Three-hundred new volunteers from the national AmeriCorps program are on their way to some city schools that desperately need them. NY1's Lindsey Christ filed this report.
The city's most struggling schools are about to get an infusion of bright-eyed, enthusiastic, do-gooders: 300 AmeriCorps volunteers—a small army that education officials hope will turbocharge their efforts to turn around poor performing schools.
"The goal is to help every child come to school, to stay on track and to graduate," says AmeriCorps Director Bill Basl.
The influx of volunteers is being underwritten by a two-year grant from the Corporation for National and Community Service. It's a new federal initiative, and the city is the first local government to win any funding.
"The competition was very stiff," Basl says.
Officials say it will provide about $10 million over two years.
"We always take money. This is good!" says Schools Chancellor Carmen Fariña.
The chancellor announced the grant Tuesday with the head of AmeriCorps.
"I think sometimes we think of work as something you do because you have an end goal. The end goal is to be a better person and to feel wanted and loved and nurtured. And that's the job you can do very differently than a teacher, than a parent," Fariña says.
The new volunteers will work across the 128 schools the city is trying to turn into so-called community schools—offering social services, so students can get help with problems that might have nothing to do the classroom, like a sore tooth or a persistent bully.
"The only thing that those schools all have in common is high absenteeism. That's the only thing. They're all different in other ways. That's the commonality," says Fariña.
The volunteers will be focused on getting individual kids to school, and boosting attendance rates.
The city is under pressure to improve the schools quickly—with some education advocates saying the mayor's plan is not aggressive enough, and Governor Andrew Cuomo threatening to step in if the mayor hasn't made significant changes within the next year.
The chancellor says 300 extra pairs of hands on deck will only help.