CAMDEN, NJ—The Hopeworks model (out of Camden, NJ) is based on the idea of D.R.E.A.M.S.: Dynamic Realizable Efforts to Attain and Maintain Success. Their goal is to help youth realize DREAMS “by enhancing the lives ­of inner-city Camden youth by expanding the learning opportunities available to them, pointing the way to a future full of hope and working together to create that future. The heart of our program is technology training, which we provide in­ a safe, respectful, and celebratory atmosphere.”

Youth come into the Hopeworks program via an organized recruitment effort, which includes the use of myspace, outreach to the local housing authority, probation officers, and social workers. The youth who end up as a part of the program learn website design, geographic information services (GIS), computer networking and repair, and video, along with literacy and math skills. The youth also have opportunities to participate in an unique e-mentoring program and college preparatory assistance. And remember, this is all while the students themselves focus their DREAMS of becoming chefs, entrepreneurs, video game designers, and the person who’s “in charge of everything”. AND, if that isn’t enough, this is happening in a community where over 50% of children live below the poverty line, where only about 6% of the adults have a bachelor’s or professional degree, and where only about half of the adult residents have completed high school. AND, to top it off, this program isn’t just about teaching — it’s about doing. The skills these youth learn are put into practice in real life jobs where they can early cold, hard cash. Since 2000, Hopeworks has had over 180 clients who have paid them for web development and GIS services. A big task.

Father Jeff Putthoff, SJ, the Executive Director, said they can pull this off because of their size, “Some people would call us a boutique. Some people would say that it’s not scalable. I don’t know if it’s scaleable. But we want to have relationships with these kids… When people talk about scalability, they want more youth for the same price… They oftentimes don’t know what goes into youth development.” And Hopeworks definitely seems to know what goes into youth development.

One key they use in this process is Formation. From their website: “Formation is not a one-size-fits-all program, but rather a supportive environment that embraces the somebodiness and uniqueness of each youth. We seek first to listen and to know the stories of our youth and then to organize those stories into an individualized plan for success, a Personal Development Plan.”

Patrick Keenan, the Formation Director, explained how they do it, “It starts with repetition. Walking through the process… We try to do a lot in formation, but we make it as simple as possible. What we really want to do first and foremost is get our youth telling stories of success… They aren’t comfortable telling stories… So we use a process called appreciative inquiry… ‘Tell me a story about something you’ve done successfully.’ Often what comes out is their strengths. And then we build those into their plan.”

Sometimes, Keenan says, it takes a lot of probing, “‘Tell me what it’s like to play football.’ At first, you get a lot of hesitation. Then slowly they start talking about things. And I might say, ‘So what you’re saying is that it takes a lot of courage’ or ‘It takes a lot of practice.’ That’s the list of strengths. That’s the base of their plan.”

And then, once the plan is made, the staff members at Hopeworks spend time every week talking with the students about what they’ve done over the week and how it’s helping them achieve their DREAMS. And Keenan says that the next part is incredibly important — you have to take them — and their dreams —- seriously, “reeeaaally seriously.”

If you don’t do anything else today, watch this video about the Hopeworks program and see DREAMS becoming realities.

By: Dave Hinton, Director, Purple Elephant Computer Factory for KIDS!

[This is part of our Community Policy Blog series where local leaders are talking about and solving problems of national significance.]

The Silent Epidemic: On May 9, 2007, policy makers, non-profits, media, and business leaders attended the “National Summit on America’s Silent Epidemic” in Washington, DC. Participants discussed early intervention methods to increase the number of students who graduate ready for college, career, and life. This summit was necessary because high school dropout rates have reached crisis levels. Locally, North Carolina’s Regional Partnership for High School Excellence addresses these same issues. We at Purple Elephant Computer Factory for KIDS! have a solution to this problem.

Labeled the “Silent Epidemic”, more than 1 million American high school students drop out every year. That’s 6,000 students who drop out every school day. Dropouts are more likely than high school graduates to be unemployed, in poor health, living in poverty, in prison, on public assistance, and single parents with children who also drop out of high school. Graduation day is too late to find out that a child will not graduate. Early intervention to identify and help those at risk is vital.

The Milton and Rose D. Friedman Foundation states that the 716,000 working-age dropouts in North Carolina costs the state $712 million in tax revenue, $155 million in extra government-backed health insurance, and $6 million in prison costs each year.

Lifetime costs to incarcerate one high school drop out who turns to drugs, gangs, and crime is estimated at $1.8 million. For that cost, our organization, Purple Elephant Computer Factory for KIDS!, could provide 18,000 computers to these at-risk kids before they drop out of high school.

