Inside the Inner Harbor’s Colwell Center, Sarah Sterinbach is demonstrating how to use a pipette, a hand-held device that functions similarly to an eyedropper, but for use in scientific experiments. As she lifts it up and holds it vertically in her right hand, 30 high school juniors wearing lab coats and sterile disposable gloves do the same.

“Press the plunger down to the first stop,” instructs Sterinbach, a recent University of Pennsylvania grad and current Chesapeake Conservation and Climate Corps fellow. “Do you feel that? Okay, push the plunger down all the way. That’s the second stop. That’s going to expel all the liquid.”

Earlier in the morning, the students—visiting the Towson University Center for STEM Excellence through an education nonprofit called Building STEPS—learned about bioluminescence organisms, particularly bacteria sea life that produce and emit a “glowing” light. (Fireflies, as one student noted, are an example of non-sea life that produce bioluminescence light.)

Sterinbach explained how bioluminescence bacteria are used to detect and measure the impact of pollution. In basic terms, they are a reliable, relatively low-cost means of monitoring aquatic samples that may contain toxicants such as PCBS, pesticides, motor oil, diesel fuel, fertilizer, alcohol, etc.

The room had gone hush when Sterinbach turned off the lights and gently shook and lifted up a green glowing jar of bacteria in clean water. If the jar had not glowed, she’d noted, it would indicate no surviving bioluminescence bacteria—and thus contaminated water.

With an outline, the students, all from Baltimore City Public Schools, designed experiments to test potential contaminants and their impact on water purity—using their pipettes in the lab to place H2O, bioluminescence bacteria, and various liquid elements into test tubes.

“The motor oil and water didn’t mix,” a Digital Harbor student pointed out in the lab. “So there’s no glow near the oil, which is at the top of the test tube. But at the bottom, in the water, you can still see the glow of bacteria.”

The diesel fuel, his Dunbar High partner added, had mixed more completely with the water and killed nearly all the bacteria.

“Thinking through and designing an experiment, with all the protocols, is not easy stuff,” says Mary Stapleton, the director of bioscience education and outreach at TU’s STEM Center, who was suitably impressed by the students’ engagement and effort on this weekday excursion. “This is a college-level lab. It’s not something that I was doing at their age, and I have a Ph.D.”

Founded by Matthew Weinberg, president of regulatory sciences at the ProPharma Group, to address a lack of diversity in the science and technology fields, Building STEPS helps underrepresented local students graduate from college and ultimately become STEM professionals.

The program has evolved over the years, but it works like this: Building STEPS partners with Baltimore City Public Schools to identify motivated, high-achieving students in the 10th grade from resource-challenged schools and backgrounds.

After an initial application and get-acquainted process, they introduce the students in their junior year to science and technology professionals through seminar days trips to local hospitals, health and tech start-ups, research facilities like TU’s STEM Center, and campus visits, encouraging students to envision possible college and career paths. (Building STEPS offices are situated at Towson University.)

When each annual cohort of 80-100 students enters their senior year, the nonprofit assists them with college applications and financial-aid forms. The vast majority of each cohort—a remarkable 80 percent—become not just the first in their family to attend a four-year college, but to graduate, in good part because Building STEPS maintains its connection to students after they arrive on campus. They do regular in-person check-ins for in-state college students, find tutors if needed, and assist with academic and financial guidance throughout their matriculation.

One-third graduate with STEM or health care degrees and one-fourth go on to earn an advanced degree. After college, an ever-growing alumni network helps maintain those bonds when students enter the working world. When you look at the numbers, the program’s success is striking.

“The data shows that [only] six percent of students from the city high schools that we partner with go on to earn a four year college degree—it’s a little higher system-wide, eight percent, when you include schools like City College, School for the Arts, Western, Poly,” says chief executive officer Debra Hettleman, who has been with Building STEPS from the start.

A REMARKBLE 80 PERCENT BECOME THE FIRST IN THEIR FAMILY TO GRADUATE FROM COLLEGE.

The organization began by helping high schoolers find in internships, but quickly realized they needed to intercede earlier and more directly and maintain connections through college and beyond if they were going to make a real difference.

“Our students are essentially going through this process and going to college alone, even though they are generally going to college in-state,” Hettleman says. “We want to help them build community once they get to college. And, initially at least, that community is previous Building STEPS students already on campus, who are now upperclassmen.”

