We started an evening ESL program late last year to complement the morning classes. We were not sure what to expect, but the additional classes have allowed nearly thirty new learners to participate.

Learning a language is difficult, but it’s very important for new Americans to have English skills to have opportunities. Most of the learners work in service jobs where they don’t speak English, and often they are not prepared to take advantage of career changes because of their limited English skills.

For me, the most rewarding part of teaching and coordinating the ESL program is watching the learners advance in the language. While the students come from all skill levels, I have been working most closely with the beginner-level classes. Volunteer teachers teach intermediate and advanced level learners. The intermediate class works on grammar exercises and the advanced class concentrates on short stories and news articles to enhance conversation.

Since evening classes have started, I have watched the dedication our learners have for improving their English. They come to class excited to learn. We laugh a lot, spending time going over words that sound similar, creating tongue twisters to learn.

One evening with the beginner level learners last spring, we spent over half an hour going over the difference between the words “kitchen” and “chicken.” The two words are very different in meaning, obviously, but the learners often confused the words because they sounded similar to them.

It was so fun practicing, “I cook chicken in the kitchen.” Everyone was correcting the classmates who were saying this sentence, yelling out “No!” or “Yes!” while trying not to laugh in order to let each individual speak.

On the first day of class last December, one of our most dedicated learners started the beginner level with her sister, niece and two friends. She could not communicate in English, so we began in Spanish. From the start she struggled with reading and writing in her own language and had difficulty understanding instructions on the activities that we were doing.

As the spring semester continued, this woman and her sister attended class every Monday and Wednesday, eager to learn. They came twice a week in the summer and continue studying with us now. As this learner’s English abilities improve, I have noticed her gain confidence. She is now taking classes on Saturdays and is asking a lot of questions about expressions that she hears on the playground or in the supermarket, words that the toddler she nannies for says. She even wants to know how to tell the young girl to “stand in the corner” or to say “good job.”

Another beginner level learner comes to class every week with papers of completed grammar exercises for me to correct. She is very motivated and hopes to become good enough at English so that she may someday return to her native country of Mexico to teach English in the schools.

As we are nearing our one year anniversary of an expanded ESL program, the same group of beginner-level learners that has been with us from the start understand the difference between chicken and kitchen, and are now learning the difference between more complex irregular verb conjugations, such as “bring” in the present and “brought” in the simple past. We do still giggle at words that sound similar; last night it was “duck” and “book” that cracked up the class.

Working with City Gate’s 5-6 year olds was a great but challenging experience. At times the children, [youth] workers, and even parents can test your patience. But those times are when we find out who is actually here for the children and who is wiling to pull together and make things work as they are. The children of City Gate Summer Camp are active, energetic, creative, and interactive. With all these components working together in one child, it keeps our summer camp very “live” and never boring.

I have grown to love the children of City Gate, not just the 5 and 6 year olds, all of them. I enjoy coming to work everyday because every time I walk into the room I’m greeted with tons of smiles and hugs. These kids grow as attached to their teachers as we do with them. This year we were blessed with a great group of kids who I hope to see again one day.

Alexis
Summer Youth Worker
City Gate SE Summer Day Camp

“No, not a lot of parties,” I said.

“That’s what they do on T.V.,” she countered.

It is hard to communicate the college experience to a child if you are the only college student they’ve ever met, or their prior knowledge comes from the mass media. So, you can probably imagine the excitement I felt when Kristin told me that we were doing a Pen Pals and Partners Program for our City Gate kids in conjunction with American University.

Pen Pals and Partners was not only a great way for our after-school kids to meet college students, but it was also a great way from them to interact with cultures different from their own. I remember the first time the AU students met with the City Gate Kids. On the way, I don’t know how many times I kept telling the students to keep their voices down or told them to save their excitement for when we get to the church. Once we got there, they did a complete 180; they virtually didn’t speak and rarely interacted with the AU students. The AU students, who were predominantly White Americans and outnumbered them 2:1, more likely intimidated the SE kids. It wasn’t until the AU students introduced themselves (and their favorite ice cream flavor) and played games (“Move your Butt” and “Indian Chief”) did they not only open up, but reverted back to their in van excitement. It was great to witness how two groups of completely different people from completely different environments can find commonality with each other.