In the School, but not at Home: Our General Assembly in North Carolina is considering connecting all NC schools to high-speed Internet. This will allow students, teachers, and administrators to take maximum advantage of computers and the Internet…in the school. This still does not address the need for individual computers and Internet access in the home.

North Carolina educators have long recognized the need for all students to have equal computer access. Today’s lesson plans make full use of computers, but alternate lesson plans must still be developed for those students who do not have “at home” computer access.

In selected areas, all students have been provided free notebook computers and high speed Internet. In every case, because of computer access, overall grades have improved and a larger percentage of students pass end of grade tests. Laptops are too expensive, however, to be provided for free, to everyone. Golden Leaf Foundation and SAS recently provided 2,500 laptops to students in Wilson county schools at a cost of $3 million. Also, Internet access is not uniformly available.

According to the e-NC Authority, broadband Internet access varies widely across North Carolina. Twenty-six of our 100 counties have broadband connectivity levels less than 70 percent and five of these counties have less than 50 percent access. The e-NC Authority is working to provide broadband Internet to all citizens of North Carolina, but no one has yet implemented a solution to provide computers to our most needy kids, which will enable them to actually use this broadband access.

Even the “One Laptop Per Child” project to deliver a $100 laptop to the world’s children, has not reached the $100 price point. Today the laptops are being shipped, but they cost $188 each — not $100 — and they are not widely available. The “$100 Laptop” is not a reality, but the $100 desktop is available now. At Purple Elephant, we call it the “Green Computer”.

“Green Computers” – An Untapped Resource: Computers have a useful life of approximately seven years, but most companies and individuals upgrade every three to four years. Upgrades are usually driven by changes in software and network requirements, not hardware. These discarded computers offer far more computing power than the average individual needs, but the remaining three years of useful life is lost if this computer is discarded. Only thirteen percent of the discarded computers are refurbished and placed in areas where they are needed.

New computers cost between $500 and $2,000 and are beyond the reach of many families and students. Donated computers, on the other hand, can be refurbished at a cost of $100 each — less than one-half the cost of some college text books — yet these used desktop computers are being sent to landfills. A solution to this “environmental problem” is refurbishment together with an incentive for the student to eventually return the computer for proper recycling. Purple Elephant Computer Factory for KIDS can provide both.

Environmental Problem becomes an Education Solution: According to market researcher IDC, worldwide shipments of new computers were estimated to exceed 250 million in 2007. This means that over 250 million new computers will eventually become obsolete. At some point in time, all will become E-waste. Various sources estimate that over 150 million computers have already been buried in US landfills. Any effort to extend the useful life of current computers will yield a substantial environmental benefit.

According to Jim Lynch, with CompuMentor , producing the average 53-pound desktop computer and monitor requires 530 pounds of fossil fuel, 50 pounds of chemicals, and 3,330 pounds of water (due to the repeated rinsing necessary). In contrast, the ongoing energy costs associated with owning a computer, are relatively low—roughly the same as a refrigerator. Jim also states, “Over each computer’s life cycle, reselling or upgrading computers saves 5 to 20 times more energy than recycling”.

The US EPA Electronics Environmental Benefits Calculator estimates the environmental and economic benefits of reusing a desktop with a CRT monitor. By refurbishing and reusing these older computers, they become “green computers”, e.g. they do not consume new resources.

According to this EPA calculator, the 900+ computers refurbished by Purple Elephant Computer Factory for KIDS, have saved 27,000 lbs of hazardous waste, 68,000 lbs of solid waste, kept 157,000 gallons of water from being polluted, kept 1.1 million lbs of CO2 from being emitted, and saved 6.7 million kilowatts of energy. This results in an economic savings of $600,000 ($667 per computer). It does not include the additional value of recycling over 1,000 computers that were unsuitable for Purple Elephant to refurbish bringing the total environmental value to well over $1 million. These savings are remarkable accomplishments coming from just a bunch of volunteers operating out of a former Goodwill store, but this is just the cost savings of refurbishing the computer. The most important benefit is the impact these computers can have on a child’s education…to level the educational playing field for a child who does not have a computer at home.

Purple Elephants learn to dance: The Purple Elephant Computer Factory for KIDS! located in Raleigh, NC, has been taking these “older” computers and refurbishing them for at-risk kids since 2004. They offer a refurbished desktop computer to qualified kids who do not have computer access at home. A complete system is provided for a fee of $15 to $100, based on the student’s financial situation. At minimum, these PCs are 500 MHz (Pentium III or higher), 128 MB RAM, and 10 GB hard-drive loaded with Windows 2000 Professional operating system, Open Office suite, AVG anti-virus, games, and additional software. These systems include dial-up and/or high-speed Internet access capability, monitor, keyboard, and mouse. These become great student systems at a “negative cost” to society, ($667 environmental savings above minus $100.00 refurbishment costs still equals $567 in savings, or “negative cost” per computer). To recap: One new laptop costs $1,200. For that cost, Purple Elephant can provide more than 12 refurbished computers and save over $8,000 in environmental costs. What is wrong with this picture? Everything – North Carolina is not processing enough “green computers”.

