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Summer program inspires learning
summer enrichment program showcases participants
By Denise Dick
YOUNGSTOWN
A program that helps students brush up on academics while exposing them to new places and experiences capped its first year in the city by recognizing participants’ achievements and showcasing their talents.
About 75 city school students in third through eighth grade spent six weeks of their summer vacation in the first Inspiring Minds Summer Enrichment Program in Youngstown. The program started in Warren in 2006.
Inspiring Minds, which is free for students through grants and fundraisers, allows students to practice math on computers, swim, play sports, perform yoga, cook and take field trips.
Eryka Walden, 8, a third-grader at Paul C. Bunn Elementary School, says that Inspiring Minds helps people, and she believes the things she learned will help her in school this fall.
“I liked when we went swimming and played football,” Eryka said.
Namarcus Rutledge, 8, also a third-grader at Bunn, liked the activities “like when we built a tower out of marshmallows. Whoever built the tallest tower won a $5 gift card.”
It was fun, he said.
“We tried out best, but we didn’t win,” Namarcus said.
Dejuan Thomas, 12, a William Holmes McGuffey Elementary School sixth-grader, enjoyed the program, too.
“I just loved it,” he said.
Friday was the last day for the summer program, and students earned gift cards, new shoes, headphones and a Kindle Fire for their attendance, improvement, skills mastered and commitment. Families watched their children sing, dance, act and execute martial-arts moves in the program’s talent show.
Deryk Toles, founder and executive director, said the plan is to offer an after-school program starting this year like the one in Warren. Next year’s summer enrichment in Youngstown also may grow to include high-school students.
“It’s important that we indoctrinate students and their families in the IM way,” he said.
That philosophy imparts the importance of education and program participation.
“We require 100 percent participation,” Toles said.
Douglas Hiscox, deputy superintendent for the city schools, gives the program high marks.
“This is just an awesome program,” he said. “You see so many changes from when the kids start with the program to when it ends.”
The program doesn’t limit participation based on grades or behavior, Hiscox said. It’s open to anyone.
Toles, a Warren native who played in the NFL until sidelined with an injury, recalled a story of one former IM student.
“There was a young man [in Warren] who didn’t graduate on time because he didn’t pass the math part of the proficiency test,” he said.
The organization provided a math tutor, and the boy passed the test, graduated and went to Lincoln University in Pennsylvania to study biology.
“He struggled and did everything he had to do,” Toles said. “This past May he graduated and is going to Delaware State University” to earn an advanced degree.