Pen Pals and Partners has been an innovative way to introduce college life. They loved American University’s library, went crazy at AU’s basketball game, walked within their dorm rooms and hung out in their lounge while eating pizza. And also, our after-school kids rarely ask me about my college life anymore. It’s probably because they’re experiencing it themselves.

Tiauna Miller
AmeriCorps Volunteer & City Gate Program Associate

Our after-school children first started showing up with Obama caps and buttons in December. Teaching them the importance of government and their role in democracy has always been difficult (they simply didn’t relate), and the way social studies is taught in DC public schools is usually drudgery, but suddenly our children knew facts and figures, political players, and even statistics. (Student: “Yes, and did you know he was president of the Harvard Law Review…” After-school instructor: <shocked silence>)

Second, we have been collaborating with another non-profit which wants to do some sports-based mentoring in SE. The guys who run this organization are well-educated, street-savvy, and truly passionate for at-risk youth. As we sat in the basement community room one night to work out a grant proposal, the upcoming inauguration came up. One of them said, “It’s cool to be smart now.” All I could think of was, “thank you, God.” It’s tough to compete with rappers and sports stars for influence over our children and youth. Maybe now we have a bigger piece of the pie.

Lastly, I’ll share a personal experience that illustrates how the flavor of race relations in our country has started to change. As I walked to my car that same night, an African-American colleague asked me if I was ever afraid of working in SE. I gave him my first and honest answer, which was no, even at night I’ve found folks there to be friendly and helpful. “Usually though,” I added, “being a white woman in SE, it’s because they think I’m lost.” My colleague laughed. Having working in one capacity or another in that same neighborhood for the past 8 years, I’m almost never lost. However, in that moment, as we both chuckled, I realized that this moment may just be a tiny droplet in a tidal wave of such conversations. Here’s to hoping.

Truly this was a victory for African-Americans. But more than that, this is a victory for all people who have felt — for a variety of reasons — that they were on the outside of a great society looking in. They are the very kind of people we work to help at the “city gate”. This is not about holding up a certain race or demographic — it’s about justice. This is not about inclusion or multi-culturalism — it’s about valuing people as individuals, uniquely created in His image.

Whatever you think about the economy, the war in Iraq, and our new president, I hope you share at least a little of that victory. For myself, I can’t wait to see what it’s “cool to be” next.

Kristin Wiener

Prior to our walk, we did what we often do and hosted a lock-in: a fun, rambunctious, once-a-year, sleepover for our after-school kids and a long, exhausting, bleary-eyed night for us chaperones. Always terribly popular with our kids, I have often conjectured that this is one of the few times they get to let go and just be kids — no need to be watchful as they travel the streets, no thoughts about school or struggling with homework, just a time to play games, watch movies, and stay up much too late at night. For the staff, this is our golden opportunity to interact with our kids in the way we like best — hearing their laughter, seeing their smiling faces, and experiencing child-like joy along with them.

We always discuss the purpose of the walk with our after-school kids and ask them to make banners and signs to carry on the walk. This year, while struggling to gain the full attention of two girls who insisted on singing instead of speaking, I managed to record a song about homelessness created solely by them:

If I was in charge of the whole wide world…
I would help the homeless …
By giving them some food.
By giving them a home.
By giving them a job.

If I was in charge of the whole wide world…
I would tell the people…
To give the homeless some money.
To lower gas prices for the homeless.
To give the homeless a car.

If I was in charge of the whole wide world…
I would love the homeless.
I would treat the homeless like they were my sister.
I would treat them like they were special.
I would wake up in the morning and give them a hug.

Going in to the holiday season, I hope you will feel inspired to give as generously and love as freely as these children do. I invite you to join us as we strive to shape these children’s lives, and are shaped by them in turn.

Kristin Wiener

A new school year is beginning, and students are returning to classrooms with stories of how they spent the summer. Many will talk of taking trips to historic places, having fun at summer camps or learning new skills. But an idyllic summer is a myth, not the norm, for most low-income children. For them, the end of school is the end of opportunity and a loss of academic skills that leads to them entering September already behind their better-off peers. Efforts to close America’s achievement gap would be helped if more attention and resources were directed to these crucial summer months.

