Editor’s note: This is the third installment in a series about Big Brothers Big Sisters of South-Central PA, which is Harrisburg Magazine’s Charity of Choice through 2026.
During January, when the calendar turns to a new year and resolutions are still fresh, Pennsylvania’s Capitol glows green in recognition of National Mentoring Month.
It’s a quiet signal, easy to miss if you aren’t looking for it. But for people who understand the power of showing up for a young person, it means everything. Mentorship doesn’t always announce itself loudly. Often, it works in small, steady ways, changing lives not through grand gestures, but through consistency, patience and care.
It’s also why Amy Rote, president and CEO of Big Brothers Big Sisters of South-Central PA, immediately thought of one volunteer when planning how to represent the organization to Harrisburg Magazine readers during January: Angela Wiley.
Wiley, she explained, has been connected to the agency’s mission for years as a Big Sister and as someone who has supported Big Brothers Big Sisters through its Values to Action Committee. “She believes in the power of mentorship in everything that she does, so to represent us for National Mentoring Month in January, I thought it would be a perfect fit,” Rote said.
For Wiley, mentoring isn’t a concept or a campaign. It’s a way of life.
“I’m just a nobody, really,” she says, waving off attention with a laugh before quickly trying to stop the comment from being written down. But spend even a short amount of time listening to her talk about the girls she mentors, and it becomes clear that “nobody” is the last word that applies.
Wiley, principal project manager at Members 1st Federal Credit Union, has more than 25 years of experience in the IT field. She’s also a Central Dauphin graduate, a mother and grandmother – and a woman shaped by the generosity of others long before she ever thought of becoming a mentor herself.
That story begins with her own childhood.
Wiley grew up as the daughter of a teenage parent. Her mother, Cynthia Braddy, raised three children on limited resources, navigating life on a fixed income without fanfare or complaint. There was no spotlight on struggle, no public request for help. What Wiley remembers most isn’t hardship itself, but the people who quietly stepped in.
“I didn’t have formal mentors,” she said. “But I remember my mother’s co-workers. They would do things for us. They would take up collections. I remember Christmastime oftentimes, because my mom was on a fixed income, very limited resources.”
Sometimes, on Christmas morning, a bag of toys would simply appear on their doorstep – no note, no explanation, no expectation of thanks.
“My mom knew nothing about it,” Wiley said. “It wasn’t like she was broadcasting that resources were tight. It was just the heart of those people around her who loved her and knew that she had three little kids.”
Those moments stayed with her. They didn’t feel transactional or performative. They felt like care. Over time, they fostered a spirit in her that kept growing.
“That sort of lit the spark for me about the importance of seeing others and giving back,” she said.
Wiley carried that lesson into adulthood, building a demanding career in IT project management, a field she describes as fast-paced and notably short on women who look like her.
“In this profession, there are not very many females, and not very many minority females,” she said. “You blink and what you do today changes tomorrow.”
But success in her professional life only sharpened her sense of responsibility to reach back.
“Given the fact that I know there are not many people that look like me in this field, that further gave me the motivation to try to give back and teach young girls to look at other career paths than their traditional ones,” Wiley said. “To be that tangible, real-world example of it is possible.”
Her own journey wasn’t conventional. College wasn’t immediately accessible after high school. She worked. She navigated. She figured things out as she went.
“Coming from a background where you didn’t have a lot of resources, and I’m extremely successful,” she said. “That matters.”
Rote says the organization’s role is to make sure mentors understand what saying “yes” to Big Brothers Big Sisters really entails – and to support them as life inevitably changes.
“We say ‘it takes little to be big’ in our program,” Rote said, “because it just takes a little bit of time to make a big impact with a young person.”
But “little,” she added, doesn’t mean casual.
“It is a commitment that they’re there for them – to actively listen at any time,” she said. “You might get a text from them in the evening. (You’re) there for them to navigate challenges. And that’s not always easy.”
Wiley’s match began during the isolation of the COVID-19 pandemic. An email circulated through her workplace listing volunteer opportunities. Big Brothers Big Sisters was one of them. At the same time, Wiley found herself in a new season of life.
“I was an empty nester,” she said. “My kids are gone. I’ve got grandkids. And I was, like, I need some babies around me.”
She reached out, completed the training and was matched with a Little – a young girl who also had a sister. Almost immediately, Wiley knew she couldn’t separate them.
“I was like, ‘Well, I’m not going to just pick up the one and leave the other one at home,’” she said.
Through another Big Brothers Big Sisters initiative, Beyond School Walls, Wiley began mentoring middle school students monthly at the Whitaker Center, focusing on career exposure and professional skills. It was there she met and bonded with Hevan – a quiet, unfocused eighth-grader who didn’t yet see a reason to care much about school or what came next.
When the program ended, Hevan asked to continue the relationship. With the support of Big Brothers Big Sisters and Hevan’s mother, Wiley’s role shifted into a traditional match.
“She didn’t want to let me go,” Wiley said.
Today, Wiley mentors three girls: Hevan, now a high school senior; SaNaa, who was 8 when Wiley first met her; and her sister, Serenity, who was just 6.