She adds that Building STEPS also has students who attend college outside Maryland, which the staff keeps tabs on virtually, but she believes it’s more supportive if a peer does some of the checking in. “It’s a developmental opportunity for the upperclassmen who do the relationship-building and mentoring, too,” Hettleman says.

In fact, the week prior to the students’ lab experience at TU’s STEM Center, Building STEPS’s current class of high school seniors met with staff, volunteer professionals, and Building STEPS college students to work on their financial aid and college applications and essays.

Seated in a first-floor conference room at the West Village Commons on Towson’s campus, the seniors worked on their. financial aid applications on their Building STEPS-provided laptops. Afterward, they moved to an upstairs conference room for one-on-one Zoom sessions with their essay tutor.

In its 25th year, Building STEPS now has a network of 150 volunteer professionals available to assist students. Among those on hand to support the seniors were De’Mon Kess, an Edmondson High grad now in ROTC and studying biology and premed at Morgan State, and Tavon Mitchell, a Patterson High grad in graduate school at the University of Maryland College Park.

Kess had initially attended the University of Maryland Eastern Shore, but got homesick and returned to Baltimore, taking a year off before restarting his education at Morgan. Taking a year off and transferring schools is the kind of interruption that can sometimes derail a first-generation college student, but Building STEPS maintained contact with Kess through the process, after helping plant a seed about a career in health care.

“Applying to Building STEPS in high school just opened doors for me,” says Kess, who recently began working part-time for the organization as well. “They got me an internship in high school with a radiation oncologist, and seeing what they do day-to-day, interacting with patients, made me realize I’d like to be in a career where I help people, too.”

Mitchell, who earned a Bachelor of Science degree in Kinesiology at Maryland before getting accepted into the school’s Master of Public Health program, says field trips to TU’s STEM Center and elsewhere inspired him in high school. At the University of Maryland, Building STEPS alums served as role models, a role he now embraces.

“They help with everything in the college process,” says Mitchell, also a first-generation college graduate. “They help with the financial aid part. All of my undergraduate degree and 95 percent of my graduate program has been free [nearly all Building STEPS students qualify for Pell Grants]. They help you work out a daily schedule, set aside study times, college advising. You’re not on your own.”

The overwhelming majority of Building STEPS are first-generation college students like Kess and Mitchell, which makes their success rate with students from some of the city’s most challenging neighborhoods all the more remarkable.

According to the Pew Research Center, students who have at least one college-educated parent are far more likely to complete college than those with parents with less formal education (70 percent to 26 percent). To put it another way, Building STEPS’s first-generation students are three times more. likely than first-generation students nationally to graduate within six years.

While college is not for everyone and a degree is not needed for every career, the wage gap between high school and college graduates has been widening for 40 years. And it climbed significantly last year, per data from the Federal Reserve Bank of New York.

The median wage for a recent college graduate in 2023 shot to its highest mark, $60,000. The median wage for high school graduates grew as well, but only to $36,000. The gap in career earnings grows even wider with those who earn graduate degrees. According to the Social Security Administration, men with graduate degrees earn a median of $1.5 million more throughout their lifetime than high school graduates. Women with graduate degrees earn $1.1 million more.

After a quarter-century equipping students for college success, there have been plenty of full-circle moments for the nonprofit. Asia Cole, for example, who earned a Bachelor of Science degree in Speech Pathology from Towson University after graduating from Digital Harbor High in 2014, came back to Building STEPS five years ago and now serves as the nonprofit’s hands-on director of outreach and engagement.

“I was definitely a nerdy, teachers-favorite-type student in school with a lot of interests,” Cole says with a smile. “I was interested in the sciences, health profession, that type of stuff, and working with Building STEPS, in an indirect way, is still working in the area. For me, my mother and father didn’t go to college, my father did not graduate from high school, so we had a lot of learning to do.

“My grandmother was a big motivator for me,” Cole continues. “She never wanted me to settle for less than what she knew I could achieve, and first learning about Building STEPS and getting that support that I needed through the college process really made a difference in where I ended up after high school.”

The biggest full-circle moment, however, is still a work-in-progress, but scheduled for completion the fall of 2026.