I want to thank you for your support, which has helped us touch the lives of nearly 200 children and teens — many living at the poverty level. Instead of being unsupervised or on the streets, they had a safe place to come to, three decent meals every day, summer fun, field trips, and a variety of enrichment opportunities. Besides giving kids a chance to be kids, our day camps helped stop what educators call “summer learning loss.” We see real evidence that our kids, instead of sliding farther back, will be better prepared to go back to school — in terms of better social skills, increased intellectual curiosity and background knowledge, as well as having done reading and math during the summer.

It is a huge challenge to put together the programs and staffing every summer that these kids need — and we couldn’t do it without you — the individual donors, the churches, the Urban Hands mission groups who share the dream of every child becoming all that God created them to be.

Every day we see bright-eyed, beautiful five-year-olds bouncing in the door — as well as fifteen-year-olds where sometimes it feels like our opportunity to help shape their lives is slipping away. We thank you for caring, for helping and loving these kids. Pray for us as we head into fall. We’re providing backpacks, school supplies, even shoes as kids go back to school. We’re starting a new after-school program in another public housing complex and have been vetted by the DC Public Schools to assist onsite with after-school programs at two high-need elementary schools.

The needs and opportunities are greater than ever, and we need and thank you for your support.

God’s peace,

Lynn Bergfalk
Executive Director

• “While in camp, your child will never go hungry and will not be bored.
• They will never be without something to do or someplace to go, something to learn or a new thing to try.
• They won’t be put down, told they are stupid, or only given one chance to get things right.
• There will be no dozing in front of the TV, no high-stakes testing, no hanging out in the street, and they will never wonder if they are wanted or safe.
• We will never assume your child can’t do something, because of the way they dress, how they speak, or where they live.
• And we will never forget that this child is your precious one and only, irreplaceable and special in every way.”

In the future, I probably should write notes to read off of or perhaps produce an informative brochure. It could go something like this:

For these seven weeks of summer camp, your child will also be our child.
Therefore, they will be nourished, cared for, loved, and disciplined.
They will be taught math and reading, science and sports, history and art, right from wrong, and that they are unique and highly valued.
They will be given an outlet for their creativity, a shoulder to cry on, encouragement for their efforts, a pat on the back when they succeed, and a hug when it’s been a hard day so far, and it’s only 9 am.
They will learn how to be helpful and polite, clean up after themselves, show concern for others, and take responsibility for their own actions.
They will gain new friends, computer skills, and a better perspective on the world around them.

At the end of seven weeks, the same child you sent to camp will come home to you– but they might just be more respectful of others, confident in their own abilities, and ready to succeed in school — be prepared.

Obviously, we’re not in the business of producing perfect children. But we are here to bring children who are marginalized to the center of society, where they can use their skills and talents, and reach their full potential.

Looking toward this fall, we’re exploring new ways to give even more children from disadvantaged neighborhoods the kind of opportunities our summer day campers have had. Will you join us?

Kristin Wiener

For City Gate, this is one of the busiest times of the year as we plan and prepare our summer program. This year we have camps in Southeast DC, Columbia Heights, and Tenleytown neighborhoods, plus an additional youth empowerment program for teenagers that will touch the lives of as many as 200 children and youth.

We are putting together a great program and staff, and have some — but not all — the resources we need. And that’s where we need you. You might be able to pick up the cost of camp for one child for the whole summer, or for a week, or maybe just a day. But we need partners who believe, as we do, that every kid should have a safe place to go, activities that are both fun and enriching, three good meals every day, and new experiences that will help children grow and thrive.

Together we can make a difference for children living in poverty. We can provide a safe and supportive environment every weekday through the summer. We can make sure kids get three good meals a day. We can allow kids to be kids: having fun at the pool or playing games, taking day trips or participating in special events. We can expand their horizons through new experiences, and provide engaging educational enrichment that will help kids go back to school in September with greater self-confidence and stronger academic skills.

I invite you this spring to make an investment in a child by helping us provide the summer opportunities that will help them reach their God-given potential. Please take a moment to read our “Make Summer Great in 2008” flyer to see how you can be involved. We thank you for your compassion for children, for your prayers, and your financial support.

For love of the children,

Lynn Bergfalk