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About Us

Mentoring for the next generation of Black women

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At The Catalyst Collective, we believe that mentoring can be a powerful intervention in the lives of young women. We recruit, train, match and support professional Black women with Black teenagers for year-long mentoring relationships.

 

We know that an excellent mentor can change our trajectory, challenge our thinking and encourage us to go further than perhaps we thought ourselves capable of.

 

We are committed to facilitating meaningful mentoring relationships between young Black women, and mentors they can identify with to support them in achieving their goals.

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We are building a community of Black women. Will you join us?

Our Story

The Catalyst started in December 2020 as a simple idea - that by connecting Black girls with role models to act as mentors, they would accelerate towards and achieve their goals even faster. We launched our first pilot cohort of 6 pairs in January 2021, and we've kept going from there. This year (2023-24) we're on track to match and support 75 mentoring pairs.

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Our approach centres creating and sustaining a joyful, authentic and supportive mentoring community of Black women, and we're focused on providing opportunities for our mentors and mentees to learn and grow from each other.

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As one of our mentees explained: 

...this matters a lot to me. The only other black people I come into contact with are my family. The majority of my teachers are white and male, and I don’t feel able to identify with them... It’s nice to see someone who is the same as me, and to be able to learn from their experiences and apply them to my own journey.'

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We couldn't have put it better ourselves.

Our Values

At the Catalyst, we have a set of values - co-designed by a group of mentors and mentees - that we embody in the way we work and run our programmes. These extend into everything that we do.

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Celebration: We celebrate Black girls and Black women unapologetically.

Authenticity: We see you, and you can bring all of yourself to this space.

Support: We are the bridge - supporting you on the journey between where you are and where you are going.

Community: We are a community - we have each other's backs and we learn from each other's experiences.

Joy: We are joyful - like sunflowers, we turn towards the light and each other.

Meet the Staff Team

Meet The Advisory Board

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Get in touch

Thanks, we'll be in touch shortly!

info@thecatalystcollective.co.uk

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