“They’re my babies,” Wiley said simply. “My girls.”
From the beginning, the relationships felt natural and steady.
“Our relationship started off great from Day 1 and has not wavered,” she said. “We are family.”
That sense of family extends beyond Wiley and the girls. Their mothers, both single parents, are active partners in the relationship.
“There’s no intimidation factor,” Wiley said. “It’s not like, ‘Will they like her more than they like me as the mother?’ We have a partnership.”
The memories that stand out most in Wiley’s mentoring story aren’t grand gestures. They’re small, ordinary moments that carry outsized meaning.
For SaNaa and Serenity, early outings focused on overcoming obstacles, the kind of impediments that grow when children haven’t had many chances to explore beyond familiar boundaries.
“The focus was facing fears,” Wiley said. “Simple things, like roller coasters or slides at the playground.”
She remembers standing at the bottom of a tall playground slide, encouraging Serenity, terrified at the top.
“She was like, ‘Can you come down with me?’” Wiley recalled. “I said, ‘I can’t, but you can do this.’”
Serenity cried at first. Then she slid.
“And she had such jubilation, because she actually did it,” Wiley said. “Then next thing you know, she just kept doing it over and over.”
With SaNaa, Wiley encouraged courage in different ways, including a roller coaster at Hersheypark.
“She was shaking like a leaf when we got off of it,” Wiley said. “But I encouraged her, like, ‘Look what you did. You can do things that are scary. You can do things that are hard.’”
The lesson stuck. This past summer, SaNaa returned to Hersheypark with friends and rode roller coasters all on her own.
“That courage,” Wiley said. “That’s what matters.”
For Hevan, the transformation has been deeper.
When Wiley first met her, Hevan was 13 and carrying the weight of past experiences that had taught her to meet conflict with anger. Before relocating to the area, she had been kicked out of school.
“She didn’t know how to handle certain situations,” Wiley said. “So, the only way to do it was to fight her way out.”
Wiley was there to lend her support.
“All it takes is one person to look that child in the eye and say, ‘I care about you,’” she said. “Because the only thing they hear is, ‘You’re no good. You’re not going to be anything.’”
Wiley pushed patiently and consistently, helping Hevan slow down her reactions and think through her responses.
“Let’s break this thing down,” Wiley would tell her.
Today, Hevan’s grades are solid. She participates in sports. She has no disciplinary issues. She’s working. She’s filling out her FAFSA student loan forms. She’s talking about college –possibly nursing.
“I have goals set for her,” Wiley said. “‘Did you do your FAFSA? Let’s do it together.’”
Wiley’s approach to mentoring isn’t rigid. She listens first, then responds.
“I let them talk,” Wiley said. “Based on where they are, that’s where I weave in.”
With Hevan, the urgency is real.
“She’s a senior,” Wiley said. “The clock is ticking.”
But the support remains steady – text messages, phone calls, plans to make cookies on a Monday when Hevan is off work from FedEx.
Mentoring, Wiley said, has changed her as much as it has changed the girls.
“It opened my mind to think outside of myself,” she said. “It’s one thing to love the people who come from your bloodline. It’s a different thing to have love for others who have no connection to you whatsoever.”
The joy, she said, comes in simplicity.
“They don’t want to know what my résumé looks like,” Wiley said. “They don’t care. We don’t talk about work.”
Sometimes they get ice cream and sit. Sometimes they paint. Sometimes it’s building a puzzle or playing a board game. They do activities that allow Wiley to see life through the eyes of a child.
“It’s so simple,” she said.
Life hasn’t paused around mentoring. Wiley has weathered grief and caregiving, and at times worried that missing a meeting meant she was failing her Littles. Big Brothers Big Sisters reassured her otherwise.
“They’ve been awesome,” Wiley said. “They’ve been understanding.”
When people hesitate about becoming mentors – worried they don’t have time, money or the right personality – Wiley doesn’t overcomplicate her answer.
“Just jump right in and be who you are,” she said. “Bring your authentic self.”
Mentoring doesn’t require perfection.
“They’re not looking for a perfect person,” she said. “They’re looking for someone who can just be there.”
Ice cream, a park bench, a phone call – it all counts.
“It literally is the time that you want to set,” Wiley said. “And you will get so much more out of it.”
Asked what traits make a strong mentor, her answer is immediate.
“Love and unselfishness,” she said. “If you have those two things, you’re going to be fine.”
Looking ahead, Wiley’s hopes for her girls bring emotion to her voice.
“I want Hevan to break the cycle,” she said, choking back tears. “I want her to thrive and excel beyond her wildest imagination, despite her background.” She had similar wishes for SaNaa and Serenity.
And the relationships, she said, aren’t going anywhere.
“They’re not getting rid of me,” Wiley said, grinning.
As January unfolds and National Mentoring Month invites communities to look closer, Angela Wiley’s story is a reminder that mentorship isn’t about programs or slogans. It’s about presence. It’s about someone standing at the bottom of a slide, looking up and saying, “You can do this.”
Sometimes, that’s all it takes.
For more information about becoming a mentor, contact Big Brothers Big Sisters of South-Central PA at bbbsscpa.org
