Here’s the new edition of The Weekly Connect. Check it out and sign up to have it delivered to your inbox!
Here are some of the things we’ve been reading about this week:
Replacing older school buses improves attendance.
President Biden signs an executive order to make child care cheaper.
A City Connects school in Dublin, Ireland, uses compelling activities to address absenteeism.
To read more, click on the following links.
Continue reading “The Weekly Connect 4/24/23”
Earlier this month, Lynn Margherio, Founder and CEO of Cradles to Crayons, and City Connects Program Manager Sara Davey led a hearing at the Massachusetts State House to talk about clothing insecurity in the state of Massachusetts – and across the country.
“The goal,” Davey says of the briefing which was co-hosted by State Representative Marjorie Decker, “was to raise awareness and talk to legislators about how they can help children and families.”
Some legislators were already aware of the problem.
“Several legislators spoke from the heart about their own childhood experiences of living in low income situations,” Davey explains. “One legislator said that when he was young, his clothes came from a local church. It was powerful to hear from legislators who know what the impact of clothing insecurity is.”
Cradles to Crayons defines clothing insecurity “as the lack of access to affordable, adequate, appropriate clothing.” Families “may have some clothing and shoes, however, they may not fit properly, be in wearable condition, or be seasonally appropriate for the weather.”
Continue reading ““It’s about so much more than clothes:” City Connects and Cradles to Crayons at the Massachusetts State House”Here’s the new edition of The Weekly Connect. Check it out and sign up to have it delivered to your inbox!
Here are some of the things we’ve been reading about this week:
Using a curriculum rich in arts, history, and science led to reading improvements.
Title IX athletic rules could be finalized by May.
Ohio plans to boost the graduation rates of special education students.
To read more, click on the following links.
Continue reading “The Weekly Connect 4/19/23”
Tackling social inequity is hard work. Last year, Salem Public Schools took on this challenge by forming a partnership with the nonprofit organization Equity Imperative that includes feedback from students.
That partnership led to the Student Voice Project, an effort to amplify students’ concerns and help them take action to address these concerns.
“We’re getting trained as adults to be facilitators,” Joy Richmond-Smith, the City Connects Coordinator at Salem’s Saltonstall School, says. “District staff are being trained about equity and race and how they affect our students, as well as about the negative impact of implicit bias and institutional racism in schools.”
The training for facilitators includes the Youth Participatory Action Research (or YPAR) framework, which encourages, according to YPAR’s website, the creation of “positive youth and community development” based on “social justice principles.”
“In each middle school and high school,” Richmond-Smith adds, “we organized a student voice group that’s supported by an adult mentor.” And this year the program expanded into Salem’s elementary schools.
Initially, the focus was on first steps. Richmond-Smith and Jaleesa Tentindo, a school counselor, worked with Saltonstall middle school students to identify “a pressing issue at our school that they want to research and then try to come up with recommendations for our school to implement,” Richmond-Smith says.
“The issue they chose was the lack of consistent and meaningful dialogue about race and racism.”
Continue reading “Promoting equity in Salem”Here’s the new edition of The Weekly Connect. Check it out and sign up to have it delivered to your inbox!
Here are some of the things we’ve been reading about this week:
Girls say social media is hurting their sleep and their mental health.
School districts are suing social media companies, claiming they have contributed to the teen mental health crisis.
This year, the number of school shootings may be higher than last year, according to a researcher who tracks this information.
To read more, click on the following links.
Continue reading “The Weekly Connect 4/11/23”We’re excited to announce the release of our new video, “Introducing City Connects.”
Filmed at Boston’s Winthrop Elementary School last fall, the video is an overview of our work that will help us share our approach with schools and educators that are not part of our network.
The video covers some of the many barriers — among them food insecurity and a lack of safe housing — that prevent children from focusing on school.
City Connects addresses these barriers so that children can focus on learning, because, as the video explains:
“Opportunity is possibility. For an educated student, the possibilities are endless.”
Here’s the new edition of The Weekly Connect. Check it out and sign up to have it delivered to your inbox!
Here are some of the things we’ve been reading about this week:
Over the past decade, kids’ mental health hospitalizations have surged.
States have been spending Covid relief funds on positive reforms.
The school shooting in Nashville reveals misperceptions about this kind of violence.
To read more, click on the following links.
Continue reading “The Weekly Connect 4/3/23”When Gerard Cullen talks about City Connects, he talks about the importance of keeping students at the center of the work we do.
Cullen, the program manager for City Connects in Dublin, Ireland, explains this in a video posted by Ireland’s Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth.
“One of the things City Connects does every year is we survey the children [about] what their interests are,” Cullen says. “We’re surveying children from junior infants to sixth class. And I was blown away the first year – and the results were the same second year – [by] what those interests are. I would never have believed in the Northeast Inner City in Dublin the number one interest was swimming. The second highest interest was Lego. Arts and crafts and cookery were there.”
“By having that list of interests, we can then use that to approach the different community partners – whether it’s Dublin City Council or whether it’s a local youth club – and say, Listen, this is what the children want. And I keep giving credit to all of the community groups in the Northeast Inner City. They have not been found wanting when they see that this is what the need is.”
“And when you said, How does it all work? or what’s the secret for making it all work – [it’s] if we keep the child at the center of the room. At the end of the day, all of us want to improve their lives.”
To hear more, please watch the video.
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