Distance Learning 2020 - Jan Kaplan

Distance Learning
Funding Opportunity

INVESTING IN CHILDREN’S EDUCATION

Therapeutic Childcare • Enhanced Education • Incredible Outcomes
NEIGHBOR.ORG | 3350 E STREET, SAN DIEGO, CA 92102

Investing Distance Learning
in Children’s Education Initiative

In normal circumstances, children experiencing Through our Distance Learning Fund, you will
homelessness are four times more likely to help provide critical support and key learning
have delayed development and twice as likely tools to enable our elementary, middle, and high
to repeat a school grade than their housed school students stay engaged with online lessons,
classmates. Now, with San Diego County school including:
districts enacting distance learning due to
Covid-19, catching up has become an even bigger • Collaboration with School Administrators and
barrier for many of the school-age children we Teachers: Our Therapeutic Childcare staff works
serve. Parents have limited ability and supplies with residents and school officials to ensure that
to help their kids successfully navigate online each child has a school-issued device. Backup
learning, while they are focused on overcoming laptops and tablets will be available to students as
homelessness. needed.

Through a new Distance Learning Fund, Father • Learning Spaces: Virtual Learning Lab areas,
Joe’s Villages will create an environment where with appropriately spaced desks and tables, will
children can succeed in their online studies be created in our Therapeutic Childcare Center
including reading, writing, math, and science. and Residential Floors.
The fund provides dedicated support from our
Therapeutic Childcare staff and the necessary • Technology Support: We will provide reliable
tools needed to empower parents with new skills wifi, assistance navigating online learning
to support their child’s education now and in the platforms, and ear buds with microphones for
future. every student, so they can participate in virtual
learning on our Village campus.
Research across fields shows that early success
and engagement in school is a key predictor of • School Supplies: Visual aids, art supplies,
success later in life.* Thus, the avoidable negative pens, paper, printing, multiplication & periodic
impacts of our kids falling further behind in tables, dictionaries, and materials needed for
school would have devastating impacts on their science labs and class projects will be available
abilities to break the cycle of homelessness as for our children, as they would be in home-based
adults. We hope you will support our Distance learning spaces.
Learning Fund to keep that from happening, and
to benefit our families and children through this • Mentoring & Tutoring: A School-Age
Covid-19 crisis and beyond. Classroom Coordinator and an Educational
Coordinator will assist 100+ children with
*National Institutes of Health, Robert Wood Johnson technology and tutoring, and support parents in
Foundation, and American Institutes for Research overseeing their children’s virtual school
assignments.
Sincerely,

Jan Kaplan

Development Officer,
Major Gifts

Education Breaks the Innovative Education &
Cycle of Homelessness Therapeutic Childcare
Model
“Many of our parents struggle with helping
their children in distance learning, while Nearly 20% of San Diego’s homeless population
also trying to secure employment and are parents with children. Child Development
find housing. This spring, when students Specialists, Preschool Instructors, Mental Health
finished the school year remotely, many Clinicians, and other experts in our licensed
of our parents needed help getting Therapeutic Childcare Center help each child
technology up and running and found it strengthen a foundation for healthy development.
difficult to work effectively with schools Parents participate in workshops to improve
for help, let alone oversee their children’s parenting skills and family management.
lessons each day.” ~ Jennifer Ryan,
Therapeutic Childcare Center Manager Further, once children are enrolled in Therapeutic
Childcare, parents are free to build job skills and
While each school is different, online lessons secure employment with assistance from our
provided by the San Diego Unified School District Employment & Education Services, find long-term
indicate that students will watch and reflect on housing, and address physical and mental health
TED Talks, conduct backyard science experiments, challenges through our Village Health Center.
create videos, construct containers using Our Therapeutic Childcare Center and other
algebra, complete math problems and writing programs for children and families are a key pillar
assignments, and more projects throughout a in breaking the cycle of homelessness.
full school day. Many working “housed” parents
we interviewed shared that they feel ill equipped Through our Distance Learning Fund, you will
to manage the role of effective teacher and have enable Father Joe’s Villages to establish a new
decided to hire tutors to assist this process. remote learning infrastructure critical to ensure
that our 100+ school-age children have the
However, this option is not available to the resources to succeed academically during these
families we serve. Parents at Father Joe’s Villages unprecedented times of Covid-19, and for years to
are working to overcome challenges that impede come.
stable housing, such as health and addiction
issues, unemployment, searching for housing, Please consider a gift to support our school-
and more. Further, many are learning effective age children by contacting me directly, making
parenting skills with us for the first time. a donation online (my.neighbor.org/donate),
or mailing your gift to our offices. We are ever
Our solution is to build upon what we do best: grateful for your caring and support of those we
provide resources that give our students the best serve.
opportunities possible to succeed academically
and grow toward a life out of poverty and
homelessness. This year and for the near future,
those resources require a Distance Learning
infrastructure of staff support, equipment, and
supplies, which will all continue to serve our
children year after year, in and out of school
classrooms.

We must act now to give families
and children the educational tools
they need to end the cycle of
homelessness.

Jan Kaplan, Development Officer, Major Gifts
619-840-3457 | [email protected]