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Our Team Christopher Yanov, Executive Director Christopher Yanov graduated from the University of California, San Diego in 1999 with a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science and Spanish Literature. Mr. Yanov also completed two Master's programs at the University of San Diego in 2004 with degrees in Peace & Justice and International Relations. Mr. Yanov spent two and a half years at each institution while completing his coursework. Mr. Yanov has worked with high school-aged youths at the Hispanic Presbyterian Church since 1996. For the first five years, the primary focus of Mr. Yanov's work involved reaching out to gang members who had fallen down a self-destructive path that was punctuated by drugs and violence. Seeking to find students that lived in these same tough neighborhoods yet had a strong desire to change these realities, "Reality Changers: Agentes de Cambio" was born in May 2001. During the past seven years, Reality Changers' 100 current students and 50 program graduates have earned over $3,000,000 in scholarships. Currently, Mr. Yanov is a recent graduate of LEAD San Diego and serves
on the board of directors for various scholarship-focused organizations.
In 2006, Mayor Jerry Sanders appointed Mr. Yanov to the newly-created
San Diego Commission on Gang Prevention and Intervention. In 2007, Mr. Yanov was named a Paul Harris Fellow by Rotary International. Jonathan Villafuerte, Solana Beach Site Director Jonathan Villafuerte currently attends Point Loma Nazarene University as a Psychology major. While graduating from James Madison High School in June 2005, Mr. Villafuerte also became the first graduate of Reality Changers to be named site director of a different program location. Mr. Villafuerte never missed a single activity as a Reality Changers
student, holding an unmatched perfect attendance record for three consecutive
years. At UCSD’s Academic Connections, he took classes on Ethics,
Morality, and Politics in 2004 and Robotics in 2003. The oft-quoted
Mr. Villafuerte is perhaps best known for saying, “Ask not what
Reality Changers can do for you, ask what you can do for Reality Changers.”
Direct Success is the official group of tutors for Reality Changers and has included an eclectic collection of volunteers, including college students, business persons, parents, mechanics, camp counselors, and even an Olympic athlete. Students currently attending UCSD can earn college credit towards a minor in Public Service by tutoring at Reality Changers. Responsibilities for the members of Direct Success include attending
the weekly three-hour program, making weekly contact with their students
outside of Reality Changers, and sending weekly written updates on their
students to the director. Each tutor is matched with an individual student
for an entire school year and there are numerous activities for tutors
to interact with all of the students in the program through various
activities sponsored by Reality Changers throughout the year. The 100 current students in Reality Changers attend over 40 different
schools throughout San Diego County. All students will be the first
persons in their families to attend college. The majority of the students
who enter Reality Changers raise their grade point average (GPA) by
at least one full grade point. Some of the greatest success stories
include students who have raised their GPA's from 0.0 to 3.5; 1.2 to
3.6; and a 1.9 to a 4.0 in just a single school year. Students have come from as far north as Oceanside, CA and as far south as Tijuana, Mexico to attend the Reality Changers program. In the summer of 2004, one student even decided to leave the negative influences that surrounded him in New York City and moved to San Diego with the specific intention of joining the positive influences that now surround him at Reality Changers. Over 85% of students at Reality Changers have attended college residential
programs before entering their senior year of high school. Thanks for making all of our programs possible! The Bravo Foundation - 760 740-6630
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