Communities In Schools of Chatham County

For 25 years bringing Chatham County Together!

Youth

Garry and Shymein

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Garry Sronce and his mentee, Shymein move around a lot! Just check out the ol’ log book. 47 miles hiking and an impressive 83 miles biking various trails. That’s 130 miles in 4 years.

83 miles is tough on one’s bike. Recently Garry and Shyein visited The ReCYCLEry NC in Carrboro. Dave, a ReCYCLEry volunteer, and Shymein looked over dozens of bikes until Shymein found “the one” that would replace his old 1 speed green bike. The new one would be a shiny silver, 21 speed.

In one afternoon, Shymein became a bike mechanic. He and Dave replaced brake cables, fixed the derailer, replaced the handle grips, seat and tire tube. They even trued up a tire rim that was not perfectly round. Next, they checked the gears to make sure they were working, then cleaned it up. And just like that, Shymein was the proud owner of a new bike.

When asked if this was the highlight of the match, Garry said “I learned a lot. I totally enjoyed our Saturday outing. Now Shymein thinks he is an expert bike mechanic.” Garry reflected on the many activities he and Shymein participated in. “My greatest moment of joy with Shymein was when he said that he never knew how to skip rocks until he met me. It brought back so many fond memories of raising my two sons.”

The ReCYCLEry NC is a non-profit located in Carrboro, North Carolina that teaches bicycle repair and maintenance and allows community members to earn their own bikes.

CIS’s Shirille Lee on Mentoring, Intervention

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Shirille Lee, the Student Support Specialist for Youth FIRST for Chatham Communities In Schools, joined the CIS team as a staff member in 1998. But long before that, she was a volunteer mentor and board member. Her full-time service to CIS has included being the Governor’s One-on-One mentoring coordinator and Volunteer and Youth Services coordinator. She brings infectious enthusiasm the job and says she is guided each day by a favorite quote: “To the world you may be one person; but to one person you may be the world.”

In 2018, Lee initiated a new program at CIS, “Mentoring Plus,” where she began working more directly with schools to provide mentoring, lunch buddies and other kinds of supports for students. It’s funded by the United Way of Chatham County, Chatham County government and generous individual sponsors.

Communities In Schools’ Shirille Lee works to identify behavior problems and other issues in schoolchildren. She then pairs the child with mentors to improve behavior. She has started a new program, ‘Mentoring Plus’, to assist children in schools.

With Youth FIRST (Finding Integrated Resources & Supports Together), Lee coordinates individual, case-managed intervention services to reach referred students in Chatham County. In the past year she served 68 youth across 11 schools, with a concentration of services at three schools: Pittsboro Elementary School, Horton Middle School and Siler City Elementary. Lee works with each student to complete a needs assessment and a student support plan identifying an attendance, behavior or coursework goal. The students have monthly check-ins, and parents are encouraged to be more engaged with their child’s teacher and school. This week, the News + Record spoke with Lee about her role and the mentoring program.

What drew you to this work?

I believe we all have gifts. At one time I was at a crossroad in my life and thought I wanted to do something different, explore another gift (I had been youth leader at my church for over a decade). I didn’t really know what I was looking for but when I read an article in The Chatham News about mentoring, I signed up before I knew what I was doing. I later followed up that decision with signing up to be a foster parent for Chatham County Department of Social Services. I thought I was on a different path, but it lead me right back to working with children, just in a different capacity.

Working for CIS is the dream job!!! It’s like having your cake and eating it too!

How would you describe what mentoring is to someone who may not know what it is?

Mentoring is all about opportunity and exposure.

As a mentor you have the opportunity to expose youth to positive things in their community, include them in things they may not get a chance to explore for many reasons. It’s hard to prepare a meal or read a book together for a single parent who works 12-16 hours a day or go to the planetarium or the zoo when you’re struggling to make ends meet. A mentor can step in and provide those experiences. Surprisingly some of the favorite activities for mentees were grocery shopping, cooking a meal and sitting down together to eat that meal, working in the garden or flower bed, enjoying the peace and quiet.

It’s not about money and the things a mentor could buy, but the time spent together. Mentoring is about sharing your story. Sometimes we (adults and youth) just focus on the end results and never share what it took to reach the goal. Our youth need to hear the story and know that they can persevere and achieve.

Shirille Lee, of Communities In Schools of Chatham County, reviews a letter sent to her at her office on North Chatham Avenue as she works to pair mentors with children in need. She’s worked at the center full-time since 1998.

