Every year the Breakthrough Minneapolis at Blake (BMB) program is given a six-letter word that grounds the work teachers and students do together. As we wrapped up the 2025-26 year earlier this month, we officially closed out the year of Eunoia. A Greek word meaning “beautiful thinking,” Eunoia highlighted our focus on academic excellence, goodwill and positive thinking.

Over this last year, 20 college students, 13 Blake Upper School students and four high school-aged program alumni taught, mentored and inspired 83 BMB scholars (grades 7-10). It was a year filled with fun, friends and community, as you can see by the word cloud that was generated from scholars who were asked to describe BMB. The larger the word, the more scholars said it.

BMB intentionally embeds fun into programming, but we also always keep our eye on the goal of supporting students’ academic progress on their path to college. We are proud to share that our laser focus on our mission can be seen in our results. For instance, during summer 2025, 94% of students made academic progress in reading and/or math, ensuring our scholars were well positioned to succeed in the upcoming school year. Additionally, with our long-term goal of college access, we are so excited to report 90% of the class of 2025 enrolled in college immediately following graduation. This is far above Minneapolis Public School’s rate of 72.8%.

We can’t wait to kick off the 2026-27 program year in June, when we will once again have the opportunity to support Minneapolis students as they strive to reach their full potential.