Purple Elephant is a registered 501 (c) 3 non-profit organization. They hold a “Microsoft Authorized Refurbisher” designation. They have A+ and Network Certified Instructors. They have over 200 volunteers. They have a current inventory of over 500 used computers to be refurbished. But, most important, they have a backlog of over 180 requests for refurbished computers.

Inspiration at Purple Elephant: These discarded computers, if refurbished, are an inexpensive yet vital link to bridge the “Digital Divide” and to comply with the intent of “No Child Left Behind”.

With funding, Purple Elephant can provide both a computer and a “Return Certificate” to a potential high school graduate. This Return Certificate can be applied as credit for a newer computer if the student returns the computer for an upgrade after 2 years. This will provide the serious student with continuing, updated computer technology and discourage landfill dumping.

Environmental costs associated with landfill dumping of one desktop computer and one CRT monitor is $667. For that same cost, Purple Elephant can provide six computers to six families and affect over 10 kids. Return on investment by refurbishing a computer rather than dumping it into a landfill is 667%. While 667% is a great return, it pales when compared to the value of helping a child. If just one kid stays in school, graduates, and becomes a productive member of society, THAT RETURN ON INVESTMENT IS PRICELESS.

Changing the Rules: Unfortunately, in NC, there are currently no tax incentives for businesses to donate computers to non-profits. Also, large businesses typically do not consider donating computers to a small refurbisher because they are concerned that data will not be properly erased from the hard drives (Purple Elephant wipes the hard drive using Department of Defense approved software).

Governments have rules that prevent a refurbisher from receiving their surplus computers. EPA, at RTP, NC, and other federal agencies dispose of large quantities of computers each year through the General Services Administration. These computers are not available to Purple Elephant because Purple Elephant is not an “educational institution”.

Approximately 3,000 similar computers were replaced by one North Carolina state agency. These computers could not be donated to Purple Elephant, although they were available for purchase after other agencies had a chance to claim them. Even universities have inconsistent computer disposal procedures. At one university, some departments removed and destroyed hard drives and sold the computer. Other departments wiped the hard drives and eventually donated them to Purple Elephant. Purple Elephant simply purchased the computers for $1 each and installed the donated hard drives. The computers worked fine. (At that time, Purple Elephant was paying $12 for used computer memory, so the $1 purchase was a bargain). If the rules were changed, refurbishers would be eligible for large quantities of similar computers. Identical computers can be refurbished in assembly line fashion at costs of $40 to $50 per computer. Increased access to computers and reduced refurbishment costs means more students will have access to “at home” computers.

In North Carolina, we all have choices:

Dump one computer into a landfill — or — Provide six kids with a computer?
Incarcerate one gang member — or — Provide 18,000 computers to kids?
Ignore the high school dropout problem –– or –– Close the Digital Divide?

At Purple Elephant, we believe the answer should be:

A Mouse in Every House!

By: Dena Simmons

[This is part of our Community Policy Blog series where local leaders are talking about and solving problems of national significance. It is the second in a series of posts by Dena on parent accountability. Last week, Dena asked the question, “How do we get parents involved?” This week she provides some answers based on her own experiences as a middle school teacher in the Bronx.]

In low-income neighborhoods in the inner cities and in rural areas, parents have less flexibility to attend parent-teacher conferences, to chaperone trips, or to volunteer in the classroom because they have to work long hours to bring money home to make end’s meet. While some parents may be unavailable to attend parent/teacher conferences or to get involved with school governance, other parents, who may be available, feel disempowered because they cannot speak English or because their own experiences in school have been negative, and they have no faith in what school has to offer to them or to their children.

The problem of getting parents involved then becomes three-fold. First, how do we make parent/teacher conferences and school meetings more accessible to parents? Second, how do we create a welcoming environment to support non-English speaking parents? Last, how do we change the mindset of parents who have no faith in school? The first two problems are easier to solve. To solve the first problem, schools should schedule more meeting times for school functions so that there are more opportunities for parents to be involved. To solve the second problem, schools should send material home to students in more than one language so that all parents could read the material and feel included in the school’s discourse. On conferences and meetings at the school, the school should hire translators for every language represented at the school as well as offer English classes for parents as a way to empower them and engage them in school affairs. By working on the first two problems I identified, we could move in the right direction of supporting and of encouraging parent involvement. My solutions are not original. Educators discovered these solutions a while ago already. The problem is that these solutions are not always practiced or implemented in schools, which is unfortunate.

