How To Help Boys Share Their Feelings
Ashanti Branch has dedicated his life to helping boys share their emotions - here's what he's learned
Hi Readers! So many of you have questions about how to stay connected with boys, and how to help boys practice sharing their real emotions with others. One of the people I look to for guidance in this area is Ashanti Branch, the founder and Executive Director of the The Ever Forward Club. This month marks the 21st anniversary of the club’s founding, and Branch is celebrating by publishing a new book about the group, how it started, and how he’s kept it going. He’s an extraordinary person who shares things you can use immediately in your own life. I hope you find this interview encouraging and inspiring. Big love - Christopher
What Do Boys Really Need?
In 2004, Ashanti Branch was brand new to the classroom, and he saw that something was off in his 9th grade math classes:
”In my first year teaching, I was noticing that there were African American males failing my class. They weren't even trying. I was really confused by that. So I invited some of them to a meeting.
I told them: I'll buy you lunch once a week. In exchange, you're going to teach me how to be a better teacher.”
Week after week, the newly-named Ever Forward Club kept meeting, and slowly developed into a real support group for boys who were feeling disconnected from school and needing some positive encouragement.
Branch thought that by providing these students with mental health support, mentorship, and a safe space to meet, he might help them stay on track and graduate from high school.
The approach worked. Since the club’s founding, every member of the club has graduated from high school, and 93% of them have gone on to attend college.
In the 21 years since that first lunch meeting, The Ever Forward Club has become an official non-profit organization, and running it is now Branch’s full time job. Unlike programs focused mostly on tutoring or academic support, the Ever Forward Club puts a big emphasis on “heart work” - providing emotional tools to help boys feel safe, seen, and heard.
In recognition of these successes, Branch received the 2023 U.S. Surgeon General’s Medallion for Health. This award is the highest honor that the Surgeon General can present to a civilian who represents outstanding “acts of compassion, innovative mental health efforts, and exceptional leadership in advancing the well-being of their communities.”
“As I look back on it, I realize I was building what I wish I had when I was growing up,” Branch says. “I wish I had a place to go to talk about stuff, to explore what I was going through, and to realize that other young people around me were going through similar things.“
A New Book Tells The Story
Branch explains how he got started in this work in his new book, Diary of A Confused Educator. Through humor, compassion, and vulnerability, he recounts trying to meet his students where they are - beyond the masks they wear to hide their true selves. He writes about why he believe that every young person deserves a space in which they are safe enough to discover, and be, themselves. The book chronicles his journey from overwhelmed educator to global leader on boys’ and mens’ issues.
Make Your Own Mask
In workshops, the club uses a simple mask making activity to bring participants together and change how they see one another.
Here’s how it works: Everyone gets a plain piece of paper (or a paper with a mask outlined on both sides of the paper), and these prompts:
On the front of mask:
What are the qualities and characteristics that you gladly let others see? Add at least one drawing and six words.
On the back of the mask:
What are the qualities and characteristics that you don’t let others see? Add at least six words.
Once everyone people are done, they are asked to share their masks in small groups, and then process the experience using questions like this:
How did it feel to share your mask?
How did it feel to listen to someone else’s mask?
Did you notice any similarities between your mask and the rest of the group?
How did this activity change the way you think about the other people in the room?
What do we get by only showing our masks? What does it cost us?
What is the importance of friendships where you can just be yourself?
Is there anything you are thinking about doing differently as a result of this experience?
By encouraging vulnerability and sharing, this activity helps young people and communities gain a deeper understanding of how much they have in common. The Ever Forward Club shares this activity publicly as part of what they call the “Million Mask Movement,” where they also keep a gallery of masks people have made from around the world.
UnMASKing With Male Educators
Recently, Branch re-launched his long-running podcast with a new focus: Male educators. In each episode, he talks to an educator about their views and experiences with education, or shares stories from his own years as a math teacher and assistant principal.
Find all the episodes in this Youtube playlist.
Dig In With A Documentary
Many people learned about the The Ever Forward Club when its work was featured in a documentary from The Representation Project called "The Mask You Live In," which premiered at the 2015 Sundance Film Festival. It’s a powerful film that’s has a lot of influence. Jonathan Reed, the Director of Programs at the Canadian nonprofit Next Gen Men, cites it as an inspiration:
“A few years before I started working with Next Gen Men, Jennifer Siebel Newsom created “The Mask You Live In,” and that was a really impactful film for me. I remember seeing Ashanti Branch, the facilitator of Ever Forward Club, doing the work that he was doing with boys and young men, and I was like, that's it—that's what I want to do.”
You can now stream the film on Kanopy.
Thanks for reading! And extra special thanks to those of you supporting Teen Health Today through a paid subscription to this Substack. The only reason that I’m able to devote so much time to this project is because of your generosity.
PS: Another way to support Teen Health Today is by purchasing books through our page on Bookshop.org, where we feature many of the books we’ve talked about in this newsletter.
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Yes more of this.
Loved reading about the details and the focus on heart work which definitely is needed.