[Faith Communities' Support
for Children's Learning]
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[Resources and References]
What are the activities in which your partnership will engage to help your community? Will you provide safe havens for the afterschool hours? Will your members be reading tutors? Will your partnership's emphasis be on college going for young men and women? Will you help make your local schools and neighborhoods safe and drug-free learning and living environments?
The activities for building partnerships outlined in the previous chapters will help you to work within your community to determine its priorities in education and family involvement. For the past several years, members of the Partnership for Family Involvement in Education have been involved in many activities on the national, regional, state, and local levels. Because of these many successful activities, the Partnership has determined several priority areas that are supported through up-to-date materials, resources, and funding. These priority areas, detailed below, can help local partnerships bolster their own activities by building a connection with other groups to share and learn from one another, providing the latest information and resources to strengthen activities that support these priority areas, and providing recognition for visible commitment.
According to the FBI, youth between the ages of 12 and 17 are most at risk of committing violent acts and being victims of crime between the hours of 3:00 p.m. and 8:00 p.m. Surveys show that parents want their children to be involved in safe afterschool learning and enrichment activities with opportunities to use technology; to participate in the arts, drama and music; to get extra help with basic academic skills; and to participate in community service.
Faith community members can help students take advantage of the afterschool time in a safe and constructive manner by starting or supporting extended learning programs in local schools and communities. By providing these activities and more, faith community partnerships are giving children lots of wholesome activities and helping schools and other facilities stay open before and after school and in the summer as community learning centers. By sponsoring alcohol- and drug-free activities and by providing extracurricular learning activities, mentors, internships with employers, and community service opportunities, faith communities are making a difference for youth in their community.
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Shiloh Baptist Church in Washington, DC, established a Math and Science Computer Learning Center to teach critical thinking and problem solving skills to children in 4th through 8th grades using math, science, and a computer-based curriculum. The Center is open after school and evenings and is staffed by both paid and volunteer staff. During the daytime, the Center is used for adult skill development in a welfare-to-work program. |
Organize and sponsor afterschool, extended learning activities for students of all ages. Your faith community members—and members of your broader partnership—can find out what children are learning at school and reinforce that learning in afterschool activities. By sharing expertise and talents, your group can make it possible for students to participate in the arts, perform appropriate science experiments, help others in the community, or engage in any number of fun learning activities—all in a safe, orderly afterschool environment.
Teach children and their parents about the latest technology and its uses for learning. Your group can coordinate with schools and libraries to use their computer labs for special activities or you can establish your own computer lab by collecting and repairing donated computers and printers.
Host or co-host recognition opportunities. Try sponsoring contests and award ceremonies in the arts, music, math, and reading to help reinforce academic achievement in school and throughout the community. Held in the afterschool hours or early evening, they provide an occasion for children and their families to gather and recognize local achievements.
Support and help coordinate the use of college or high school students interested in teaching. As tutors or homework supervisors, older students can help younger ones with their academic skills. The younger students get the extra help they need, and the older students get valuable experience as they plan their own futures. Provide older students with information about available opportunities for careers in teaching and the steps involved in becoming a teacher.
Publicize the need in your community for safe, fun, afterschool learning activities. Children of all ages, and especially middle school youth who have few options open to them, need safe afterschool activities. Perhaps your faith community is small and cannot provide these activities on your own. Your community can start an awareness campaign by word-of-mouth or by generating publicity to bring together many community groups who will rally around this need.
Help staff members and directors of afterschool programs. Your community may already have a small program for the afterschool hours. Think how much more effective the existing program could be with additional volunteers, more space, new books, and appropriate supplies. By coordinating with existing programs, your faith community can extend its reach and enhance their effectiveness.
Safe and Smart: Making the Afterschool Hours Work for Kids. This new report from the U.S. Departments of Education and Justice highlights the benefits of afterschool activities and offers evidence of how such programs can make a difference for children. It details key components of high-quality programs and showcases some outstanding models in communities across the nation.
