For the first time in years, when school opened at Burnley-Moran Elementary, the Westhaven Afterschool Program remained closed. Former program director Harold Folley told C-VILLE in June that a grant administered by the Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors since 2007 was no longer available, and he hoped to find more funds to reopen the program during the 2010 school year. When public school resumed without the program, however, some students from Westhaven—the city’s 126-unit public housing project on Hardy Drive—went to Folley’s house to do their homework.
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A former student of the Westhaven Afterschool Program takes part in the neighborhood’s portrait project. Thanks to Dave Matthews Band’s charitable fund and oversight from the Big Brothers Big Sisters, the afterschool program will return in coming weeks. |
Now, thanks to contributions from Dave Matthews Band’s Bama Works Fund and oversight from the Big Brothers Big Sisters of the Central Blue Ridge, the program is slated to reopen in a matter of weeks. The local Big Brothers Big Sisters chapter, part of a national network of nonprofit mentoring programs, will serve as a fiscal sponsor for the afterschool program, to help locate additional funds.
“We’re supporting Big Brothers Big Sisters, and Big Brothers Big Sisters is supporting the Westhaven Afterschool Program,” says Ann Kingston of Red Light Management, DMB’s management company. Bama Works awarded $270,000 in grants through the Charlottesville Area Community Foundation in June. Mayor Dave Norris, executive director of the local Big Brothers Big Sisters, did not offer a funding total figure but said there are “commitments in place to fund the first year” of the program.
The afterschool program, which historically offers snacks, homework help and the occasional local field trip, should open again during the next few weeks. It will run four afternoons a week rather than two, and will remain at the Westhaven Community Center, where two part-time staff members (including one Westhaven resident) will assist students.
“Harold’s been doing this on his own,” says Norris. “Now, we have the administrative side, and Harold has the passion for the kids, and the history with the program.”
However, Folley—now a full-time organizer for the Virginia Organizing Project—will not be among the staff. Rather, he will be part of a formal advisory board composed of longtime friends of the afterschool program, which has previously hosted volunteers from The Bridge/Progressive Arts Initiative and Light House Studio youth filmmaking program.
The local Big Brothers Big Sisters organization currently works with 10 or so “little brothers and sisters” from Westhaven, and has more students from the housing project on its waiting list. With the additional funding, Norris says Big Brothers Big Sisters hopes to increase its staff capacity, but adds, “I think we would take this [program] on even if it weren’t going to affect our mentoring program.”
Folley says he is happy to see Big Brothers Big Sisters take an oversight position with the afterschool program. “That was the icing on my day, going there to see kids smile, get their homework done,” says Folley about the program. “That was good therapy for me, as an organizer, doing what I do.”