Certainly, mentoring is about giving, but it’s also about receiving. It’s an amazing feeling to know that you are making/have made a difference in a person’s life. You learn so much from your mentee about resilience and endurance. You also learn a lot about yourself and a sense of gratitude for the informal mentors that influence you.

How does mentoring benefit a young person?

Mentoring provides additional support for a youth. Whether academic, recreational or emotional support, a mentor can be there to help meet the need. Mentoring gives a young person the opportunity to experience new things that could have life changing effects. A trip to the ballet or museum to expose a creative, artistic side or helping in a garden and cooking a meal together, exposing an interest in culinary arts. The possibilities are endless.

How do you find volunteers, what is the process for an applicant, what kind of training and supervision is offered?

Finding volunteers can be challenging. We make posts, write articles, do presentations at churches and civic meetings/events, post flyers and information in neighborhood newsletters/e-letters, but it’s mostly word of mouth from current and former mentors.

How do parents feel about their child having a mentor? How do you work with parents of mentees?

This program is voluntary, so parents make the decision to allow their child to participate. Most parents recognize the possibilities of what mentoring can offer. I work with parents to make sure all their questions are answers. Allowing a stranger to leave with your child can be difficult, so just helping parents to process those feelings. When needs are identified, helping parents find resources and encouraging parents to build a relationship with the schools if one is not established are just a few of the things when working with parents.

How do you decide which kids get mentors since there is a limited number of volunteers available?

The decision can be difficult, but we look at location. We try to match within a 10-12 mile radius, we look at interest — mentor and youth, parent support — whether parent is really supportive of match, whether youth is open to the match and possibly trying new things. We look at goals — what the youth, parent and mentor hope to accomplish to see if it’s compatible. We look at temperament as well as energy levels for compatibility.

What does mentoring look like? What does it consist of?

Minimum requirement of four hours per month for one year. Don’t try to create time for mentoring, but include mentee in things you are already doing — gardening, cooking, hiking/walking, grocery shopping. Other activities are fun too, but it’s about the time spent together.

If you’re interested in hearing more about volunteer opportunities, contact Shirille at shirille@cischatham.org

A Network of Support Makes a Difference!

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CISCC would like to congratulate Armani Baldwin, 2018 graduate of Northwood High School, for being recognized on the Dean’s List at Chowan University, Murfreesboro, NC (Spring 2019). Students who receive this honor have successfully achieved a grade point average between 3.25 and 3.79 for the semester. We celebrate Armani for his academic success and award of distinction.
Armani was in second grade when he matched with his CISCC mentor, Megan Bolejack on September 7, 2007. For more than 6 years their relationship blossomed. Even after officially ending the match, Megan and Armani managed to stay in touch.
In 2013, Armani’s biggest advocate, his mother Theresa, requested a math tutor for Armani and Stephen Townsend stepped up to the plate. Steve had worked with other CISCC youth and had a proven track record of helping students increase their grades. Armani was no different. Through hard work and practice Armani achieved Math grades he wanted. Armani, CISCC is extremely proud of you!

“Programs Don’t Change People, Relationships Do” ~Bill Milliken

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The mission of Chatham County Schools (CCS) is “to graduate globally competitive and confident students by providing a rigorous and relevant curriculum in a supportive, safe and nurturing learning environment.” This is a lofty mission, and it’s difficult to achieve when many students face serious challenges both inside and outside of the classroom. That is why the work Communities In Schools of Chatham County (CISCC) does is so important.  Joelle Brummitt-Yale, CISCC board member, says she values CISCC “for being the piece that schools don’t have time to address. CIS Chatham works to help youth be ‘well’ and that includes academically, socially, and behaviorally.” Taking a holistic and targeted approach to helping students succeed in school and in life is especially illustrated through CISCC’s school-based program.

Chatham Middle School (CMS) in Siler City is one of two sites where the school-based program is implemented. Students who attend CMS live  in a community with many identified risk factors that impede their learning and the likelihood that they will stay in school. These factors include, but are not limited to, poverty, discrimination, housing instability, hunger, poor health, limited extracurricular activities and high levels of daily stress. The CISCC school-based model places Student Support Specialists directly inside schools where they serve as the single point of contact in addressing students’ needs. Tych Cowdin has been the CISCC Student Support Specialist at CMS since the fall of 2014. Since then, he has built strong relationships with school administrators and community partners to secure vital supports that are tailored to students’ and families’ individual circumstances.