Give Us Wings! Let Us Fly! This brochure provides information about afterschool programs: how afterschool programs can help, where they can be found, examples of programs making a difference, what you can do to help make options available for children in the afterschool hours, and resources for obtaining additional information.
Keeping Schools Open as Community Learning Centers: Extending Learning in a Safe, Drug-Free Environment Before and After School. This guidebook shows the benefits of keeping schools and other community facilities open for children and families beyond traditional operating hours, and it gives practical advice about how to provide access to valuable educational resources in public buildings that are safe for children.
Bringing Education Into the Afterschool Hours. Provides schools with ideas on how they can use their afterschool program in new and effective ways to promote student achievement and meet the needs of their students and community. Each activity illustrated includes suggestions for additional resources available through the U.S. Department of Education.
Publications are free of charge and may be ordered by calling 1-877-4ED-PUBS. They are also found on the web page for the Partnership for Family Involvement in Education at http://pfie.ed.gov. Further information on afterschool learning can be obtained by calling 1-800-USA-LEARN or visiting www.ed.gov/21stcclc/.
The 21st Century Community Learning Centers program funds partnerships of local public schools and community organizations (including faith communities) for providing extended-time learning activities in public school buildings in rural and inner-city areas. The public school or public school district serves as the fiscal agent for the grant. Extended-time learning activities can be held before and after school, on weekends, during school vacations, and in the summer months. The focus of this program is to provide extended learning opportunities for participating children in a safe, drug-free and supervised environment. A priority of the program is to focus on middle school students.
In 1998, the 21st Century Community Learning Centers program provided nearly $100 million to rural and inner-city public schools to address the educational needs of their communities after school, on weekends, and during the summer. In 1999, another $100 million in new grants were appropriated for this program.
Currently, about 900 rural and inner-city public schools in nearly 300 communities—in collaboration with other public and non-profit agencies and organizations, local businesses, educational entities, cultural organizations, and faith communities—are now participating as 21st Century Community Learning Centers.
Building on this U.S. Department of Education program, the C.S. Mott Foundation is providing up to $55 million for technical assistance and training for afterschool programs in every state.
Faith communities interested in tapping into this source of funding for afterschool and other extended-time learning programs should contact the community relations staff member in their local public school district. As a partner, faith communities can help design the program, assist in hiring staff, provide volunteers and materials to enhance the program, and recruit student participation. Remember that activities by faith communities in this setting must be secular and neutral. Faith community partners should also plan to attend training sessions for potential grantees. For more information, visit www.ed.gov and www.mott.org.
There is a national consensus, based on well-established research, that children should read well and independently by the end of the third grade. Research demonstrates that if students cannot read well by the end of the third grade, their chances for success are significantly diminished, and there is a greater likelihood they will drop out of school later on. Yet, 40 percent of America's fourth graders cannot read at the basic level on challenging national reading assessments. Research shows that parents and other concerned individuals in local communities and the private sector can make a difference as tutors and mentors, extending the reading program of the school. The president has issued the America Reads Challenge to get everyone to pitch in and help reach this reading goal.
The America Reads Challenge is a call to all Americans—parents, educators, libraries, religious institutions, universities, college students, the media, community and national groups, cultural organizations, business leaders, and senior citizens—to support teachers and to help ensure that every child in America can read well and independently by the end of the third grade.
Reading is a skill that is developed not only in the classroom but also in the home and the community. Your faith community can play an important role in the America Reads Challenge by working with students who need extra help in learning to read. You can provide resources and encouragement to parents in your congregation, collect children?s books to distribute to local families, provide volunteers for an ongoing reading effort in your community, connect to a public library's summer reading program, or begin a weekly reading program in your facility.
