Weekly Media Roundup: October 9, 2024

What Do Teens Do After School? Utica Hoping They'll Head to Parkway Recreation Center, Utica Observer Dispatch (New York)

This fall, Parkway Recreation Center in Utica, New York will open a free afterschool program for teenagers, providing them a safe space to engage in leadership activities, sports and physical fitness programs. Utica’s DeSales Center is also opening an afterschool program specifically for teens that will offer tutoring, art classes, mental health counseling and much more. “There is a clear gap in afterschool activities,” Utica’s Mayor Mike Galime told the Utica Observer Dispatch. “These programs will be in different locations, providing more access to more neighborhoods. As we move forward, we are leveraging city funding where we can and collaborating with existing community organizations to foster a better network of youth activity.”

Afterschool Programs Shouldn’t Be an Afterthought: Ken Wood, Cleveland Plain Dealer (Ohio)

In a recent guest column for the Cleveland Plain Dealer, Boys & Girls Clubs of Northeast Ohio Director of Communications Ken Wood notes that for every Ohio child enrolled in an afterschool program, five others are without access to one, leaving hundreds of thousands of students alone and unsupervised after school lets out. As a result, youth miss out on critical opportunities and juvenile crime peaks between 3pm and 6pm. “Support afterschool programs wherever they exist. They help kids develop teamwork, new skills, compassion and critical thinking skills. Those aren’t nice-to-haves. They matter,” Wood writes.

New After-School Program Locator Aims to Help Increase Access to Hamilton County Families, Chattanooga Times Free Press (Tennessee)

Families in Hamilton County, Tennessee can now search for out-of-school time programs and filter by zip code, transportation availability, program focus, grades served and more thanks to a new centralized program locator created by Chattanooga 2.0's Out-of-School Time Alliance. The organization hopes that over time, the data will be used to identify gaps in afterschool availability and encourage targeted investment. Brandon Hubbard-Heitz, Chattanooga 2.0's director of literacy and student strategies, told the Chattanooga Times Free Press that out-of-school time programming plays a critical role in “not just supporting working parents and keeping kids safe after school, but also supporting their academic achievement and success in the workforce.”

South Dakota Afterschool Programs Receive STEM Grants, Dakota News Now (South Dakota)

Thanks to STEM Next Opportunity Fund’s Exploring Career Connections in STEM initiative, afterschool programs in Missouri, Nebraska, South Carolina, and South Dakota will enhance their STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) offerings as well as provide internships and apprenticeships in those fields to students. “What we’re going to do is move into more of a career opportunity,” Billy Mawhiney, executive director of South Dakota Afterschool Network and an Afterschool Alliance Afterschool Ambassador, told Dakota News Now. “80,000 hours of paid internship for youth from ages 14 to 21 [with] biotech companies. They’re going to be in afterschool programs providing STEM education. They’re going to be to be working in the healthcare field where they can learn and explore and grow.” The South Dakota Afterschool Network reports students are seven times more likely to pursue STEM careers and educational opportunities when exposed to STEM in an afterschool setting.