The Learning Alliance Moonshot Rocket bus landed in the parking lot of the school district campus recently to help celebrate Indian River County being named a Bright Spot Community.
The award was presented by the nationwide Campaign for Grade-Level Reading in recognition of the community’s exemplary and innovative responses during the COVID crisis to children’s education and health.
Communities had been invited to submit stories to the CGLR in a “What’s Working Exchange” that highlighted the various ways they had worked to ensure that children and families had sufficient access to their needs.
Ron Fairchild, CGLR senior consultant, related during an MCAN Zoom meeting that of the more than 500 submissions from 170 communities across the country, nearly 80 of them came from Indian River County. Indian River County was among 54 communities recognized for its efforts to mitigate the effects of the pandemic, especially pertaining to children’s access to education, food and health services.
The 80 accounts, gathered and submitted by the Learning Alliance, demonstrated the efforts undertaken by members of the Moonshot Community Action Network, made up of community partners, law enforcement and the school district, during the pandemic. Their approach, which piggybacked on the work already being undertaken by MCAN, ensured that student education and care were continued, unlike many other places around the country.
“Indian River County is a perennial leader in the Grade-Level Reading network. I don’t think of you as a small community. I think of you as a powerhouse that’s generating so much knowledge with insight in how to do this work for others to follow across the country,” said Fairchild. “You hold a disproportionate impact on the success of that knowledge exchange of information in our network. I just continue to have so much respect and admiration for everything you’re doing.”
Fairchild identified attendance, technology, meal distribution and tutoring as just a few of the crucial areas that enabled a continuous forward momentum so that children could recover and flourish academically and socially-emotionally.
CGLR members were impressed with the school district’s distribution of laptops and Chromebooks to about 73 percent of the student population, coupled with substantial IT support. Additionally, the district offered parents the choice of virtual, in-person and transitional educational models for their children, and some 10,463 meals were delivered each day to 45 sites over 22 weeks.
The community as a whole pulled together to deliver a variety of programs and services to families with children. Tutoring programs went virtual; learning kits were supplied, and in some cases delivered; healthcare and vaccines were provided; modified summer camps were offered; and financial assistance was offered for rent, utilities and prescriptions.
Fairchild suggested that the community take stock of the adaptations and innovations made during the pandemic and consider continuing some of those practices.
“The nation recognizes what is going on here,” said Ray Oglethorpe, TLA board chair, as he presented the school district with a Bright Spot certificate.
Oglethorpe cited the innovative responses and hard work of the school district that resulted in an increase from 67 percent of students attending in-person classes at the start of the school year to about 85 percent at its close.
“From Day One, the entire district pulled together to support our students, from human capital operations to IT to food service workers, bus drivers, everybody in this whole community from the external organizations that support us. This success is all of your successes,” said Richard Myhre, assistant superintendent of curriculum and instruction, speaking on behalf of the school district.
In his letter to the Learning Alliance announcing the award, Ralph Smith, CGLR managing director, wrote: “We applaud the civic leaders and local funders whose time, talent, energy, and imagination allowed them to quickly adapt and meet this moment. They truly are bright spots, and we congratulate them for the differences they’re making. We look forward to learning from their success as we move onto a post-COVID learning environment.”
The nationwide Campaign for Grade-Level Reading is “a collaborative effort of funders, nonprofit partners, business leaders, government agencies, states and communities across the nation to ensure that many more children from low-income families succeed in school and graduate prepared for college, a career and active citizenship.”
For more information, visit thelearningalliance.org or moonshotmoment.org.
Photos by Kaila Jones
