The step team for Gentlemen of Vision, a mentoring program based out of North St. Louis County, won the National Disney Step Classic in Orlando, Florida on September 4, 2010. The African-American male students, largely from Riverview Gardens High School, placed first above 40 teams from the following states: California, Florida, Illinois, Texas, Maryland, South Carolina, and New Jersey.
The Gentlemen of Vision Rites of Passage Enterprises, Inc. is a predominantly
African-American male mentoring program founded by Marlon Wharton, a guidance
counselor at Riverview Gardens High School. The mentoring program consists of 35 African-American males from 9th grade to college. The program consists of many components ranging from stepping – a cultural combination of drill and dance coined by African-American fraternities and sororities – to counseling. The organization has yet to find a sponsor for the program that would provide a “home” for counseling, mentoring, and stepping. The group members practice in supporters’ basements, parking lots, and park pavilions.
“It seemed as if no one wanted to support a mentoring program for young
African-American males,” Wharton said. “With many doors slammed in their faces, the boys continued to practice harder.”
They won first place at the Regional Disney Step Championship in Nashville,
Tennessee in March 2010. And now they are national champions.