Deon Avery was one of the students in Building STEPS’s very first cohorts. “I was just a little Black girl from Southwest Baltimore. My father had died when I was three and I was raised by a single mom in a low-income community,” the former Baltimore City assistant principal and Washington, D.C., school principal explains. “If you look at the statistics, the odds were against me, but programs like Building STEPS showed me the possibilities for what I could build my life into. I still remember going to a technology company and learning about all the different types of engineers there. And going to another company and meeting graphics designers and artists at work. I did not know jobs like that existed. It motivated me to forge forward and to just try.”

Ultimately, she focused on education, the importance of which came to mean so much to her. She eventually earned a Ph.D. in Education and is now working to bring the first Montessori high school to Baltimore and will serve as the Charm City Garden Montessori School’s principal when it opens for the 2026-27 academic year.

“We’re looking at the southwest side of Baltimore, specifically the Saint Joseph neighborhood where I grew up. It’s a long process to put in the application and get the building deal done, so we are working on those things, but that is the community where we would like to open our doors.”

In the meantime, Avery has another pressing issue. Her daughter is in 12th grade at Western School of Technology & Science and planning her future.

“She’s 17 and she is on her way to college and we’re enjoying receiving all of the college acceptances and the award letters,” Avery says. “We’re just waiting to get all of them so we can make a final decision about where she’ll attend.”

Tonee Lawson takes the phrase “knowledge is power” to heart. And she believes every kid deserves the same opportunity to be successful.

How to make that happen? In 2014, at age 27, she founded The Be. Organization to empower Baltimore’s youth to live above their socially imposed limitations, and, later, to achieve excellence in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM).

“The name The Be. is an open-ended statement that you have the opportunity to shape your future,” Lawson says. “You can be amazing—you can be anything you want to be. We come in and give you the enrichment, push you over the hump to make sure you’re not leaving any potential untapped.”

The Prince George’s County native never intended to enter the nonprofit world. It was a passion she first nurtured when she accompanied her grandmother on community service missions, then during her time at Towson University, when she served as program coordinator for her sorority’s Emerging Young Leaders Initiative.

However, as a self-professed science nerd with multiple degrees in molecular biology, biochemistry, and biotechnology, she always imagined her career taking place in a lab. And it did, originally—yet she was missing that social connection. As executive director of The Be., being able to use her STEM experience in an educational capacity is the best of both worlds. Operating out of various schools—though the goal is to have their own building in the near future—Lawson and a team of three staff members provide creative workshops, an enrichment curriculum, and youth conferences focused on life skills and STEM teachings.

“The kids are so filled with love, creativity, and resiliency. I end up learning more from them than they learn from me,” Lawson says. “They pour their heart into their work. They don’t know how talented they are until they’re challenged, until they have someone make real-world applications.”

Lawson lives for the moments she sees those connections happen—“You can see it in their eyes, like, ‘Oh, this is what my teacher was talking about.’”

The Food Playground is one initiative where these connections take place regularly. It takes science skills from school to create fun experiments in the kitchen, where the students make everything from ice cream to salad vinaigrettes. After participating in Be. programs, surveys show that student confidence and interest level in STEM careers “skyrocket.” It warms Lawson’s heart to hear from parents that The. Be programs have given their child a boost.

“There’s a girl who came to us as a shy sixth-grader and is now such a strong leader. It’s so exciting to see her blossom and open up, and to know we had a role to play in her growth,” Lawson says. “I see this growth all the time, and it keeps me going.”

By coupling social-emotional learning with STEM skills, Lawson hopes to give participants a leg up so that they’re well-rounded, exposed to new experiences, and able to create a path of long-term success. But Lawson’s ongoing commitment to bringing additional resources to her students has opened her eyes to the disparity that exists for Black-led organizations in the funding world.

“It’s tough to fight a battle of equity and have people understand that yes, Black kids can code, they can understand STEM, they deserve the same resources,” she says. “So many of our kids need laptops, they need Wi-Fi, those aren’t staples in every house. We’re not asking for handouts—just the same opportunity for them to be successful.”

CH-CH CHANGES

STEM: It’s going to be a big year for Urban Pastoral—the local development firm that specializes in high-tech urban farming. In the coming months, founders J.J. Reidy and Christian De Paco are planning to unveil 3,000 square feet of hydroponic greenhouse space inside a new learning center at Green Street Academy in West Baltimore. Once it’s up and running, the project will not only serve as an educational tool for students, but it will also provide an estimated 25,000 pounds of leafy greens per year to local restaurants. The produce will certainly come in handy for STEM, the newly rebranded iteration of Reidy and De Paco’s Stall 11 inside R. House in Remington.

