Success Stories

Privacy issues prevent us from featuring many of the young people we have or are currently mentoring and offering non-traditional support. A few, however, have agreed to have aspects of their personal story shared on this website. Below are a few such success stories that are still unfolding.

At Risk Youth Finds Mentor and Resources to Graduate
from High School and Create and Exhibit his Art.

Curtis, a Hispanic and Native American teenager had been virtually homeless for much of his teenage years. In his senior year, when he learned he would not graduate from High School because of absenses, he found a mentor and resources to reclaim his life. Today he is serving in Americorp as a conservation team leader in Central Alaska where the photograph to the right was taken in April, 2005 (Read complete story)

Young Poet Published

Augustine spent years in the Youth Authority system for gang related activities survived tremendous neglect and abuse by writing poetry. Catalyst mentors helped him submit his work to LaRevista Magazine and he was published in the Spring of 2002. (Read some of his poems)

Writer Published in DeBug Magazine

Mike was twenty-two when he was arrested for graffiti for the first time. At twenty-three he wa incarcerated in the Santa Clara
County’s Work Furlow Program for drug use. During that time he found friends and mentoring in Catalyst and in the staff of DeBug Magazine: The voices of the young and temporary. When he was released, he enlisted in junior college and wrote two articles that were published in DeBug magazine. (Read articles)

Young Artist Exhibits His Work & Now Runs
Heart of Chaos Artisan Collective

Miquel, a 25 year old artist gets his second chance to exhibit his work at the Youth on Fire Exhibit and then goes on to show his work at other place in San José including in the Phantom Gallery program. Today he is a director on the board of WORKS/San Jose, a non profit art gallery in charge of the children and family workshop program and he is the newly appointed Assistant Director of the Heart of Chaos artisan collective. (Read story)

Talented Illustrator Turns His Life Around and Launches His Art Career
on the Heart of Chaos Website

Antonio, a 24 years old Hispanic male, has spent seven years of his life in San Quentin for gang related crimes. Throughout his life, a consistent thread was his interest in drawing. Antonio is a talented artist and illustrator who is now creating a new life with art at its center. His illustrations range from creating an elaborating design that was subsequently tatooed on his back to a series of portraits of rap artists created using only letterforms.

Young Woman Artist Gets a Hand Up to Continue Thriving.

One of Catalyst's mentorees, Tracy, was born to a single mother in the late sixties. When her mother eventually married, her new stepfather gave her his name. Although the marriage didn’t last, a second marriage would shape her path in definite and significant ways. Her new stepfather was a man named William Hyde. He was a writer, a gambler and an avid, if not careless, advocate of hallucinogens. Tracy left home at age 16 and joined the military to escape a home environment that continued to be unstable and detrimental to her emotionally and physically. In the military, however, she was almost killed in a car accident and was subsequently honorably discharged.

Returning home she found herself in the same environment that she had joined the military to escape. She decided to move to Hawaii. Struggling to survive without a formal education or training, she became a stripper and then a prostitute. The bleakness of her life on the streets and its lack of promise pushed her into a deep depression. In the midst of this dark night of the soul which lasted several years, she was introduced to Kung Fu. It was the light inside the dark. This martial art discipline restored some of her confidence and renewed her desire to be a painter. Today she is passionate about painting and enrolled as a graphic design student at Brooks college where she is meeting the challenge of becoming computer savvy and design literate with the help of a Catalyst mentor. Her curiosity (1969 year of the monkey) and thirst for knowledge continues to motivate her in school while her bold paintings (see Heart of Chaos artist list under Tracy) nourish the deeper threads of her creativity.