The last problem is the hardest to solve. Is it possible to change someone’s negative experience in school that has caused him or her to have no faith in schooling at all? Is it possible to change someone’s mindset? There are no easy answers or solutions, but something needs to be done to engage these disillusioned parents in the schooling process. One solution could be to provide monetary incentives for these parents to come to school, but I hate the idea of extrinsic motivation so I would not propose this. Sadly, I actually believe if parents, who are mostly poor, knew that they would receive some money to show up for a meeting with their kid’s teacher, they might just show up. When a child sees his or her parent in school, no matter if the parent has been paid or not to be there, the child learns that his or her parents is invested in his life and in his learning. We all know that parents should come to their child’s school not because they are getting paid to do so but because they genuinely care about what their child is learning.

Another solution, which would be harder to implement, is to mandate that parents attend parent/teacher conferences (with flexible meeting times, of course) and a certain number of parent association meetings per year. If the government could hold principals, teachers, and students accountable to their learning, why can’t we hold parents accountable too? Why is there nothing in place to make sure that parents are doing their jobs? Besides feeding children, providing a warm, non-abusive, and loving shelter to their children, and making sure children go to school, being involved with the child’s school and in the child’s education should be just as much a part of the list of responsibilities of a parent. Why should I have high-stakes test judge my effectiveness as an educator? Why should the principal, the student, and I take all the blame for a student’s academic failures when their parents have just as much of a role in the child’s learning? Where is parent accountability?

We need to hold parents accountable because maybe if we did that, some of my students’ parents would not send their children to school hungry or unkempt. Maybe, my students would not have unmonitored access to suggestive material on the Internet and on the television. Maybe, parents would come to meet with administration when their child gets in a fight at school or cuts class. Maybe, parents would come to pick up their child’s report card. Maybe, some parents would come to school after numerous messages about their child’s late arrivals to school and absences. Maybe, parents would be more involved. Maybe, schools will improve because parents will be involved. Maybe.

On another note, many of my students’ parents who, according to statistics, are considered poor, use the little money they have to buy their students and themselves unnecessary gadgets and products. For example, many of my students have cell phones and not just any cell phones. They have Motorola razors and T-Mobile sidekicks that range in prices from 75 dollars to 300 dollars. Not only that, but most of my students also come to school with the latest Jordan sneakers and name brand clothes. Many of my students have computers and Internet access—of course—so that their parents and they could keep up with the Joneses on Myspace.com.

Being from the Bronx, I know how important it is for people here to show their value and worth through what they have. This is a clear poverty of the mind. Only those who do not have want to show everything they do have. This is sad. What is even more upsetting is that parents tell me that they do not have the money to send their children to low-cost tutoring programs when I suggest they send their children, who need more services than the school could offer, to a tutoring program. Instead, they demand a free program or do not send their children to tutoring at all. Interestingly, these very same parents, who do not have money to pour into their child’s learning, have money to buy their children name brand sneakers and clothes. The value is not placed on school, but on material possessions. Investing in education does not seem to be an option for most of my students’ parents.

Thus, I propose that schools offer courses to parents to teach them how to spend their money wisely among other courses on childhood development and non-culturally biased childrearing so that parents are equipped with the knowledge they need to be good parents. These parent courses should provide parents with knowledge about educational resources available for them and for their children. In other words, schools need to educate parents as much as students. More than that, however, I demand that parents take some ownership of their child’s learning and wellbeing. From my experience, the problem with inner-city schools seems to be the fact that parents and students, who are mostly poor, seem to feel entitled to getting whatever they want because they are used to getting things for free. That is, when some parents send their child to school, they expect that their child will get everything he or she needs at school and do not necessarily check to make sure that this is the case. They feel no need to get involved because to them, the schools are supposed to be doing their job of educating their children. We know this is not necessarily the case.

This sense of entitlement breeds laziness and hopelessness. At school, my students demand pencils and paper. They demand bus passes. They demand that I bring them snacks for breakfast. They demand and demand and demand some more without thinking they have to work for what they get. In this country, when a person does not make enough money in this country, she or he qualifies for Medicaid, Section 8, food stamps, and other benefits. However, while these social programs are great in theory, they are often abused and mismanaged, costing the local and federal government money they could pour into adequately educating communities. Worst of all, these social programs disable the very people they are supposed to help. Basically, why work when you could collect free money for having children you cannot afford?

