A year out of college, BryAnna Goslant of Danville mentors Lyndon Institute students for success

Back in the spring of 2022, VSAC profiled BryAnna Goslant of Danville , who was then a rising senior at Husson University, majoring in criminal justice, and gearing up for an internship with the Vermont Department of Corrections’ Probation and Parole Office in Newport. BryAnna was the first in her family to go to college, and she also overcame a serious infection as an infant that left her with painful hip dysplasia. Still, she played on multiple sports teams and was a leader at Danville High School. “She is a determined young woman,” says her former VSAC GEAR UP counselor, Patricia Turner.

BryAnna graduated from Husson in 2023, and she accepted a position earlier this year as a program assistant for the Lyndon Institute Upward Bound Program, which is a federally funded program to help students achieve the dream of achieving a four-year college degree. After facing some additional personal challenges in the last couple of years, BryAnna knows firsthand what it’s like to, as she says, “be dealt cards that aren’t the best,” and turn them into a winning hand.

Trauma and triumph

“My internship with Probation and Parole was an amazing experience. Everyone I worked with was phenomenal,” says BryAnna.

While she found the work fascinating and fulfilling, it was also challenging and triggering. Many of her clients were sex offenders.

“There’s one case that has stuck with me. I remember reading the affidavit, and I went on with the rest of my day, but when I got in my car to go home, I broke down and started bawling,” BryAnna recalls. “I never met the victim, but I still think about that child from time to time, and I wonder where they are now and what they’re going through.”

That summer was also an emotionally difficult one for BryAnna outside of work, with several deaths in her family and someone very close to her dying by suicide. Struggling with her grief, BryAnna admits she had a hard time.

When she returned to Husson for her senior year, academics provided a welcome focus. “I made the President’s List both semesters, and I was accepted into the Alpha Phi Sigma National Honor Society for criminal justice majors. That was a great feeling,” she says. “If you compare my transcripts from high school and college, you’ll see two totally different people. I wanted nothing to do with high school, and I excelled in college. I’m really proud of myself for that,” says BryAnna, attributing her college success to finding self-confidence in her academic abilities.

Fighting hard and coming out on top

After graduation, BryAnna had hoped to jumpstart a criminal justice career, but the traumatic events of the previous summer meant she had to take some time for herself. “I had put myself in a hole that I had to dig myself out of, which paused my career plans. Ultimately, I fought, and I came out successful,” she says.

For the short term, BryAnna took a job alongside her mother, who runs a motel in Danville that accepts housing vouchers for people experiencing homelessness. While she saw some rough situations, she was also inspired by many people who turned their lives around. “I met some really good people who happened to be struggling. Some had lost their jobs during the pandemic, and others were in recovery and getting back on their feet. One of my favorite things about working there was when people came in to tell us, ‘I just got an apartment.’ That was so rewarding.”

Working with her mom was a challenge, though—something both women readily admit. “We’re too much alike,” BryAnna says with a laugh. Her mom also told her that her time on the motel’s full-time payroll would be short. “She said, ‘I don’t want you working here forever.’ She was proud of what I’d accomplished,” says BryAnna.

Breaking out of the comfort zone

Once she was ready to look for a job on her own terms, a friend told her about the open position at Lyndon Institute’s Upward Bound program . While BryAnna remembered the program from her own high school years, she was only aware of it from a distance. “I didn’t do Upward Bound at the time. I didn’t want to be away from home,” she says.

So she went into the interview—and, ultimately, the job—with no prior firsthand experience, which was a major source of nerves for BryAnna. “I’m only 23, and when I walk into a high school, everyone thinks I’m a new student. I’m so close in age to these kids. I thought to myself, ‘Can I really do this?’”

At the same time, it piqued her curiosity. “Even after the first phone interview, something seemed so intriguing about working for Upward Bound. Now, I could cry talking about my students. I love them so much. I think of them as my younger brothers and sisters.”

BryAnna’s experience going through tough times, and her ability to be that “big-sister” mentor, has helped her make instant connections with her students, many of whom face significant challenges of their own. She enjoys being there for kids who need a friendly ear. “I’ve sat with kids while they cried, and I sat with a kid who wanted to drop out,” she recalls.

“BryAnna is a terrific role model and inspiration to students,” says VSAC’s Patricia Turner. “I was delighted when she told me she was working with Upward Bound.”

“What we do pays off”

Upward Bound’s official mission is to help first-generation students, like BryAnna, go on to college or other postsecondary training and prepare them for career success. “But I feel like there are also a lot of other underlying purposes to it,” says BryAnna. “Getting kids to step out of their comfort zone is one of the biggest ones. So they know, ‘I can do this.’”

This year’s Lyndon Institute Upward Bound summer program hosted 26 students, most of whom stayed on campus for the five-and-a-half-week program. They also took a multi-day trip to Boston, where they visited the aquarium, Fanueil Hall and Quincy Market, did a Duck Boat tour, and attended a Red Sox game. For many students, it was a rare (or even a first) trip outside Vermont, and an introduction to a “big city” where they might one day want to go to college.

“For many of them, just being away from home is the biggest adjustment,” says BryAnna. “A lot of what we work on is the social aspect. Kids rely so much on their phones now. They could be sitting across from each other at the same lunch table and texting each other. They don’t have phones at camp, so it forces them to have actual conversations, and to break out of their friend groups and converse with other people.” While all of the students knew each other before camp, they didn’t necessarily hang out together, BryAnna explains. “Seeing the cliques dissolve into one big group was incredible.”

Lyndon Institute’s Upward Bound program also extends through the academic year, when the program can accommodate 60 students, and the focus turns to more focused preparation for college applications. The program organizes college tours, one of which BryAnna will be leading this year, to visit her own alma mater, Husson University, as well as the University of Maine.

“Being able to give these students opportunities and watch them smile is the best part of this job,” BryAnna says. “It’s amazing to watch students come out of their shells. What we do pays off.”

This story is produced by Vermont Student Assistance Corp., created by the Vermont Legislature in 1965 as a public nonprofit agency, to advocate for Vermont students and their families to ensure that they achieve their education goals. Our vision is to create opportunities for all Vermont students, but particularly for those — of any age — who believe that the doors to higher education are closed to them. We begin by helping families save for education with Vermont’s state-sponsored 529 savings program. To help Vermonters plan and pay for college or career training, our counselors work with students in nearly every Vermont middle school and high school, and again as adults. Our grant and scholarship programs attract national recognition, and our loan programs and loan forgiveness programs are saving Vermont families thousands of dollars in interest. Visit vsac.org to learn more.

Read the story on VTDigger here: A year out of college, BryAnna Goslant of Danville mentors Lyndon Institute students for success .