Tag Archives: Good Works

Veterans Watch Over 8,000 Students Every Day

The call of duty continues for a team of veterans that keep students safe.

In 2011, the nonprofit Leave No Veteran Behind (LNVB) started the Safe Passage Program that deploys veterans in unsafe Chicago neighborhoods to watch over students as they walk to and from school.

The program’s goal isn’t only to reduce youth violence in Chicago, but to also help veterans with their student loans. The nonprofit covers the veterans’ debt and helps them look for jobs and their payment is 100-400 hours of community service, watching over the students. Leave No Veteran Behind has currently paid back over $150,000 in student loans through a Retroactive Scholarship Program.

More than 400 veterans have participated in the Safe Passage Program, watching over 8,000 Chicago students daily.

The organization plans to expand the Safe Passage Program throughout Chicago this year.

 

Church Revitalizes Gang-Infested School

An inner city Portland, Oregon school that at one time was scheduled to be closed because of gang violence and under performing students is now thriving after a partnership with a local church.

“Roosevelt High School was well known as the most under-resourced and failing school in the state. It had become a metaphor for failure, with a capital ‘F,”‘ Pastor Kip Jacob of SouthLake Church in West Linn told The Christian Post.

The school was once part of a thriving community until the late 1980s when members of the Bloods and Crips gangs moved north from Los Angeles in an attempt to extend their criminal enterprise.   The church’s facilities and grounds crumbled and it became almost impossible for students to focus on their education with the rising crime level.

Then in 2008, SouthLake Church partnered with Roosevelt to turn around the culture of the area.

“When the opportunity for that first work day came, people rallied and communicated to the kids that they are really worth it,” Pastor Jacob told CP. “That is one of the things that has been so exciting for us to see is that it has led to a renaissance of the school and the community.”

The church provides the school with clothes, hygiene products and even food for the students when they need it.  The church members also work with each academic department to see what specific needs they have for their students.

“The clean-up day went so well, the school told us that it was about a $250,000 benefit to the school. That was their evaluation. They just kept inviting us in. The needs were so great,” Jacob said. “We just filled gaps and met needs and they kept inviting us in to do that to the point where they invited us to have a staff person with an office in the school to help coordinate volunteers.”

As a result of the church’s efforts, private businesses have now joined to help the school.

“I think what happened is the church was able to be a catalyst for others to come in, businesses to come in,” Jacob said. “Nike came on board once they saw the momentum and said, ‘We can build a [turf] football field,’ and they did. Then another business came in and built a track, the best track in the Portland area. It just really rallied the community around the common good of the kids.”