As conservative as this may sound, I propose that parents be asked to provide a small and affordable donation based on a sliding scale to their child’s school in an effort to make parents more invested in their children’s schooling. While our taxpayer dollars already fund public schooling, there is still not enough money for schools to function as necessary. That is not to say that some schools do not mismanage money, but if you are a teacher without text books and with needy students like me, you will realize that you, the teacher, have to spend money out your own pocket to ensure student learning. With that said, the school fees could go towards educational trips, teacher professional development, classroom supplies, special services and programs for students, guest speakers, and other necessities to improve the school. Because we are talking about public school after all, those parents who cannot afford a donation should be mandated to attend all parent/teacher conferences and to volunteer for two school activities. In other words, these parents could donate their time to their child’s education and to the school instead of their money. Is that so much to ask?

In general, people tend to take care of things on which they spend their hard earned cash. Maybe, if parents had to put money into their children’s schools in the form of a donation, they might feel as though they had a voice and a presence in the school. Maybe, donating to and investing in the school will give parents the confidence they need to demand better books, better teachers, and a better curriculum. Maybe, parents would be more involved because they have invested their money in their child’s school. Maybe. Just maybe.

One counter argument, of course, is that it is unfair to ask low-income parents to donate to a school when they do not have money in the first place. My answer to that is: have you seen the things my students have and the clothes they wear to school? Believe me, if a parent could afford a 275-dollar cell phone and the monthly payments that go along with the phone, then, they could afford a small fee to attend school. Put money where it counts the most, not on futile gadgets that will not get your children out the ghetto and into college. Besides that, if parents know they have invested some of their money into their child’s schooling, the expectation is that the parent will be more likely to make sure their child is getting an adequate education. They would be more likely to get involved to make sure they get the most of their money. Most importantly, they would feel empowered.

Something else that I have noticed from my experience teaching is that many of my student’s parents are young parents. I hate to generalize and say that young parents are not good parents, but statistics about teenage mothers prove that there is a need to combat teenage pregnancy. Teen pregnancy is a critical focus for school health interventions because the population is relatively easy to identify, at significant risk of educational failure from defined circumstances (i.e., pregnancy and child rearing), and lends itself to a health-driven response with a potential revenue stream support (i.e., Medicaid).

I charge the Department of Education with the task of developing a comprehensive plan to address health and educational issues related to teen pregnancy and parenting students. The plan should focus attention on the geographic areas and school regions with the highest number and rates of teenage pregnancy. I propose that this plan include a comprehensive, pre-adolescent and adolescent-focused pregnancy prevention program and that the Department of Education develop partnerships with health care providers to expand availability of adolescent-focused reproductive health care counseling and services, pregnancy and post-partum services, and well-baby care.

This plan should also aim at the enhancement of existing day care resources within and associated with public schools along the lines of an early childhood development model and the improvement of conditions within schools such that all pregnant and parenting students are able to take advantage of the educational and student support resources available. With these measures, I hope that there will be fewer unwanted teen pregnancies and that those children brought into this world by teen mothers will have a better future.

Opponents to this proposal may argue that having pregnant and parenting students in school may give other students ideas of having children, but driving teen mothers out of schools and not allowing them to have an equal opportunity to education can be a Title IX violation. When help, through knowledge building, comes through schools, this is the best of citizens’ tax dollars at work to prevent the expenditure of additional dollars for children of teens. If the government does not provide any support to keep pregnant and parenting teens in school, they will be more apt to have more children that they cannot care for, thus perpetuating the cycle of poverty and other social problems. Point blank: by educating a mother, you are educating the whole family.

My two proposals focus on parenting and the necessity of good, involved parenting. I could have easily become a typical Bronx statistic because everything about my neighborhood told me that there was no future outside my city block. My building was dilapidated. My school was overcrowded. My block was covered in graffiti and dominated by drugs and violence. However, my mother did not allow the many bad messages and negative influences to brainwash my mind. Through her example, she stressed the importance of education; she showed us that she cared, and so my sisters and I cared too. This is why parenting is key. This is why good parenting is even more important. This is why collective schooling and parenting is necessary because it should not be only the teacher’s job to make sure that my students succeed; it should be something we all do.

While individual, good childrearing is powerful, collective parenting and schooling is revolutionary. Children are our present and our future, and for us to only care about our own children and not our neighbor’s children is to do a disservice to our society, as we would probably all like productive individuals living among us. When issues of education and public health and of abuse and discrimination against children come up, we should all get involved. We should all fight the fight because we would want the best for our own children and thus should want the best for other children no matter which part of the world they reside. As a collective unit, we could all make a bigger difference. We should all be walking activists, fighting for all children as we would fight for our very own.

