A r c h i v e d  I n f o r m a t i o n

Greater Washington Urban League

The Greater Washington Urban League (League) is a social service organization that focuses its efforts, through advocacy and direct service delivery, to provide resources to a wide variety of constituent groups, such as: parents, children, the unemployed, the underemployed, and the aged. The League's parent assistance activities will result in the following benefits: 1) increased parent participation in parent training activities and increased parent awareness; 2) expanded ability of the school system to address the needs of parents; 3) enhanced cooperation between public and private institutions providing parent training/education which also includes social service providers, other organizations, businesses, and churches; and 4) increased number of community resident participation in many of the activities. It activities include:

1. Enhancing the Frederick Douglass Community Center
   The Frederick Douglass Community Center is located in a high density public housing area of Washington D.C. and already offers such services as: an infant child center (ages 0-2 years), a parent education program, a Parents as Teachers program, a community room and kitchen for meetings/training sessions.

Its services are being enhanced to 1) include families with children ages 0-7 years; 2) a resource/media library; and 3) a computer system to enable staff and parents to access data and parenting information on the National Urban League Parent NETWORK. The full service center provides support to any family in the area, but is targeting four groups: 1) adolescent mothers; 2) parents of junior high school/middle school children; 3) grandparents and guardians raising children; and 4) parents residing in homeless and battered women shelters.

2. Creating a Mobile Training Team and Van
   The parent center program will be centrally located, but a mobile training unit will further enable the League and its community partners to provide services to parents who may not come to the central location for a variety of reasons. The team will be comprised of grassroots professionals operating out of a van containing VCR equipment, videos, and print resource materials and will give the League and Center staff the ability to go directly to parents in their environment. The team will have four members trained to provide a variety of training/education services to the parent consumers.
3. Offering a Parenting Exposition
   The Parenting Exposition will be interactive with workshop training and hands on learning opportunities. Some of the activities will include infant immunizations, child/parent health screenings, child safety ID fingerprinting, and demonstrations of educational games. Workshops will include such topics as: The Changing School System, Parent Advocacy, Science and Math in the Home, How to Use the Community as a Learning Laboratory, and Grandparents as the Primary Care Provider, etc.

4. Developing Incentives To Participate
   Parent participation is being encouraged through the development of the Passport Incentive Program. Each participant earns points for attending activities and specified points will earn certain awards. The League will continue to use door prizes as an incentive, but it will add a number of others such as tickets to events, gift certificates, and educational books and toys.

Collaborators:

• The Frederick Douglass Community Center
• The District of Columbia Public Schools
• The National Urban League
• The National Council on Educating Black Children
• Simon & Schuster Education Group

Director:
Audrey Epperson
Greater Washington Urban League
3501 14th St., NW.
Washington, D.C. 20010
Telephone: (202) 265-8200
Fax: (202) 265-9878
Award: $264,712
Affiliation: PAT

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[Center of Excellence]