It's all good in the hood!!!!

Greetings from Dorchester (aka Christina and Meredith),

As a pioneer program for the Dorchester area, things are doing good. We have 14 coaches total, 7 for each night. There are are 28 students enrolled in the program and as of our last program night 22 were in attendance. Of the 6 students absent 3 still expressed interest in the program and the remaining three were unreachable. Our site is actually two separate buildings of classrooms, which is at times difficult because the doors are locked at all times and when students are late they have to come to the main building to be escorted to their classroom. Also most of our coaches are coming from the cambridge or wellesley area and thus have long commutes. They have a hard time getting to the program on time, because they are coming during rush hour. Another issue is snack. Our site is sponsored by the Codman Square Health Ctr and so they regulate what foods can be brought into the building and our snacks did not pass approval. We have to work on getting "healthier" snacks. Our site host contact, Meredith, has given us some left over snacks from the school year.



Positive notes are that we gave away our first prizes: delicious cupcakes!!!! 6 students won cupcakes for excellent attendance. It was done in front of all the teens in the program and we made it a big deal. Most kids are coming from work and have not eaten full meals and love the idea of a juciy cupcake!!!! I think that will really help with keeping kids coming back.



This past Sat Meredith and myself went fundraising in the local Dorchester area. It was a successful day with many people willing to donate, with a following fax request.