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The Baltimore-Washington Conference of the United Methodist Church began a summer reading program through Foundry United Methodist Church in Washington, DC, using the READ*WRITE*NOW! Program. Reading program volunteers work with children from neighboring public schools during the summer months to provide a fun and enriching reading program. Both volunteers and children agreed—it was a great success! Additionally, the Baltimore area UMC churches joined an existing literacy program to extend the services offered. |
Instill a love of reading in children. By reading aloud to their children regularly and using TV wisely, parents and other adults in your faith community can empower children with the lifelong habit of reading. Holding family reading nights, story hours, and book exchanges can help families make reading a priority.
Encourage reading in your group, schools, and the community. Host a read-in at a local school to kick things off. Coordinating with the school principal, librarian, and reading coordinator, invite parents, police officers, high school and college students, business people, the mayor, and any community members to bring their favorite children's book to read to a class. Students can read their own favorite books to their classmates and the visiting community members. The talents of faith community members and other local partners can create a wonderful day for children.
Be a volunteer tutor. Members of your faith community can mentor and tutor both children and adults who need extra help with reading. Faith communities can adopt schools and serve as reading tutors to those students. Or, start by hosting programs for members of your own congregation. Spread the news by encouraging participants to bring a friend. If your group is not ready to tackle a project of its own, plan to join an existing group. Many community and civic groups already sponsor tutoring programs and can always use extra volunteers.
Connect parents and tutors with reading experts. Involve experts who can provide parents and tutors with guidance and training on the best way to help children learn to read. Effective reading practices can make the efforts of tutors and the support of parents and family members even more helpful.
Support high standards. Find out about the state and local standards for reading achievement and the results of reading assessments for schools in your community. Join parents, teachers, and school staff in supporting high standards and reward students who reach those high standards.
America Reads Challenge Resource Kit. This kit will provide you with everything you need for accepting the challenge of making sure all of America's children learn to read well and independently by the end of the third grade. Topics such as finding and serving children, recruiting and training tutors, forming a community coalition, and reaching out to families and teachers are covered in the kit.
READ*WRITE*NOW! Available in both English and Spanish, this is a summer reading program designed to be used by a child pre-school through grade six with a reading partner. The child reads 30 minutes a day, at least five days a week, and meets at least once a week with his or her reading partner. The READ*WRITE*NOW! series includes the basic kit (in English and Spanish), an early childhood kit (READY*SET*READ!), a learning partners guide, and a new learning poster which contains activities to do together that encourage reading and strengthen skills.
Simple Things You Can Do to Help a Child Read Well and Independently. This booklet provides suggestions for parents, schools, librarians, concerned citizens, community organizations, universities, employers, and members of the media on how to help meet the America Reads Challenge.
Checkpoints for Progress for Families and Communities and Checkpoints for Progress for Teachers and Learning Partners. These two publications help to identify what most children can do in reading and writing at different ages and what most children can read by grade level.
Publications are free of charge and may be ordered by calling 1-877-4ED-PUBS. They are also found on the Web page for the Partnership for Family Involvement in Education at http://pfie.ed.gov. Further information on the America Reads Challenge can be obtained by calling 1-800-USA-LEARN or visiting www.ed.gov/americareads.
The Reading Excellence Program, a $260 million federal grant program, awards competitive grants to selected states. States use the funds to improve reading for children in high-poverty schools and schools needing improvement by supporting research-based reading instruction and tutoring. The program's goals are to ensure that children enter school ready to learn and that they quickly learn to read once in school. Participating local schools:
A key feature of the Reading Excellence Program is the requirement that its activities be based on reading research.
Faith communities may participate through partnerships with the local schools that receive Reading Excellence grants from their state. Check the U.S. Department of Education's Reading Excellence Web site to see if your state received a grant. If it did, check with the state contact listed to see which districts and schools are participating. The Web site is at www.ed.gov/offices/OESE/REA. You can provide valuable assistance to your community by partnering with your local school and contributing to the effectiveness of the Reading Excellence Program.