By: Dena Simmons

[This is part of our Community Policy Blog where local leaders are talking about and solving problems of national significance.]

Born on the small, Caribbean island of Antigua, my mother was neglected by her own mother. She raised herself from the time she was old enough to walk. To keep herself occupied, my mother went on adventures alone in her small country village. Sometimes, she returned from those solo excursions with bloody gashes–lifetime scars, evidence of neglect. As a confused seven-year old standing by the entrance gate of her stepmother’s house, my mother, with her mouth opened as it usually was, watched her own mother drive away in the blue Humber Hawk, never to return again. Abandoned by her mother, she was forced to live in the unfamiliar home of her father, stepmother, and two stepbrothers. There, my mother received the typical stepchild treatment. She was the outcast of the family and was ordered to do all the chores in the house to compensate for her stepmother’s allowing her to live in a home that didn’t belong to her.

Dressed in outfits made from the rough cloth of potato sacks, my mother walked barefoot along the steaming dirt roads of Powells Village to school each day. At lunchtime while other students played at recess, my mother would run back along those same roads to feed the sheep, pigs, and hen, and if she were lucky, she had a piece of bun to eat. When it was dinnertime, my mother had to wait until everyone in the house had finished eating supper to eat her own dinner. Usually during her meal, she would have to stop eating to clean after her family while they were getting ready for bed. If anything went wrong, if the dishes had not been washed properly or a sheep had gotten loose earlier in the day, my mother’s stepmother, Dada, would cuff my mother across the head.

Although it must have been hard for my mother to find any peace at her stepmother’s house, she still found happiness in her dreams of coming to the United States. When she told her stepmother that someday she wanted to raise her children in the freedom of America, Dada shrugged and replied in her strong Tortolian accent, “If you ever did go to the states, you’d probably have a ton a pikney (children) by a ton of different men.” However, my mother did not let the lack of support destroy her dream of coming to the United States. When she was eighteen years old, she left the hundred and eight square mile island of Antigua to come to the country of her dreams. With no one supporting her and no family to come to, my mother made her journey anyway.

Thirty-nine years later, my mother is still in this country, pursuing her dream of a better life. However, my mother faced her share of burdens because she is Black, an immigrant with little formal schooling, and a single mother, three strikes already against her. My mother raised my two sisters and me in a poverty-stricken, drug-infested neighborhood in the Bronx, not because she wanted to, but because living on 183rd and Creston Avenue was where she could afford to have us live. My mother’s only mission in life was to be the mother to us that she never had.

It was not unusual for my sisters and me to see drug dealers on the corner or to see gang-related fights on our way to and from school. Clearly, my mother did not allow us to hang out outside, and no matter how much we begged her to sit on our building’s stoop with friends, she made it very clear that after our after-school commitments, we were to go straight home to do our homework or to go to her office to do our homework. There was no television-watching, no hanging out, no stoop-sitting with friends; there was none of that. We were strictly told to do our homework or read. When we were done with our homework, my mother signed our homework as a stamp of approval, as a way to show us that she held us accountable for our work and that we represented her when we left the comfort of our one-bedroom apartment. No matter the many bad influences around us, my mother made clear the importance of education through her participation in our learning and through her stern, involved, and caring parenting.

Because my mother’s selfish stepmother wanted to keep my mother powerless by keeping her from school, my mother had no choice but to work in a travel agency, where she made only one hundred and fifty dollars a week, after years of being a nanny. My mother did what she had to do and made no excuses about her shortcomings. Despite not making enough money, she made up her mind before she left Antigua that her children will not attend public school and managed to send my sisters and me to the neighborhood parochial school because she wanted the best for her children. Through her constant struggle to earn enough money so that she could afford to send us to school, my mother instilled in us the importance of education. She was always working, always struggling, and always inspiring.

My mother’s hope was and is for her daughters to have a better life. Thus, it is no surprise that my mother was always searching for more educational opportunities for us. In fact, after graduating eighth grade, my sisters and I all went on to attend prestigious boarding schools in Connecticut with scholarships. From high school, we all went on to attend top New England colleges. My mother’s determination to come to this country and to make her children’s lives much better than any life she could have dreamed of continuously proves to me that anything is possible.

As a middle school teacher in the South Bronx in one of the poorest congressional districts in the nation, I often think back to the life I have and the life I could have had if I did not have such a resourceful and involved mother. I constantly thank my dear mother, who went against the grain and who struggled just so that my sisters and I could have a better life through educational opportunities. Unfortunately, most of my students are not so lucky to have a mother like my mother who was equipped and resourceful and involved enough to help her children leave the ghetto.