Cowdin has one foot in the school and one foot in the community, and he brings them together beautifully. The support that he provides can be as basic as asking local businesses to provide school supplies, volunteers to provide academic assistance or partnering with a local church to provide students in need extra food on the weekends. Support can also be more intensive in the form of small groups and one-on-one check-in addressing bullying, anger management, and dealing with grief. Support can even be after-school enrichment activities. Whatever the needs are, the goal is to combine strong one-on-one relationships with evidence-based programs that leverage resources and remove barriers that keep students from succeeding.

According to Abby Bishop, School Counselor at CMS, “Tych has had a major impact on the students at CMS. He has a caseload of students he serves, but he also has a presence at the school where all students know him and want to work with him. He does a wonderful job of being around and being available to students.” Ms. Bishop is grateful for the many programs and services Cowdin has coordinated such as: summer camp placements, Cooking Matters, yoga classes, Strengthening Families Program, and many more. He works with CMS students about their behavior and focuses on the social/emotional development of each student so they have better academic outcomes. Bishop says, “Tych relates to the students and they feel comfortable opening up to him. He’s such a huge asset to our school! Tych is not only loved by all CMS students, he’s also loved by the CMS staff!” CMS principal Chad Morgan agrees. He said, “Cowdin’s “impact on the school has been just monumental,” and that his “greatest asset to our school is his ability to build relationships. He focuses on building relationships with all stakeholders…and his energy to serve is contagious.” Morgan adds that Cowdin does “not just start programs for the sake of starting programs. He listens, reviews data, and seeks feedback from all stakeholders to ensure the programs implemented match the needs of the school.” The needs assessment, student support plans, and ongoing monitoring of student data are all elements of the proven CIS school-based model; but, as Communities In Schools founder Bill Milliken said, “Programs don’t change kids-relationships do.”

Cowdin says, “It really boils down to a lot of mentoring. Kids often don’t have anybody they can view as a role model or somebody to talk with or look up to—somebody there at school they can have a relationship with.” Attendance, Behavior, Coursework + Parent and family engagement are the focus areas guiding  CISCC’s school-based work, but this ABC+P model only works with strong relationships inside and outside of the school.

The program’s positive impact is reflected in what community members and partners are saying. Recently, participants in the Hispanic Liaison Youth Program in Siler City participated in a focus group as part of a community assessment for the Building Integrated Communities Project out of UNC Chapel Hill on how the youth cope with daily stresses. The draft report stated that the youth may not be able to tell you what ‘programs’ helped them, but they talked about the “great person at Chatham Middle who built relationships with the kids, was enthusiastic and cared about them.

Erika Guy has been volunteering at CMS regularly for the last two years, conducting school-wide seminars, small groups, and helping coordinate the healthful cooking classes, and she speaks highly of the collaboration that has been fostered at CMS. She said to Cowdin, “I cannot adequately express how much fun it has been to collaborate with you over these last two years.  What I missed the most when I left my job in Boston, was working with a team of similarly motivated folks—always thinking creatively about how to make the lives of kids just a little bit better. I have found that with you and Abby Bishop, CMS and CISCC.”

Thinking creatively and working together to make the lives of the children and families a little bit better—essentially helping add to their overall wellness— that’s what it’s all about.   

To learn more about CISCC school-based model, the work done and partnerships made, please contact Tych Cowdin, Program Director/Student Support Specialist, Chatham Middle School at tcowdin@cischatham.org or (919) 663-0116 ext. 413

 

“Our kids are hungry for knowledge. We just need to feed them the right way.”~Jazmin Mendoza Sosa

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In November 2016, with increased support from Chatham County Schools, Communities In Schools Chatham County (CISCC) expanded its services to Virginia Cross Elementary (VCE) in Siler City to reach the younger siblings of Chatham Middle School (CMS) students and their classmates. Jazmin Mendoza Sosa is the CISCC Student Support Specialist at VCE, and she is great at putting out fires. In fact, she’s even better at preventing fires from starting in the first place. Mendoza Sosa serves as a liaison within the school and also between the school and the community. Whether it’s making sure the school staff is aware of CISCC volunteers coming into the school, helping teachers and non-native English speaking parents communicate, directly helping students needing extra attention, or bridging the school and the community, Mendoza Sosa works with passion and skill. She is especially invested, because, as she tells her students and families, “I was one of you. I grew up in Siler City. My parents are hard workers too. You can work hard and be like me!”