Today, more than ever before, education is the fault line between those who will prosper in the new economy and those who will not. More and more jobs in the future—particularly those involving technology—require at least some postsecondary education, making the opportunity to go to college more important than ever for American families and their children. Fifteen years ago, the typical college graduate earned 38 percent more than a high school graduate; as of 1995, that advantage had increased to 81 percent.
To "think college early" means to plan for the future by getting on track for college in the middle school or junior high years. Taking the right courses, such as algebra and geometry beginning in the 8th and 9th grades, will open the doors to college. As students move on to high school, they prepare to enter and succeed in college by taking college preparatory and Advanced Placement courses and tests that reflect national standards of excellence.
For years, the college-going rate of lower-income students has lagged far behind the rate for students from higher income families. Much of the problem stems from the fact that many lower-income families do not know how to plan for a college education, often because they simply have never done it before.
Faith communities can play an important role in this process. They can echo the high standards that schools and families set for students, encourage them to work hard and earn the best grades they can, connect them with mentors who will help them in their studies, and make sure that students and their families know about financial aid opportunities.
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Many United Methodist churches hold annual college fairs in their common areas for local middle, junior high, and high school youth. The fairs feature materials about colleges, application procedures, academic requirements, and financing a college education. These fairs are held in cooperation with the local school system and in partnership with other faith communities and community organizations. |
Emphasize the importance of working hard in school and of going to college. Almost 90 percent of new jobs being created require more than a high school level of literacy and mathematics skills. Earning a two-year or a four-year college degree makes a difference in lifetime earnings, choices, and opportunities. Your groups can spread the word in the community about the importance of college and lifelong learning.
Host a series of "Think College Early" events for middle, junior high, and high school students. Your group can join forces with school counselors, local colleges and universities, PTAs, religious groups, the Chamber of Commerce, local and state government offices, recent college graduates living in your area, and others to sponsor meetings and activities to get information out to students and their families. Members of your group and other caring adults can invite college officials, faculty members, representatives of groups that sponsor scholarships, or other speakers to attend meetings in order to talk with students and parents about college and what it takes to attend and graduate. Leaders from any field can talk about the education needed to succeed in their profession, and they can encourage students to visit local college campuses, send away for materials about colleges, and access information about colleges on the Web.
Help middle, junior high, and high school students take the right courses. Students who take challenging mathematics courses, such as algebra in the middle grades, will be ready to continue in a college preparatory or tech-prep curriculum in high school, with courses such as geometry, algebra II, chemistry, physics, and calculus. Your group members can tutor junior high and middle school students in core subjects, such as algebra and geometry, and provide helpful hints for getting through difficult school work.
Organize workshops to help with the college application process. The college application process can be daunting for high school juniors and their parents. Your faith community can organize group sessions pairing new college applicants with "helpers" from the faith community. These volunteers can assist with filling out the college application form, student loan forms, and applications for scholarships. You can also conduct classes to assist students in writing required essays for their applications.
Build a school-college-community partnership to improve student achievement. Your group can help connect area colleges and universities with middle and high schools to help improve student achievement and to encourage students to go on to college.
Launch a mentoring, job-shadowing, and internship program. Started at the beginning of the school year, these programs can be a wonderfully positive experience for students and the adults providing the mentorship. Your group members can serve as role models to students, starting in elementary school, so they receive the special attention needed to develop confidence in their abilities. Members of faith communities come from all walks of life. Your group can organize job-shadowing opportunities for middle school students, allowing them to spend a day in the workplace with a mentor to see the possibilities of different careers. At the high school level, students gain practical workplace skills and a greater understanding of their career options through internships.
Think College Early Web site. This creative Web site is designed especially for middle school students, their parents, and their teachers. It has special sections on course taking, financial aid, and resources. It is found at www.ed.gov/thinkcollege/.
Database of Early College Awareness Programs. This database of early college awareness programs allows you to find a program, searching by state and by various program characteristics. It is found at the Think College Early site at www.ed.gov/thinkcollege/dbhome.html.
