A standard, innocuous elementary school classroom assignment: draw a picture in your home. One student’s drawing made its solution to Cathyann Solomon’s desk in a credit application. Your chance was of an tent.
“That’s why we all do whatever we do,” said Solomon, associate director in the Weekend Hunger Backpack Program at Gainesville Catholic Charities. “When you already know you will find kids out there that are coping with a tent, you just will not help but choose to make this happen.”
As today, 659 children receive food backpacks in Alachua County. They have been referred by their teachers to be part of the Catholic Charities program to grab backpacks of donated food to transport them over the weekend when school-provided meals aren’t available.
The schools in Catholic Charities’ network are probably the most struggling schools inside the county.
For example, Lake Forest Elementary School, only 12 miles west of your “A” school William S. Talbot Elementary, is really a failing school, as per the Alachua County School District website. A hundred percent from the students are believed to be economically disadvantaged.
Hunger is just one of the facets of poverty which affect students’ opportunity to grow into success school.
Enter the town school. It’s a program that enables schools a thing being a connection point, linking families in need of assistance to public benefits programs and partnering with local charities and benefactors. The community school concept is meant to address poverty as well as effects directly, rather then focusing only on academic performance, by causing anti-poverty resources on offer at schools to grant parents and students to obtain easier access.
The idea is that by addressing issues like hunger, the means to access healthcare and stress, schools can boost academic achievement among poor students. Following your concept proved success at Evans Community Senior high school in Orlando, Howard Bishop Middle School has become the first first full-fledged community school in Alachua County in fall of 2016, after school officials saw the way the concept worked in Orlando.
Eighty-one percent of Howard Bishop’s students are economically disadvantaged. The city school office for the middle school (called “The Nest” with the school’s mascot, the Howard Bishop Hawks) is among the hub for college kids seeking referrals to in-house guidance counselors along with a community school director who meet families to assist them get attached to resources.
Another benefit of community schools
