A Case Study for Forward Movement in Education | Harlem Children's Zone

As you recall, I have mentioned the very moving and informative Waiting For 'Superman' documentary that chronicles the pitfalls of the US educational system.  In this must-see - Geoffrey Canada, founder of Harlem Children's Zone, is interviewed and makes several appearances throughout the movie.  He even has left viewers with insightful "quotables" about US education: "Either the kids are getting stupider every year, or something is wrong in the education system."

But how many of us truly know his story?  Here it is - as articulated in Black Faces and White Places by colleagues Dr. Randal Pinkett & Dr. Jeffrey Robinson:

"For decades many of the same problems that [people] witnessed growing up in the South Bronx plagued neighboring Harlem, where Geoffrey Canada came to work at the Rheedlen Centers for Children and Families.  Canada, who is also from South Bronx, studied education at Harvard.   He worked at Rheedlen in the late 1990s, but grew frustrated that its afterschool programs for promoting antiviolence and truancy prevention weren't doing enough to decrease the low graduation rates, criminal activity, and youth unemployment that afflicted the community.  So Canada decided to design a program to fill the gaps and transformed Rheedlen into what is known today as the Harlem Children's Zone (HCZ).

The HCZ team put together a program that connects education, health, and youth development issues and that appreciates the complexity of the urban environment.  Its comprehensive "cradle to college" philosophy includes programming for parents and babies, preschoolers, and older students.  'We had to create a pipeline that started at birth, that ensured our children came into the world health and happy, and [that] stayed with these children through every development stage of their life until they graduated, and then into college, and then we would stay with this group of children through college," Canada said.

 In 1997, the agency began a network of programs for a twenty-four-block-area -- the Harlem Children's Zone Project.  In that same year it spread to an almost 100-block area serving 7,400 children and more than 4,100 adults.  In 2009, President Obama announced that HCZ would be used as the model for a national program to create programs in twenty 'Promise Neighborhoods' and allocated $10 million toward the planning of the initiative through the US Department of Education, along with an appropriation of $65 million for 'Choice Neighborhoods," a related effort through the US Department of Housing and Urban Development."

It is clear that Canada's progress in education demonstrates that with the right measures - urban "at-risk" youth in underserved communities can become educated, meaningful contributors to society.  Why can't this type of program or project be replicated in other areas throughout the US?

Thankfully, Project Still I Rise is making similar strides to "empower youth [in underserved communities throughout Dallas] for tomorrow's opportunities."  Make a donation on http://www.psir.org/ in support of PSIR's programs and initiatives today!