ACE Mentor Program of Rochester

Congratulations to the amazing students who participated in the Community Parks Program this year! 🏞️ Students in this program learned about civil engineering, landscape architecture and urban planning over the course of the past few months, and had an opportunity to work on two exciting projects! 🛠️

Students began the year designing a community park for the Highlands Senior Living Community that catered to a multigenerational audience and included great features like benches, nature areas, and more! ⛲️

Later in the year, the teams partnered with Bridges for Brain Injury to design and built fun play and shelter structures for goats and alpacas! 🐐

All of the students had a great year and fantastic presentations, and a special congratulations to those who earned a scholarship or took voucher! We are very proud of you all and can’t wait to watch you succeed in the future. 🧑‍🎓

On Friday, March 27th we hosted our amazing annual ACE Mentor Program of Rochester Graduation Ceremony! This event was a celebration of the amazing work that the students in our three programs, Community Parks, Playhouse, and Trades, completed over the course of the past six months. 👏🏼

We had our largest group yet, with 83 students from 24 different Rochester-area schools as well as homeschooled students. This first post highlights overall celebrations, board member and ACE regional director speakers and fun celebration photos! 🧑‍🎓

We would also like to highlight our three William J Ketchen Emeritus Scholarship Award Winners: Brooklyn, Leeah, and Sahar. Congratulations to you all on a well-deserved award 🌟

As we excitedly prepare for our 2025-2026 ACE Mentor Program of Rochester Graduation Celebration this Friday, we want to sincerely thank all the amazing companies who sponsor our program and help students learn more about the Architecture, Construction, Engineering and Trades fields each year. We could not do this without your generous support, we are so thankful to each and every company on this list! 👏🏼❤️

This year we added the highly-requested Trades Program to our curriculum, focusing more in-depth on trades like carpentry, framing, electrical, plumbing, HVAC and more. Sixteen students from across the Rochester area meet weekly to learn new skills and work on hands-on projects, with support from industry professionals in the trades and related fields. 🔨

We are immensely thankful for the generous donation from Construction Industry Association of Rochester to the ACE Mentor Program of Rochester to help the Trades Program come to fruition. The funds help offset the cost of building materials, space for training and tool vouchers for select students awarded at our graduation later this month. 🏆

It is partnerships like these that help make our program such a beneficial resource for the next generation of young professionals in the ACE industry. Thank you, Construction Industry Association of Rochester! 👏🏼

We are thrilled to invite you to our annual ACE Mentor Program of Rochester Graduation Ceremony on Friday, March 27th! 🎓 Students, Families, Mentors, and Industry Professionals are welcome to join us at the Memorial Art Gallery for an incredible night full of student presentations, awards, scholarships and celebrations! ✨ This event is entirely free, but donations are always graciously appreciated. All proceeds from donations and 50% of the 50/50 Raffle will go directly back to the program for the following year! We hope you can join us, see you all in a few weeks! 🎉

Thank you Local 276 for hosting one of the most fun events of the year - the Metal Stud Framing Competition! Students loved the hands-on competition and learned so much from the volunteers - thank you to the following companies who participated (Grayco Corporation, , and RW Dake) and congratulations to the Davis Fetch Corp. who came in 1st place! 🏆🛠️

We are so excited to share the Winter 2025 Issue of the ACE Mentor Program of Rochester Newsletter! 🗞️

Our three programs - Trades, Playhouse and Community Parks - are full of amazing students from all over the Rochester area who have been hopping right into hands-on learning and activities over the past few months, supported by industry professionals who serve as mentors to the students. 👷🏼‍♀️🛠️

Check out the photos, program updates, Q+A’s and more in this edition of our newsletter and comment below what aspect of our program you love the most! 🌟🫶🏼

📣 Calling all ACE Mentor Program students, parents, mentors, sponsors, alumni, and friends! 📣

Please consider supporting our program by purchasing a meal at Chipotle on Saturday, November 8th from 5-9 pm at the West Ridge Road location! 🌯

25% of the sales from this fundraiser will be donated to our program - please come out and support! 🙌🏼

Today is ACE Day of Action - a chance to spotlight the impact of our program and to celebrate the amazing students, mentors and sponsors who help our mission!

Since our inception over 17 years ago, more than 500 students have benefitted from the ACE Mentor Program of Rochester. So many have gone on to pursue an ACE-related field, with some coming back to serve as mentors as a way to pay it forward to the next generation!

Last year alone we were able to award $40,000 in scholarships towards higher education and trade programs, and continue to support students through internship programs as well.

This program is not possible without the support of our community, especially including sponsorship from the leading ACE companies in the Rochester area and mentoring by amazing professionals in the industry.

Check out some photos from our past year and reach out to us via email if you’d like to join this incredibly rewarding and impactful program! 👷🏼‍♀️🛠️🎓

📣🎉 TWO WEEKS AWAY! 🦺🛠️

Students, Parents, Teachers and Mentors are invited to join us on Wednesday, September 10th from 6-7 pm to learn about the ACE Mentor Program of Rochester and the 3 Program Offerings: Playhouse, Community Parks and new this year: Trades!

Visit us at Colliers Engineering and Design right in Downtown Rochester and meet our President and other ACE Mentors, we are so excited to meet you and have new and returning students in our programs!