Beginning this Sunday, January 12, the plant-based eatery will feature a redesigned counter experience, DIY bowls and salads, and a rotating roster of seasonal items. Although there will be many new options, Stall 11 regulars will be happy to hear that favorites including the Korean barbecue cauliflower, vegan mac and cheese, and avocado BLT will remain on the menu. “R. House was created as a launchpad for food entrepreneurs, and this is the evolution of our business and vision,” Reidy said in a statement. “After three amazing years with Stall 11 at R. House, it was time for a change in concept. . .We can’t wait for Baltimore to meet STEM and to share more of the delicious plant-based dishes that we know will become new favorites.”

Friends and Family: Speaking of rebrands—and vegan and vegetarian options—Fells Point mainstay Sticky Rice is closing its doors on Tuesday, January 21 with plans to reopen as Friends and Family in March. Known for its sushi, tater tots, and wide array of plant-based options, the restaurant will soon transition into a breakfast-all-day concept that maintains its emphasis on vegan and vegetarian dishes. “As we settled into our tenth year of business, we have determined it is time to retire the current concept and expand on our core principles,” managing partner Ginny Lawhorn, who will remain at the helm of the bar program, said in a statement.

Slated construction plans include renovated bathrooms, the removal of the large sushi bar to make way for more communal seating, and Lawhorn’s curated installation of artwork by—you guessed it—friends and family of the business. The new name was also inspired by the building’s former inhabitant, Friends—which Lawhorn and her husband, owner Ronnie Pasztor, describe as a cozy neighborhood dive bar. “Friends was a local favorite driven by comradery,” Lawhorn says. “Sticky Rice built on that comradery with an inclusive menu and welcoming team. We are looking forward to expanding on these pillars and cultivating our place in the community.”

Cunningham’s: Yet another dining destination starting the decade with a refresh is this Towson hotspot, which closed its doors earlier this week. The farm-to-table restaurant will reopen this spring after a major redesign by Patrick Sutton and the expansion of its downstairs cafe. Executive chef Jay Rohlfing tells us that the decision was influenced, in part, by all of the retail and residential development happening in Towson. “We figured it was time to be part of that renaissance,” he says. Though details about the new concept are still in the works, Rohlfing confirms that the locally sourced menu will emphasize American classics and the dining space will be downsized to include more bar seating. Read more here.

OPEN

Rooster & Hen: Just when we thought Cross Street Market had everything we could ever want (from pizza and beer to pho and Haitian cuisine), the newly renovated Federal Hill staple now boasts its own mini grocery store. Located just off of the Light Street entrance, the new “market within the market” offers a selection of produce, flowers, dairy, snacks, baked goods, and prepared foods for diners to grab on the go. Husband-and-wife owners Joe McRedmond and Allison Smith, who started Rooster & Hen in Catonsville in 2016, will also use their new space to continue Lucky Pantry—the store’s home meal kit program that now offers pick-up at the market every Monday. The new space also features a full kitchen for the owners to host food pop-ups, cooking classes, and other programs that contribute to their community-focused mantra.

The Veranda at The Milton Inn: Executive chef Brian Boston has launched an extension of this fine-dining den in Sparks. What was previously the outdoor patio is now The Veranda, an enclosed lounge highlighting a stone fireplace and retractable roof for the warmer months. It will also be a venue for live jazz and feature its own menu of drinks and small plates including crabmeat cocktail, charcuterie samples, and deconstructed s’mores that diners can roast at their tables.

Debra E. Hettleman’s goal is to be so successful that she’ll work herself out of a job.

She’s CEO of Building STEPS, a program that’s been in Baltimore for
20 years and identifies about 100 high school juniors annually from 15 Baltimore City public schools who have an interest
in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM). It provides field trips, workshops, seminars, summer programs, in-person visits, and other resources as students apply to and attend college, then enter the workforce.

“I’d like Building STEPS to not be necessary,” Hettleman says. “I would like our education system to be so strong that the kids would get all the exposure and support they need through school.” But until we live in that world, she sees the program as “a replicable model propelling students across the country to college and career success.”

