As a full-time student at Lesley, Sparks balanced weekend and night classes and his full-time job. To make it all work, Sparks used up all of his vacation and sick time as well as his work breaks. He later added his unpaid counseling internship to that, which was also at Rindge. Sparks would arrive in business clothes and leave in Dickies.
“There are few people like Jesse,” says Professor Dalia Llera, Sparks' advisor who first met Sparks when he interviewed for the counseling program. “He is a compassionate, selfless, strong and resilient individual who is determined to follow his dreams while offering pathways for youth to reach their own.”
Sparks kept up his grades, graduating with a cumulative 3.75 GPA, even though his “stress and anxiety were at an all-time high” while he studied, worked, and interned. Quitting wasn’t an option, though. Sparks dug into his counseling courses, taking the lessons to heart.
“I come from an environment where you don’t talk about your feelings because it’s seen as a weakness. Lesley started to break down that wall within me,” he says.
Sparks’ embarrassment also dissipated as he began to see himself as an example to kids who grew up in the projects like he did.
“I used it as a teaching tool for the students,” he says. “I told them sometimes you have to do things you don’t want to do to get to where you want.”
Sparks realized teenagers want to hear “I feel you” not “I feel for you.”
Like other students at Rindge, he has experienced setbacks. His father died when he was young; his stepfather was incarcerated for trafficking drugs; and all of his brothers have been arrested. Sparks was determined not to go down that path.
His life story gave him more credibility with students says Michael Tubinis, the Rindge guidance counselor who supervised Sparks during his internship.
“He is quite honest about how he got to where he was. It gave him an immediate ability to bond with the students,” Tubinis says.
During the internship, Sparks had a caseload of 30 students and also co-led a group of struggling junior boys with Tubinis. He called parents and worked with teachers, always displaying the positivity and energy needed for the job.
“He will be tremendous at this work. We need more people like him in the field – more people that have the positive energy and have lived some life,” Tubinis says.
Tweets and retweets
On May 20, Sparks' determination and hard work were rewarded when he accepted his diploma in front of thousands at Lesley’s commencement.
“It was a surreal moment because it had been a long journey for the past three years,” reflects Sparks.
When he tweeted out his accomplishment, it went viral in ways fledgling YouTubers only dream of. Sparks went to sleep with a few hundred likes, and he woke up to a dead phone – all of the notifications overnight had drained his battery. It’s been liked by nearly 70,000 people, and retweeted by 17,000.
He drew the attention of major news outlets and was featured in the Boston Globe and ABC News.
The newly minted counselor isn’t looking for more fame. Instead he’s spending the summer as the co-director of an academic enrichment program to prepare rising ninth graders for high school. He’s also looking to put his degree to work in a full-time guidance counselor position.
Sparks said he would like to go out of state to get more experience, but eventually wants to return to his hometown and even the high school where he’s already put in tons of sweat equity.
“Eventually I would love to be a guidance counselor there and come full circle."