For so many students, the summer brings a few weeks reprise from schoolwork and less-focused days are filled with outdoor activities, summer camps, and vacations. For more affluent students, they likely will have a few days or weeks of summer camp, too, making sure they balance their television and video game with a science lesson or organized outdoor adventure.
For low-income families, summer camps are rarely an affordable option. This disparage in opportunity is evident in what’s called the Summer Slide: the education loss youth face over the less-focused summer months. According to the National Summer Learning Association, most students lose about two months of grade level equivalency in mathematical computation skills over the summer months, and low-income students lose more than two months in reading achievement.
Especially poignant for low-income students, research shows that more than half of the achievement gap between lower- and higher-income youth can be explained by unequal access to summer learning opportunities. These gaps in learning eventually lead to lower high school graduation and college enrollment rates.
“I Have a Dream” does not let its student slide. Our summer program is a vital part of our long-term model. Our Dreamers get to spend their summer in our program, in a six- to eight-week of summer camp at no cost! During our Summer Program, Dreamers split their time between summer school, literacy and STEM building workshops, and enrichment activities that help boost their social, mental, and physical development. A select number of our high schoolers participate in a pre-collegiate program on the University of Colorado—Boulder (CU)’s campus.
Dreamers also meet with their mentors and participate in service learning opportunities. They take field trips that include educational experiences (museums), college preparatory activities (campus tours), career programming (tours and internships), and outdoor activities (rafting). For many of these students, “I Have a Dream’s” trips are the only way they will be exposed to activities like this, which help build character and life skills.
This summer program is so important to ensuring the youth’s hard work during the year doesn’t dissipate, and it works! Last year, 82% of Dreamers maintained or gained in reading level over the summer.
Our community, including you, ensures these youth have access to our Summer-Camp-like program. Our funding model asks community members to sponsor a Dreamer — and we serve 530, including our brand new La Vista Dreamer Class! — which means they provide the funding for the 10-12 years of programming as well as the money for the post-secondary scholarship. With your sponsorship or donation, you ensure our kids start the next school year ahead! A full sponsorship is a commitment of $250 a month ($3,000 a year) for 10 years to transform a child’s life, but all donation sizes are appreciated — and are collectively pooled together to fulfill the full sponsorship.
We thank you for your on-going assistance, and for sharing our project with your friends and colleagues. If you have a question about our program, please ask in the comments and we’ll respond!
Links:
On January 16, nearly 200 Dreamers marched in parades honoring Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. For these Dreamers, this day is particularly moving as the organization they participate in, the “I Have a Dream” Foundation of Boulder County, was founded on his words: “I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: ‘We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.’”
The “I Have a Dream” Foundation was founded on this idea, that all persons have a right to have equal access to a self-sufficient future. In Boulder County, the opportunity gap between low-income youth and their more affluent peers is one of the widest in the state. In the County’s school districts, only 57-65% of low-income children are reading at grade level compared to 88-90% of non-Free and Reduced Lunch (FRL) students. Falling behind at a young age leads to lower high school graduation rates — just 77% of low-income youth graduate high school compared to the overall graduation rate of 87%. And even of those that make it to high school graduation, a very small number continue to college — only 38% of low-income students will enroll in college compared to 69% of non-FRL graduates.
Following King’s dream to ensure access to education, “I Have a Dream” Foundation of Boulder County commits to helping each student through a deep, comprehensive, and long-term program that works with the youth from elementary school through high school graduation, and then into college. These youth are guided academically, socially, and emotionally by a team of supporters, including their family, school, teachers, mentors, tutors, and staff who provide daily programming from elementary school through high school graduation and one-on-one support into college. The rallying community support was illustrated during this year’s Adopt-A-Family, with more than 250 donors stepping up to provide 1,600 Dreamers and their family members with a gift this holiday.
You are part of this team. In 2015-2016, “I Have a Dream” Boulder County will serve 530 youth. This intentional and long-term intervention works: 90% of Dreamers, who are all low-income, graduate high school, and more of our youth go to and graduate from college and other post-secondary students than their low-income peers.