Yes You Can. A guide for establishing mentoring programs to prepare youth for college.
Think College? Me? Now? A handbook to help middle school and junior high school students think about college.
Getting Ready for College Early. A handbook for parents of students in middle school and junior high school about courses necessary for attending college and how to finance a college education. This handbook is available in both English and Spanish.
Publications are free of charge and may be ordered by calling 1-877-4ED-PUBS. They are also found on the Web page for the Partnership for Family Involvement in Education at http://pfie.ed.gov. Further information on Think College Early can be obtained by calling 1-800-USA-LEARN or visiting www.ed.gov/thinkcollege/early.
GEAR UP (Gaining Early Awareness and Readiness for Undergraduate Programs) is a new national initiative to encourage more young people to have high expectations, stay in school, study hard and take the right courses to go to college. The initiative awards multi-year grants to states and to locally designed partnerships between colleges and universities and low-income middle schools, plus at least two other partners—such as community organizations, religious groups, businesses, parent groups, and non-profits.
Partnerships are designed to use the following proven strategies:
If your faith community is interested in helping to sponsor a GEAR UP program during the next funding cycle, or if you would like to find out if a GEAR UP program is currently being planned, contact your local public school district office or a local college or university, particularly one with a school of education. Further information can be obtained by calling 1-800-USA-LEARN or by visiting www.ed.gov/gearup.
Recent tragedies experienced by the communities of Littleton, Colorado, Springfield, Oregon, Jonesboro, Arkansas, and others have profoundly shocked and grieved the nation. Yet, it is important to remember that 90 percent of our schools are free of serious, violent crime. But much remains to be done to make our public schools even safer and to provide for the safety of our children in their homes, their communities, and in their passage to and from school.
Our young people may dress differently and may have different musical tastes than their parents and other adults. But this is an ambitious and striving generation of young people. In this time of concern and even some fear, we must send our young people a powerful message of hope and security. To do this, we can assist parents in slowing down their lives, help them to tune into their children and their needs, and support both young people and parents during the difficult teenage years. We can also help youth make connections and have a stake in their community.
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Youth and Police in Partnership is sponsored in Boston, Massachusetts, by the United Methodist Church Urban Services. It supports neighborhood-based youth initiatives in problem solving, public safety, and trust building. The goal is to bring the resources of the religious community and its members to bear on inner-city problems. The goal is being achieved through collaborations between successful adults, youth, police and other agencies. Youth and police work together, using a problem-solving methodology, to make their respective neighborhoods safe, clean, attractive, and productive. |
Additionally, faith communities can take an active role in helping our young people take responsibility and assume leadership roles among their peers.
By bringing out the best in our young people and challenging them to bring out the best in others, we can make a real difference in our communities.
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The National Conference on Community and Justice in the Tampa Bay region operates Camp Anytown. The purpose of Camp Anytown is to foster understanding and cooperation among students from diverse backgrounds. Students exposed to this multicultural experience become better prepared to assume roles of leadership in our society. Camp Anytown is sponsored in cooperation with the school systems of the area. After attending Camp Anytown, students organize multicultural clubs in their own school and participate in monthly follow-up meetings. |
Faith communities can also provide guidance, academic support, and supervision during the summer months when children are not in school and their families are at work.
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More than 100 children from Caguas, Puerto Rico, participated in a summer program sponsored by Para una Communidad y Escuela Segura y Libre de Drogas. These children are all below the poverty line and many live in challenging home situations. The children participated in summer camp activities, academic enrichment programs, and field trips. At the end of the summer, assessment results indicated that 94 percent of the children learned to do new things and found new ways to solve problems. Ninety percent "liked themselves better" because they were respected and 96 percent reporting making new friends. |
Talk and listen. Your group members can talk with children and encourage parents to talk with their children about the dangers of drugs, alcohol, and tobacco. Started in the earliest years and extended throughout adulthood, these conversations could save lives.
