Partnerships

Many Rochester schools need a community partner to provide a helping hand to students not performing at grade level. Knowledgeable educators in the Rochester community have called for a significant increase in community involvement in Rochester city schools.  In August 2005, the Blue Ribbon Task Force chaired by Al Simone, Rochester Institute of Technology (RIT) President, issued a “Call to Arms” for 10,000 community volunteers to serve as student mentors and advisors.

In January 2008, Bill Cala, Interim RCSD Superintendent, outlined Rochester school priorities, which indicated that the short and long-term plans of the district must include partnerships, adoptions, and volunteering as critical components for student success.

Rochester has a rich history of collaboration between community organizations and the city public schools.  Today there are many community organizations providing student support services in many elementary schools in Rochester.  Some of these partnerships have been in existence for 20 years and other ones have begun recently.  Until now, the existing community partnerships have managed their programs on their own.  This decentralized model has grown up organically from grassroots community activism.  FREE Partnerships has evolved to organize and provide additional services to the existing partnerships and expand their impact.

There are several gaps in the current landscape of community support: 

• Not every school has a community partner that provides in-school volunteers
• Within their school, current partnerships do not reach all students who need help
• Existing partnerships can be improved to be more effective

Community volunteers support students by helping to fill the following three academic gaps:
	1) Skills Gaps		Promote Student Practice Reading, Writing, Math, etc
	2) Knowledge Gaps		Support Curriculum Social Studies, Science, etc
	3) Attitude Gaps		Be a Positive Adult Role Model Promote a passion for learning Promote positive self-image

 

What does FREE Partnerships Do?
FREE Partnerships supports community – school partnerships in Rochester, NY schools to help students succeed in school and to build a stronger Rochester community:

• Community partnerships support teachers by providing volunteers during the school day that work with students to help their learning and skills development.
• Volunteers help elementary school students achieve the academic skills they need to be successful in school and in life.
• Improving educational outcomes in Rochester is essential to revitalize our city.  FREE Partnerships is building a stronger community to improve life in the entire Rochester area.

FREE Partnerships works to make community – school partnerships more effective by:

• Recruiting, screening, and training more volunteers to support students
• Helping community partners to be more effective by using successful practices
• Supporting partner collaboration for continuous improvement
• Developing community partnerships with more schools

What Schools Does FREE Partnerships Support?
FREE Partnerships has an agreement with the Rochester City School District (RCSD) to support the following ten community – school partnerships:

• School 7 – First Universalist Church
• School 10 – Community Christian Church
• School 12 – Highland Park Neighborhood Association
• School 15 – First Unitarian Church
• School 20 – Mt Olivet Baptist Church
• School 22 – First Unitarian Church
• School 34 – Grace Urban Ministries & St. Catherine’s Church
• School 39 – Church of the Transfiguration
• School 50 – St. Joseph’s Church
• School 52 – Temple B’rith Kodesh

Has FREE Partnerships been Successful in Supporting these Schools?
Yes.  FREE Partnerships is helping these partnerships implement Successful Practices.  The partners collaborate in a monthly FREE Coalition meeting to continuously improve their programs.  FREE Partnerships has recruited over 150 volunteers to supplement the partners’ own recruitment efforts.  These schools have over 250 volunteers who provide 800 hours of support per week!

Does it Work?
The FREE Partnerships model works!  Using this model, in 2010 and in 2011, School 52 was ranked #2 in the Rochester City School District out of 38 elementary schools on the NYS English Language Arts (ELA) exam.  The volunteers in School 52 have become an integral part of the student learning environment.  Students there are on a positive pathway.  You can feel it in the school culture.

Other Rochester City School Community Partnerships with In-School Volunteers
Community Partner	Elementary Schools
1. Asbury Methodist	School #41
2. Celebration of Life Community	School #17
3. Downtown Presbyterian & Baber AME Churches	School 3
4. Jewish Community Federation	Schools # 1 / 3 / 5 / 7 / 14 / 23 / 35 / 36 / 41 / 45 / 46
5. Rochester Rotary Club	School #8
6. St. Mary’s Church	Schools # 9 / 14
7. St. Paul’s Episcopal Church	School #9
8. Third Presbyterian Church	Schools # 6 / 35
9. University of Rochester	Schools # 10 / 15 / 19 / 29 / 33

There are also many after-school programs that support Rochester city students.  FREE Partnerships is a collaboration of in-school community partnerships that provide volunteers for students during the school day.  Therefore, after-school programs are not within the scope of FREE Partnerships services.  Most of the after-school programs collaborate via the Greater Rochester After-School Alliance (GRASA).