Our funding model asks community members to sponsor a Dreamer, which means they provide the funding for the 10-12 years of programming as well as the money for the post-secondary scholarship. With your sponsorship, we’re helping fulfill King’s dream one youth at a time. A full sponsorship is a commitment of $250 a month ($3,000 a year) for 10 years to transform a child’s life, but all donation sizes are appreciated—and are collectively pooled together to fulfill the full sponsorship.
We thank you for your on-going assistance, and for sharing our project with your friends and colleagues. If you have a question about our program, please ask in the comments and we’ll respond!
Links:
Although our Dreamers attend summer programming that ensures their reading levels and other study skills don’t drop, going back to school is a busy time for the Dreamers. New teachers. New subjects. And in some cases, a new school!
One of the immense benefits of the “I Have a Dream” program is the support Dreamers receive as they enter those big transition years—entering middle school in 6th grade and high school in 9th grade. Fortunately, because of “I Have a Dream’s” strong partnership with the school districts, we’re able to host summer programming in the new schools for these youth, so by the time the bell rings on the first day, they’ve already opened their locker and traversed the hallways of the school, making the bustling first days of school a little less stressful.
“I Have a Dream” staff are also familiar with the struggles each individual youth are likely to face; having known the Dreamers since the second or third grade, their usual challenges are familiar to our staff and so we’re able to prepare the youth based on their very specific individual needs. This allows students to start these vital transitional years with confidence.
The one-on-one attention during these transitions only occur due to your support. Your donation provides the more than 10 years of daily, year-round programming, including mentors, tutors, after-school academics, sports programs, arts and music, summer programming, field trips, and college preparation. The variety of programming and experiences we provide, including activities as simple and fun as gardening, allows our staff to know our Dreamers in different situations and therefore guide them into middle school, high school, and college.
But while “I Have a Dream’s” impact is significant, we could be doing more. With your sponsorship, another youth will see their high school graduation day. A full sponsorship is a commitment of $250 a month ($3,000 a year) for 10 years to transform a child’s life, but all donation sizes are appreciated—and are collectively pooled together to fulfill the full sponsorship.
If you’re a Colorado resident, you may qualify for a 50% Child Care Contribution Credit. “I Have a Dream” is an approved child care program in the State of Colorado, which means that your donation of $250 or greater to a qualified program is eligible for a 50% childcare contribution credit on up to $200,000 of the donation. See below for the detailed breakdown.
We thank you for your on-going assistance, and for sharing our project with your friends and colleagues. What do you think about expanding the number of Dreamers we serve? If you have a question about it, please ask in the comments and we’ll respond!
Links:
The spring is such a rewarding time for “I Have a Dream” and the youth we serve. This year, we celebrated the graduation of 18 Dreamers, 16 of which are off to college next month.
Going to college can be a daunting experience for anyone—new friends, maybe a new location, new teachers, and much more independence. For any teenager or young adult, it’s exciting and challenging, and their parents are usually a supportive force during this transition. For youth from low-income families, without the experience and knowledge of having attended college themselves, their parents aren't able to provide the same level of support to help their children apply for and be successful in college.
About 90% of our Dreamers are first-generation college students—they are the first of their family to go to college. They sought this opportunity with “I Have a Dream’s” support, which took the youth and their parents on campus tours, introduced them to different educational departments, exposed them to different careers, and so much more. “I Have a Dream” has spent 10 years with these youth, and the next four we will be beside them helping them reach college graduation. But we can’t do it without the support of our community. And you'd be joining the effort supported by First Lady Michelle Obama, whom one of our Dreamers met this July!
With your help, our low-income youth receive more than 10 years of daily, year-round programming, including mentors, tutors, after-school academics, sports programs, arts and music, summer programming, field trips, college preparation, and a lot more. And in college, we stick with them, providing financial assistance advice, scholarships, care packages, a social network, and more.
That’s why the spring is exciting. It’s a culmination of more than 10 years of work for our hard working youth and a step toward a new experience for our Dreamers and our program staff who work alongside them.
