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Viccardo Streater was only in third grade, but was already failing in school when he spent a summer at a Freedom School in Charlotte.
There he met Maggie Dixon, the site coordinator for the summer program. That was the beginning of the end of Viccardo's bad attitude.
“She was mean from the start,” Viccardo says. “I paid attention to what she was saying. I just started doing better and better and better.”
Viccardo is 15 now, and on Friday wrapped up his sixth and final summer as a student at the Seigle Point Freedom School. He used to make Fs. He's now making As and Bs.
“I was very unprepared for the world,” he says. “I'm prepared now. They have taught me to do well in school and the world. Freedom School has changed me.”
A growing Charlotte presence
Success stories like Viccardo's explain why Temple Beth El Rabbi Judy Schindler was strutting her stuff at Christ Lutheran Church the other day, and Foundation For The Carolinas President Michael Marsicano was breakdancing, or something like it, at First Presbyterian at the same moment.
They were two of the 200 community leaders who volunteered to read books to kids at Freedom School sites across the county this summer (and to dance when the kids demanded it). Their appearances were another step in the growing presence of the Freedom School summer program in Charlotte, which has expanded from about 50 children to about 500 over the past six years. Organizers hope that's just the beginning.
Freedom Schools are summer and after-school programs that aim to encourage reading, self-worth and a love of learning. Studies show that children, particularly low-income children, fall far behind their peers in school when they spend their summers hanging out at the expense of reading and other activities that engage their brains. One study said summer reading loss is the single biggest factor in the achievement gap between poor children and their peers.
So reading is a big part of the curriculum. But from my glimpse of the programs, their worth can also be measured by how much the Freedom Schools imbue children with a sense of place, belief in self and respect for others. “I can make a difference” is the driving theme – an invaluable message that truly seems to be sinking in.
The schools are a creation of Marian Wright Edelman's Children's Defense Fund. CDF collaborates with local organizations to launch the schools. In Charlotte, Seigle Avenue Partners is the local conduit. Seigle has built the Charlotte presence from one location to nine. The schools have become such a big part of what Seigle does that it plans to change its name to Freedom School Partners.
A need that's not going away
The Freedom Schools' growth in Charlotte is largely a credit to the vision of the Seigle Avenue Partners board and the capable leadership of executive director Mary Nell McPherson. McPherson believes in the mission so much that she now wants to expand the program from 500 Mecklenburg children to 5,000.
That's a bold notion at a time when most nonprofits are hanging on by their fingernails. The group's board was hesitant to expand from six sites to nine this summer. But community partners came to them, saying they had children who needed it.
McPherson thinks it could take about $5 million to make her dream of serving 5,000 kids a reality. It's a “big, bodacious goal,” McPherson admits, but would still serve a fraction of the kids who could use such a program.
McPherson deserves credit for pursuing this vision despite the hard economic times. That approach should be an inspiration for other nonprofits.
“The need is there and it's not going away,” McPherson says. “If we don't educate children well, we'll never get out of the quandary we're in. And this is very hopeful work.”
It certainly provided hope to Viccardo Streater.
Viccardo is going into ninth grade in a couple of weeks, a freshman at Harding High. That's pressure enough, but it's not all. His father is going to prison, and Viccardo says he's expected to step up and be the man of the house for his three-year-old brother.
“I gotta be strong for my dad and my brother,” he says. “I know I can do it.”
Reach me at tbatten@charlotteobserver.com.