Now that I think back on it, it is unfortunate that my mother had to suffer as she did just so that we did not have to attend public school. Shouldn’t my mother have felt confident in sending us to our neighborhood public school? Shouldn’t all schools provide all students adequate education despite location and the race and socioeconomic status of the population’s demographic? It’s a shame that we are leaving so many children behind, so many disadvantaged brown children at that, because of our flawed education system. What could we do to improve it then?

When thinking about ways that we could redeem broken schools, I think of a million and one changes that could be made to improve our educational system: find more qualified teachers and principals who understand and respect the population they serve, allocate money more efficiently, even out the playing field, create smaller schools and smaller class sizes, engage the community in school activities, train school staff on child development, and the list goes on. However, the educational system will not change if students do not come to school equipped and ready to learn when they start their educational careers. Thus, when I think of how to redeem our education system, I have to think of my mother. I have to think of other mothers and fathers who are involved with their children’s lives and education and who revolve their lives around finding the best educational opportunities for their children. Then, I lament because I have been teaching some of my students for two years already, and I have yet to meet some of my students’ parents. I ask myself: wouldn’t you want to meet the person who spends so much time with your child?

We could improve our schools through supporting and cultivating parent involvement. There have been numerous studies citing the academic benefits of parent involvement. James Comer of Yale University has written extensively on the matter and has proved through his research that parent participation yields more successful schools. Clearly, when a student sees his or her mother or father at school, it sends the child the message that his parent cares about them and that his parent supports the work they do in school. The question, now, is: how do we get parents involved?

[This is the first in a series of posts by Dena about parental accountability. Due to the length of this piece, the answer to this question will be posted next week.]

Last week, I was in China for a research project unrelated to the massive earthquake. But China was understandably overwhelmed by the nature of the tradgedy, and people throughout the country were mourning, volunteering and donating. As a non-Chinese speaker, I attended an English-language prayer meeting for the earthquake survivors which included some speeches by leaders of non-profit organizations working in the Sichuan province. Here’s a little about some of the many, many efforts which are trying to help the millions of survivors:

Care for Children

Care for Children exists to relieve hardship, distress and sickness in abandoned and orphaned children in China by the introduction of strategic initiatives in child care practice, at the request of, and in cooperation with, the Chinese national and local authorities.

Operation Blessing

With a heart to alleviate human need and suffering, Operation Blessing’s efforts combat hunger, deprivation and physical affliction with the provision of food, clothing, shelter, medical care and other basic necessities of life.

Alpha Communities

We focus on long term development through education, restoration of degraded environment, renewable energy and micro loans. We build long term relationships with local communities and government, working together to implement holistic development strategies.

All of these organizations — along with hundreds of others — have relocated to help in any way possible with the earthquake response. I am in awe of the work of these unsung heroes in China, in Burma, and in all other tragedies (past, present and future).

The month of May is incredibly busy for us, so we won’t be posting again until June. I’m trying to get the first draft of my dissertation out of the door, and we’re traveling for work and leisure throughout the month. In June, we’ll be posting some great pieces that were submitted as part of the policy blog, so please visit us again then!

JEFFERSON CITY, MO—In high school, my mother and I waded out into the water of our cold Crane Creek to fill up some vials with creek water. For me, it was just another one of my mother’s many volunteer activities. She had decided to become a Stream Team member, and so I would help her determine the health of the stream. She and I together were one little team doing one little job in small town Missouri.

But together the efforts of little teams really can make a difference. I didn’t know it at the time, but about 68,000 other Missourians across the state were (or would be) doing the same thing. This means that about one in every one hundred people in Missouri have been partners with us in caring for our streams over the last 25 plus years: cleaning them, monitoring water quality, advocating for better policies and/or educating others.

According to the the Streams Coordination Biologist at the Missouri Department of Conservation, Mark Van Patten, the Missouri Stream Team has been so successful and so long-lived because of their commitment to letting their volunteers lead. In 1989, Van Patten, a fly-fisherman, and several of his friends started trying to clean up the stream where they fished for rare, naturally-sustaining rainbow trout. According to Van Patten, the stream “was a mess,” full of washers and dryers, tires and other household items, and the small group of friends who spent time fishing there wanted to do something about it. But their first few cleanups just didn’t seem to go anywhere. There were too many dryers and not enough fishermen.

At about the same time, a Missouri conservation group was tossing around the idea of forming something called a “Stream Team.” This group would consist of volunteers, like Van Patten, who would help keep the streams and rivers of Missouri clean and healthy. They created a prototype brochure and while the brochure was still hot off the presses, Van Patten got it, filled it out and sent it in.