But while “I Have a Dream’s” impact is significant, we could be doing more. There are more than 16,000 low-income youth in Boulder County’s school districts—with a graduation rate of 77% for low-income students, more than 3,600 will not graduate!
With your sponsorship, another youth will see their high school graduation day. A full sponsorship is a commitment of $209 a month ($2,500 a year) for 10 years to transform a child’s life, but all donation sizes are appreciated—and are collectively pooled together to fulfill the full sponsorship.
If you’re a Colorado resident, you may qualify for a 50% Child Care Contribution Credit on their Colorado taxes since “I Have a Dream” is an approved organization for this additional credit for certain programs. See below for the detailed breakdown.
We thank you for your on-going assistance, and for sharing our project with your friends and colleagues. What do you think about expanding the number of Dreamers we serve? If you have a question about it, please ask in the comments and we’ll respond!
Links:
Think back to your last couple of years in high school, when you completed college applications, wrote essays, maybe even tackled the FASFA and other financial reports for the first time. Did your parents help? Maybe a teacher or school counselor? Or maybe you were, like many students, stuck tackling it on your own.
As College Signing Day (April 26) passes and high school seniors are making the decision on where to spend the next four years of their lives, it’s good to remember the support networks we had in getting to college. Part of that appreciation is thinking about where we might be without that support…
Many of the at-risk youth “I Have a Dream” Foundation of Boulder County works with would not have support in their college selection process without our program. After eight years of after-school and summer programming—which prepares them for college through on-going academic programming, life skills lessons, athletics, mentoring partnerships, ACT / SAT prep, college campus tours, and more—our seniors are ready to enter the next phase of their lives.
But it’s a daunting phase. According to the state, of 100 Latino students (most of our students are Latino), only 28 will enroll in college and just 20 of those will return for their second year.
This year 17 of our youth will graduate high school and 15 are going to college. By 2020, we’ll have sent 90 youth to college in just four years, and anticipate 54 of them will graduate college.
But we can’t wait until high school to begin to help these students. We need to take ACTION early because students without support fall behind quickly:
Third grade reading levels are a strong indicator of a child’s future success, and in Boulder County’s school districts, just over half of low-income children are reading at grade level (65% in St. Vrain Valley school district and 57% in Boulder Valley school district).
That trend is reflected in math scores also, with about 40% of low-income students reaching proficiency compared to about 75% in both districts.
That’s why we begin working with the students in the second or third grade. And we don’t simply place youth on the path to college, career, and self-sustainability, but we walk alongside them as they face unique struggles that could divert their path to success. It takes us 10 years to help them get there—and there are 14,500 more low-income youth in the Boulder Valley and St. Vrain Valley school districts who could use our help. We can’t help them without your support.
With your help, these 100 low-income youth (we only need 10 more!) will receive more than 10 years of daily, year-round programming, including mentors, tutors, after-school academics, sports programs, arts and music, summer programming, field trips, college preparation, and a lot more.
A full sponsorship is a commitment of $209 a month ($2,500 a year) for 10 years to transform a child’s life, but all donation sizes are appreciated—and are collectively pooled together to fulfill the full sponsorship. This funding supports youth like Alex. To connect the “real world” to our Dreamers academics, we introduce students to careers and jobs through job shadows and site tours. And it makes an impact, as it did for Alex, who did a job shadow at Sparkfun Electronics, where he shadowed the marketing director and had the opportunity to solder together one of their electronic kits. This experience sparked his interest in the hardware side of technology, and set higher personal goals for his academic achievement, especially in his weakness for homework assignments, in order to improve his grades.
If you’re a Colorado resident, you benefit by giving to “I Have a Dream” beyond the knowledge that you’re helping these students receive the strong, long-term academic and social enrichment support they need to graduate high school and have a successful post-secondary education and career. Donors who are Colorado residents will receive a 50% Child Care Contribution Credit on their Colorado taxes since “I Have a Dream” is an approved organization for this additional creditfor qualifying programs. See below for the detailed breakdown.
We thank you for your on-going assistance, and for sharing our project with your friends and colleagues. What do you think about expanding the number of Dreamers we serve? If you have a question about it, please ask in the comments and we’ll respond!
Links:
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