Smart Business Magazine, February 2016
22 Smart Business Columbus February 2016 Setting up a continuum City Year Columbus has been around for more than 20 years but since 2010 the organization has become more strategic about its mission Thats paying off as the nonprofit expanded into two new schools this academic year Trevitt Elementary and Champion Middle schools to bring its total up to six Our goal is for our students to be able to have a City Year core member from the time they start third grade until they get to 10th grade says Tasha Booker executive director and vice president Studies have shown if a student gets to 10th grade on track on time they are four times more likely to graduate from high school City Year is a federal AmeriCorps program where recent college and high school graduates commit to a year of service They work in the schools every day helping students who are at risk of failing English and math have an average daily attendance rate of less than 90 percent and behavioral challenges In return the 54 volunteers receive a monthly living stipend and close to 6000 which can be used for future education costs or to pay back student loans Booker says City Year is already seeing results from the expansion Champion Middle School reported a 50 percent decrease in behavior incidents over last year which is huge and theyve attributed it to the additional support of City Year she says Focus down City Year used to respond to Columbus City Schools as they asked for help We werent really strategic and thoughtful into where we went Booker says Now the organization is focusing on the elementary and middle schools that feed into four high schools Through laser like focus City Year hopes to have a long term impact following students to higher grades and providing a continuum of programming a concept based on research by Johns Hopkins Universitys School of Education So it just made sense to follow the research and not be so sporadic with SOCIAL MEDIA To learn more about City Year Columbus like its Facebook page www facebook com cityyear and follow on Twitter @ CityYearCbus City Year Columbus expands to two new schools as it follows the research BUILDING STRONGER COMMUNITIES CITY YEAR COLUMBUS BROUGHT TO YOU IN PARTNERSHIP WITH THE PILLAR FOUNDATION AND MEDICAL MUTUAL BY JAYNE GEST JGEST@ SBNONLINE COM
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