“For many reasons, our students may have barriers to doing this,” Hettleman says. “We have a case where a student lives in foster care, and between applying to college and August registration, they moved. They left their paperwork at the original foster house. So, they’re thinking, ‘Now what do I do? I guess I’m not going to go because I don’t have the paperwork.’ But we’re constantly following up. We know when a problem comes up, and we can help the student navigate it.”

Building STEPS students stay in Maryland, allowing team representatives
to visit, forward them care packages, and send them a weekly video of college or professional development tips. As students progress, they receive advice on workplace dynamics, timeliness, workplace body language, how to make small talk, and other soft skills that might not have been available to them in high school.

Eighteen years of Building STEPS alumni, the first of whom are now in their mid-thirties and many of whom have gone on to find STEM careers in Maryland, now offer internships and other opportunities to current Building STEPS students, creating something of a self-sustaining support system.

The program’s 20th anniversary last year gave graduates the chance to reflect, with one writing to Hettleman, “Building STEPS helped me see outside the four walls of high schools and set me up with tools for college.”

Another wrote, “Having exposure to different aspects of the sciences was awesome and made me want to pursue a PhD.”

“I couldn’t write that,” Hettleman says. “That’s the whole purpose, right there. They stick with us, and we stick with them.”

“I’ve always wanted to go skydiving,” I assure myself as I anxiously enter a 60-foot-tall flight chamber in a floppy blue jumpsuit, goggles, and helmet. Next thing you know, I’m hovering a few meters off the ground, my body floating untethered and aimless inside what looks like a giant test tube. Within a few seconds, my stomach stops doing somersaults. My fear eases. I am defying gravity.

At iFLY Baltimore, anyone can feel that same sensation—of letting go and soaring upwards. Since August 2016, patrons from ages three to 103 have been able to experience the feeling of a free fall at this White Marsh center, the sole Maryland branch for the global indoor-skydiving chain.

From the get-go, “Baltimore embraced the idea of something new and adventurous,” says lead instructor Kris Reynolds. Adds sales coordinator Katie Tillman, “People would drive by on I-95 and come in asking, ‘Where do you jump from?’”

But fliers don’t jump from anything—they simply watch a quick instructional video, go over the required hand signals, gear up, step into the chamber, and lean into a smooth column of air generated by vertical wind tunnel technology and adjusted to the individual’s weight and skill level with the help of a certified instructor.

iFLY offers packages for both beginners and pros. There are also Flight School programs for kids, STEM field trip options, and weekly events such as “All Abilities Night” for fliers with special needs and “Tunnel Thursdays” for experienced skydivers. Even college students can float, thanks to a new discount program for scholars.

Skydiving is an expensive hobby, “but tunnel flying is like going to the bowling alley—you can go do it right now,” says Reynolds, as first-time flights at iFLY cost less than $70, compared to a tandem skydive’s $250. “After all,” adds general manager Brandon McMann, “our mission is delivering the dream of flight to everyone.”

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Fly on the Wall
Writer Micah Costelo steps inside the chamber to try iFLY for herself.

As Baltimoreans, we all can agree that Domino Sugar is out-of-this-world good, and as of today, it literally will be. Three pounds of the sweet, Baltimore-refined crystals, along with three pounds of the California-based C&H Sugar, will be heading to the International Space Station (ISS) as part of an experiment conducted by NASA.

The SpaceX Dragon Falcon 9 spacecraft launched from the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida at 11:46 a.m. today carrying 4,800 pounds of research—sugar included—crew supplies, and hardware. Once the sugar reaches the ISS, astronauts will use it to grow crystals in zero gravity. This experiment will test the differences between growing sugar on Earth and in space and allows for students to get in on the research.

“We support educational STEM programs at schools around the country,” Brian O’Malley, CEO of Domino Foods, said in a statement. “We were thrilled when we were approached with this inventive program that uses our sugar products in a unique way to inspire young students to engage with and learn about science.”   

The Crystal Growth Experiment, as the project is known, was designed by space-related STEM organizations DreamUp, NanoRacks, and Xtronaut. It will teach students about the process of nucleation and crystallization in which sugar molecules in a saturated solution bond together and grow into the hard candy treat.

Domino Sugar and C&H Sugar, both part of ASR Group sugar refiners, each donated $25,000 to the Kickstarter campaign to jumpstart the effort. Due to the generous donation, both sugar makers will be the test subjects in the research for both the NASA astronauts and local students.

