kitchen open.”

Ibezim pivoted to law this year with hopes to take on more public-facing roles and to protect individuals’ rights on a wider scale. “When I think about the legacy of Bonner, and what it does well, it’s fostering a commitment to engaging with any community you find yourself in,” she says. “It’s the most consequential thing I’ve done.”