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Dr. Estelle Young has devoted her professional life to public service in educational, public

sector, and non-profit organizations. Between 2001 and 2007, she held Assistant Professor

positions in Sociology at Bowie State University and Morgan State University. At Bowie State,

Estelle actively supported the founding of a student mutual encouragement club named

“Operation Potential”. Members of Operation Potential used various strategies to encourage

optimal performance and urge ever-higher aspirations for their peers. The Operation Potential

club was broadly popular among students with athletes, honor students, commuter students,

international students, working students, non-traditional students and other groups as members.

While at Morgan, she served as the Morgan State Team Leader for the Lumina-funded national

Building Engagement and Attainment in Minority Students (BEAMS) project. The BEAMS

project supported the efforts of 100 HBCUs, Hispanic-serving, and Tribal colleges to apply the

findings of Project DEEP (Documenting Effective Educational Programs). Within a year of her

leadership of this project, Morgan was identified as the “project to watch” by the Institute of

Higher Education Policy (IHEP) BEAMS leadership team. IHEP selected Morgan to be

featured in their final report for the BEAMS project.

From 2008 to 2012, she served as Retention Coordinator and then Director for Student Success

Support at the Community College of Baltimore County. Her project increased white on-time

graduation rates by 50% while tripling the graduation rates for non-White nursing students.

Within three years of the program start, both groups achieved 68% on-time graduation rates.

Thus, not only did graduation rates rise significantly for all nursing students, but the attainment

gap was eliminated. These results won the Noel Levitz Retention Excellence Award in 2011.

Equally important to program outcomes is the financial sustainability and institutionalization of

the program upon grant end. To continue once grant funds end, a grant program must be cost-

effective, have other funding sources, or be integrated into the organization’s ongoing activities.

Estelle designed the program with sustainability in mind and developed a cost-effective model.

The savings garnered from retaining students and their tuition dollars was sufficient to

underwrite program staff at award end. CCBC’s institutionalization of the program went beyond

sustaining the program; the community college made a significant investment in a new student

resource center with dedicated space and computers. Designing with sustainability and

institutionalization in mind is a mindset Estelle brings to all her projects.

In 2011, Estelle began her services as a volunteer for the Greater Baltimore Urban League

(GBUL) contributing over 10,000 hours to date. She is responsible for writing or mentoring the

preparation of over 90% of all awarded grants for the non-profit since 2011. She plays a central

role in capacity-building, developing GBUL’s capacity for program design, management,

resource development, and monitoring and evaluation for their flagship youth program, the

Saturday Leadership Program. The Saturday Leadership Program won the 2016 Verizon

Community Innovator Award and the 2019 Weinberg Foundation Employee Giving Program

award.

Her approach to capacity-building puts significant focus on enhancing operational processes,

creating adaptable program, grant, and operational materials, and coaching volunteers, interns

and staff to facilitate their skill development in her areas of strength. Grant awards reflect her

coaching philosophy. She has prepared 28 successful grants with awards up to $50,000. But

those she mentored – all new to grant writing—did even better preparing 11 grant proposals four

of which ranged from $75,000 to $300,000. In addition to youth grants, Estelle prepared

successful proposals for entrepreneurship programs, operational support, and historic

preservation.

Together with co-author A. Yvette Myrick (Ed.D), Estelle self-published Thriving In Higher

Education Careers in 2019. The book sets out to be a resource for higher education

professionals, but its topics are common to us all. It includes easy-to-adopt, low cost, and

effective tips to allow you to experience your career with the same ideals of meaning, impact,

and purpose that attracted you in the first place. She holds degrees from the University of

Wisconsin-Madison (BA 1987, MA 1990) and Johns Hopkins University (PhD 2001).

Ready to talk with Estelle? 

You can connect with Estelle on LinkedIn or schedule a call or consultation below!