Provide wholesome activities. Be available to help keep schools open after school and in the summer as community learning centers. Sponsor alcohol- and drug-free activities and dances. Provide extracurricular activities such as sports, art, band, special interest clubs, and field trips. Provide mentors, internships with employers, and community service opportunities.
Regularly bring together children, youth, parents, and other caring adults. Your group can regularly involve parents and other caring adults, including law enforcement officials, in the lives of children and youth through mentoring and tutoring programs and through special events that bring together adults and young people.
Make an impact in the schools. Your faith community, working in concert with school officials, teachers, and parents, can make schools more personalized by encouraging regular communication among students, parents, and teachers and finding ways for everyone to meet and get to know others in their school community. You can also provide drug and violence prevention and character education programs to students—provided, of course, that these programs are secular in nature and religiously neutral. You can help coordinate lectures to schools from federal, state, and local safety agencies to help train teachers to prevent problems and deal with violence.
Protecting Students From Harassment and Hate Crime: A Guide for Schools. This guide defines and describes harassment and hate crimes, contains information about applicable laws, details specific positive steps that schools can take to prevent and respond to harassment, includes sample policies and procedures used by school districts in the United States, and identifies many of the resource materials available.
Early Warning, Timely Response: A Guide for Safe Schools. Central to this guide are the key insights that keeping children safe is a community-wide effort and that effective schools create environments where children and young people truly feel connected. It is part of an overall effort to make sure that every school in this nation has a comprehensive violence prevention plan in place.
Creating Safe Schools: A Resource Collection for Planning and Action. This kit provides resources for creating a safe school environment. It includes articles on gangs, violence, victimization, and bullying as well as suggestions on how to prevent or stop these problems.
Satellite Town Meeting # 54 [English VHS] "Back to School: Safe and Sound." Video of a live, interactive teleconference where renowned experts, local educators, and community leaders share ideas on how to improve schools. This Satellite Town Meeting focuses on going back to school and making schools safe. It offers an opportunity for discussion with people in your community who share a commitment to building partnerships and a common vision of educational excellence for all children.
Publications are free of charge and may be ordered by calling 1-877-4ED-PUBS. Further information on Safe and Drug-Free Schools can be obtained by calling 1-800-USA-LEARN or visiting www.ed.gov/pubs/index.html.
The purpose of Safe Start (Department of Justice, Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention) is to demonstrate how to prevent and reduce the impact of family and community violence on young children (primarily from birth to 6 years of age). The project seeks to create a comprehensive service delivery system by helping communities to expand existing partnerships among service providers in the fields of early childhood education and development, health, mental health, family support and strengthening, domestic violence, substance abuse prevention and treatment, crisis intervention, child welfare, law enforcement, and court and legal services.
Safe Start demonstration project grants are awarded to broad-based partnerships that include, among other partners, faith leaders and communities. For further information on the Safe Start initiative, visit www.ojjdp.ncjrs.org/grants/past.html.
The Departments of Education, Justice, and Health and Human Services are collaborating to provide students with comprehensive educational, mental health, law enforcement and, as appropriate, juvenile justice system services and activities. This effort is designed to ensure that students develop the social skills and emotional resilience necessary to avoid drug use and violent behavior and to help create safe, disciplined, and drug-free schools. With this grant, schools and communities should be able to enhance and implement comprehensive community-wide strategies.
Awards are made to school districts in partnership with a broad base of community organizations. Faith communities interested in learning more about the grant or joining in a local partnership application can consult the Notice of Intent to Make Funds Available at www.ed.gov/legislation/FedRegister/announcements/1999-1/020599a.html or call the school safety office in their local public school district to ask if they have applied or intend to apply in the next grant cycle. By being involved in the beginning stages of designing the grant application and offering to help support its implementation, you will be in a position to better involve students and parents in your faith community and wider local area.
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[Faith Communities' Support for Children's Learning] |
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[Resources and References] |