Down the street from Domino, students at Francis Scott Key Elementary/Middle School will be participating in the experiment by using “Crystals in Space” kits that were developed specifically for this experiment.

“When I told my pre-k students that I got an exciting email from Domino Sugar, their eyes lit up,” says Francis Scott Key teacher Ashley Demski. “[They said] ‘Ms. Demski, I pass Domino on the way to school. I can see the sign from my house!’ We do so many activities that come from kits based out of other parts of the country, so this is going to be especially meaningful for our Baltimore kids.”

She adds that she is anxious to see the results and introduce the kits to other students in the school.

“If my 4-year-olds were that excited, I can only imagine how our older students are going to respond,” she says. “STEM is right in our backyard.”

Known for its annual, sold-out Black & White party, the Pratt Contemporaries is more than just an organization that throws a great shindig. The nonprofit, now in its 10th year, has raised more than  $1 million for child and teen literacy programs at the Enoch Pratt Free Library since its inception.

Over a decade ago, library members under the direction of Carla Hayden approached two volunteers, Kate Powell and Chris Espenshade, to create an organization that would bring young donors into the library.

“At the time, I really didn’t know what that was going to look like,” said Powell, who is now the co-founder of Pratt Contemporaries. “We didn’t know each other. We’ve become best friends since, which has been such a perk of this whole thing.”

The two women began the process by forming a committee of 12, including former director of communications Roswell Encina, who was also instrumental in getting the group started. At that first meeting—held at the former Red Maple space in Mt. Vernon—the committee decided that individuals could purchase a membership for just $40, and have access to the library’s events throughout the year.

“The idea behind it was to engage younger people to have them learn about the library,” Powell said. “There’s this huge gap in time when people use the library. So part of the mission was to get people in their 20s, 30s, and 40s to just use the library.”

At this year’s annual meeting, held on June 1, Pratt Contemporaries unveiled its new logo and awarded $180,000 to 12 different literacy and improvement initiatives for the Enoch Pratt Free Library.

But deciding which specific programs to fund is never an easy task, according to board chair Jacob Hodes. The board tasks the librarians at each branch to come up with a list of programs that would be beneficial to the patrons and then Pratt Contemporaries members vote town-hall style.

“It’s like choosing your favorite child—they are all great programs,” Hodes said. “You can’t fund everything, there are a limited amount of dollars in every budget.”

Ned Courtemanche, board vice chair of Pratt Contemporaries, said that no matter what programs are chosen, they are making a tangible impact for the community.

“Personally, I always love STEM program funding,” Courtemanche said. “The second one always surprises me, because it’s so important but you don’t think about, is money for transportation. It’s something that is surprisingly expensive.”

One of the greatest obstacles for the library is actually getting students to the locations. For the 2018 year, $27,500 will be allocated to provide free buses to solve that problem. The STEM program—focusing on science, technology, engineering, and math education—will receive $20,000 for year-round programming, another $25,000 will go towards branch improvements, and a whopping $50,000 is reserved to go towards the renovation campaign of the central branch on Cathedral Street.

“The Pratt Contemporaries mission is to bring people into the library that wouldn’t otherwise come,” Hodes explained. “We want people to really see the benefits, learn about the programs, and really become ambassadors of all the great things that Pratt is doing.”

Over the years, that initial committee of 12 became a board of 18, and the Pratt Contemporaries now has more than 300 members. Members pay dues depending on their level and also get special perks, like first dibs on tickets to the famed Black & White Party every January.

“The party has really been the leader on the membership side. Becoming a member is really the only way to guarantee a ticket,” Hodes said. “We’re lucky that it’s a nimble way that we can raise funds and capital for the library.”

When Powell and Espenshade began this endeavor, they never imagined it would blossom into what it is now. Powell said that she is pleased with the direction the organization has taken and is excited to see what the future holds.

“Chris and I have really stepped back from being a part of the leadership. We are just members now,” Powell said. “The coolest thing about starting something is when you can leave it in really good hands and watch it continue to grow. It’s incredible.”

On July 1, Hodes will pass the baton over to Courtemanche and he will begin his leadership role as board chair. His goal for the group hasn’t wavered from a decade ago—to empower young professionals to get involved with the progression of the city.

“We can always remind people that the library is not just the responsibility of the city,” Courtemanche said. “The people of Baltimore really have to step up and make sure we take care of something that is essential to the growth of Baltimore.”