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HPKCC
helps Neighborhood Club teens learn their city via transit This
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The following letter and
release describes HPKCC's 2010 grant to Hyde Park Neighborhood Club. A similar
grant was given in 2009.
Club Executive Director Jennifer Bosch and Children's Program Director Abigail
Hymen wrote gracious letters of thanks with updated description of this year's
activities for the teen discovery program.
Hyde Park-Kenwood Community Conference is pleased to announce a grant of $2,400 in June 2010 to Hyde Park Neighborhood Club for the CTA passes for the component of its Summer Teen Program that makes teens learn their city and find interesting places and report on them and in the process get used to using public transportation.
HPKCC helps Club’s teens learn city via transit. As in Conference Reporter August 2010 Vol. 16 No. 2, adapted and expanded from July 7 HP Herald with a couple of suggestions from the Club. By Gary Ossewaarde
For a second year, Hyde Park-Kenwood Community Conference is pleased to underwrite transit cards for teens in Hyde Park Neighborhood Club’s Summer Teen camp.
In this program, one of several for children and youth at the Club, young teens learn self-reliance in using public transportation options, many through do-it-yourself finding, mapping, and research trips that lead to engaged citizenship. Each trip supported a variety of lesson topics that changed weekly, as well as exposure to new places and people, and to teh environmental and personal advantages of making transit a first and primary choice.
Abigail Hymen, Director of Youth Programs, wrote regarding the 2010 program:
"This summer, our Teen Program will continue to educate on the importance of public transportation but we are also making certain our kids are school ready, college ready, and job ready. Learning will be fun, with engaging research projects and trips to archives, museums, [and] historical sites. We have planned college visits for those who are considering their next step in higher education. To give our teens food for thought about career choices, they will be taking "behind the scenes" tours of sites such as NBC and teh CTA [12 in all]. We will put their train and bus know-how to the test with two exciting, week-long events: Where in the City? and The Amazing Race."The Conference is pleased to help the Neighborhood Club continue to grow its overall strength and relevance to the neighborhood, in this case by increasing out-of-school enrichment and learning options for youth. Such enrichment is also a major focus of the Hyde Park-Kenwood Community Conference Schools Committee. We believe organizations and centers such as the Neighborhood Club can bring flexibility and seek funds that the schools often cannot.
A large number of the teens in Neighborhood Club programs come from Canter Middle School and Kenwood Academy; teh younger participants come from a variety of local public and private schools, and nearly all live within a two-mile radius. Teens in the programs are passing their classes, and 93 percent leave each day with their homework done. Some programs are free or have case-by-cases access to assistance.
The Club's child and youth programs are high quality, varied, and include strong intergenerational experience. We believe that even in troubled times our community's suite of such specail places and programs can and should flourish and can provide synergy to schools' programs. Of course we also believe that programs in the schools can and must be re-grown, expanded and enriched.
Our Transit and Access Task Force, whose chairman, James Withrow, worked with Neighborhood Club Director Jennifer Bosch to initiate HPKCC's collaboration, is pleased to see young people learning to use their transportation options and getting around the city--a trend that has been noted citywide and nationally. Perhaps th is program can inspire the rest of us to do likewise.
HPKCC is therefore pleased to join many others who are supporting Hyde Park Neighborhood Club as it continues to renew and grow its serices as a center for all ages, and as it renew its facility at the start of its second 100 years.