The conservation department wasn’t actually ready to start the program. But unlike many organizations that bow to organizational red tape, the conservation department decided to go with it. Soon, Van Patten, along with many other volunteers, were out in the middle of a stream with the former Governor of Missouri and former Attorney General, John Ashcroft, doing a lot more than they could have ever done by themselves. In 1991, this second annual clean-up (which continues even today) cleared out 14.7 tons of trash out of a mile and half of stream.

By 1993, only 4 years after the original idea, Stream Teams wanted to expand their efforts. They no longer were just interested in cleaning the streams; they also were asking for ways to monitor the health of the waterways. And so the state gave them the resources. “[The conservation department] gives you with the chemicals you need — all of the resources — and then you go into the stream, collect the samples and send them in,” said Jeanelle Wiley, a Stream Team leader of over 10 years (and my mother).

Monitoring the health of streams across the state is vital for fisherman, farmers, and anyone who loves wildlife. “I’m a teacher, so I wanted my kids to learn about the environment. So every year I’d take the class — I still do, even though I’m retired — twice a year — to the creek. They need to understand how the water quality is affected by our actions and how the water quality can affect us. And a lot of the kids do,” Wiley said.

Van Patten works with individuals and policies at the local and state levels to ensure that waters, like those monitored by my mother, stay healthy over time. “If the water changes over time, we go to the local level first. Maybe someone doesn’t know that their sewage is going into the stream, and so we work with them to find the source of the pollution and try to deal with it there.” A lot of the volunteers on the Teams advocate for better water policy at the state legislative sessions, as well.

But no one is forced into any of these roles. Van Patten said that volunteers like my mother stay on the team and participate because “we don’t tell our teams what to do” — we say “what do you want to do and how we can help?” This philosophy keeps people coming back and has made the Missouri Stream Team into one of the leading water conservation programs in the nation that other states are now trying to replicate.

March is American Red Cross Month. This celebration was instituted in 1943 by President Franklin D. Roosevelt and has evolved into a time to remember those in our communities who are committed to giving of themselves and their time in order that others might live. As we celebrate the last day of March, I wanted to highlight some of the “hometown heros” listed on the American Red Cross website this month.

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Ten-year-old Jim Zellmer’s efforts to educate others about diabetes and raise funds to find a cure earned him the Youth Good Samaritan Hero award. The youngster, who was diagnosed with Type I diabetes in 2004, has turned the disease into a opportunity to educate others and has raised $30,000 in pledges in the last three years.

“I want to find a cure — 20 million people suffer from diabetes,” the Mill Creek Elementary School student said.

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After retiring as an educator and experiencing Hurricane Ivan as a Peace Corp volunteer in Jamaica, I came home to Hawaii looking for something to do. I saw an advertisement on a Website for a volunteer to help with Red Cross youth. I applied, was interviewed, and soon found myself overseeing the Hawaii State Chapter youth club program, which involves 500 teens ages 14-18 in 17 high schools on Oahu, Maui and Hawaii.

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Geraldine was inspired by volunteerism during World War II, watching her mother roll bandages and participate in knitting circles. She’s been a Red Cross volunteer since 1968 and has given blood through the years donating a total of 7.5 gallons.

The following promotional video highlights Geraldine and her efforts, along with Nikki Taylor, the supermodel who survived a life-threatening car crash due, in part, to the vast amounts of blood donated via the American Red Cross.

Just a quick note: I recently read a short article about a non-profit funeral home in Tulsa, OK, that opened last year. The article asserts their funerals will cost about half of what other funeral homes in the area charge. A much longer article (called Same Burial, Minus the Markup) from several years ago in the New York Times provides a great explanation as to the how this type of non-profit service is possible.

[This post is one in a series of amazing stories about amazing people doing amazing things that have been sent to me or that I’ve read over the last few weeks. If you know of anyone that should be highlighted, please email us at info@heartlandinnovators.org.]

Here’s another story that was sent to me a few weeks ago:

[Amanda] Dye, 23, opened the Energy of Hope orphanage last January in Zambia, a South African nation where 16.5 percent of the population has HIV or AIDS. Now the orphanage has 13 children, ages 6 to 14. Dye, who runs the orphanage from Liberty, [MO] is the children’s legal guardian and is responsible for financing their care and education.

The most amazing thing about this story? Amanda Dye is a student at William Jewell College. She was inspired by a speech from Oprah to get three jobs to pay for trips to Mexico and Africa. Soon after, she started the orphanage and began paying most of the expenses from her own pocket. You can read the whole story here.