Mendoza Sosa works with 54 students (10% of the school’s population) on emotional, social, and behavioral learning. These students have been identified as needing extra supports to what VCE already has in place. These children have different needs with different intensities, and Mendoza is exceptionally skilled at understanding these needs, anticipating supports, and finding help. Sometimes Mendoza Sosa works with small groups of children, and sometimes she goes into the classroom to work with students one on one. Whether in the classroom, a small-group setting or walking in the hallways, Mendoza Sosa models the behaviors and skills she is trying to teach. She constantly assesses each situation, “thinks on her feet,” and appropriately responds to the individuals’ and groups’ needs.

Mendoza Sosa has 30 minutes each week to work with a small group of 1st graders and 30 minutes each week to work with a small group of 3rd graders—both during the students’ lunch period. She maximizes every minute she has with them to teach pro-social skills (e.g., sharing, helping, cooperating, and empathy). Mendoza Sosa teaches responsibility and how to share by assigning each student rotating jobs such as line leader, door holder, and bathroom monitor. Mendoza Sosa also demonstrates different ways to handle situations, often on the spur of the moment, according to what students are dealing with right then. For example, she concluded a discussion with the 1st graders on strategies to use when they were disappointed by having to divide two cookies four ways. Mendoza Sosa kindly, but firmly, explained, “We don’t always get what we want. It’s ok to be disappointed. But it’s not ok to call people bad names or hit someone.” The children ended up being ok with sharing their cookie. After all, what’s better—half of a cookie or no cookie at all?

In addition to working with children in small groups and one on one, Mendoza Sosa is instrumental in communicating information between the VCE teachers and parents—especially the parents who do not speak English. She might text or call to stress the importance of children taking their ADHD medication the weekend before EOG tests. Or she might remind parents to sign permission slips for students attending summer Reading Camp. Both the teachers and parents appreciate Mendoza Sosa’s vitality in linking the school, homes, and the community. A first-year teacher at VCE with students on Mendoza Sosa’s caseload recently said, “I honestly don’t know how I would’ve made it through the year without her. She was a valuable asset to me and the students who had behavioral struggles. She is truly an amazing person to work with. She always helps to give other possible options to handling difficult situations and students. She helped with parent communication and was great at getting my concerns addressed to the parents. Ms. Jazmin is undeniably the greatest asset I had at VCE the year.”

Mendoza Sosa’s work doesn’t stop when the school year ends, though. She and the media specialist at VCE, Lindsay Shore-Wright, are taking an existing resource to higher levels this summer by expanding the Bookmobile.  Beginning on June 13th and running through August 22nd, each Wednesday VCE will bring a library on wheels to 10 neighborhoods in Siler City. This summer, though, extra activities are planned at two of the stops—activities that reinforce literacy skills and encourage reading for fun. The goal is to double the numbers of Bookmobile participants from last year. Snacks, prizes, bookmarks, pencils, and erasers will be given out and craft and reading comprehension activities will be done. There will even be a volunteer reading aloud at these two sites each week.

Not all parents feel comfortable going into their children’s schools, or even onto the Bookmobile.  Last year it took all summer for one parent to feel comfortable getting on the Bookmobile to help pick out a book for her child. Mendoza Sosa wants the whole experience to be friendlier and include more than checking out books. The weekly Bookmobile visits will give Mendoza Sosa the opportunity to engage families and find out from parents what kinds of things they need to support reading with children and their children’s learning in general. Krista Millard, formerly with Chatham Reads— whose mission is to foster community partnerships that are dedicated to ensuring that literacy and reading resources are accessible to all Chatham County residents—said that Jazmin is an integral part of the Bookmobile’s success. “She provides a safe place for families to come and access books over the summer. She interprets and is a familiar face to the students.” Mendoza Sosa is passionate about trying new things to benefit students. She tells the families, “I care about your family. We need to work together to help your child succeed.”

Mendoza Sosa lives her passion and will track data from this summer’s Bookmobile to see if the extra efforts are making positive impacts. “Our kids are hungry for knowledge,” Mendoza Sosa says. “We just need to feed them the right way.” There is no indication that Mendoza Sosa will stop until the right way is found.

For more information on the work done at Virginia Cross Elementary School or with the Bookmobile, please contact Jazmin Mendoza Sosa, Student Support Specialist, at  jmendozasosa@cischatham.org or by calling (919) 663-0116 ext. 410

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