GRAND RAPIDS, Mi. — For working parents, one of the biggest challenges is childcare and making sure your kids have enriching opportunities to thrive. And this only gets harder as those kids get older. But there's an amazing program keeping them all busy, learning and helping one another - which in turn helps our communities. It’s called New City Kids.
From helping other people, to connecting through learning, even gaining confidence and leadership skills, these are all stories from some of high school participants, who are actually employees of New City Kids. Alani Harris started as a 6th grade music student. Today he’s a teacher and a leader. He says, "New City [Kids] really helped me, it really helped guide me in the right path. It got me away from bad pathways, guided me away from some not so good pathways and guided me toward great pathways. It gave me a place to call home, it gave me support, it gave me friends it gave me a future to look forward to and even help beyond just me it helped my family.”
"Our mission is to love kids for change by creating a community where students are going to experience spiritual leadership, academic and musical development." That’s Christy Carlin Knetsch, the executive director of NCK in Grand Rapids. The model is simple. Let the older students teach, mentor and inspire the younger children. She says, "We employ 9th through 12th graders. They actually get a paycheck every two weeks for the work that they do. They're also employed as tutors, as music teachers on piano, bass, drums and guitar. And we also have a new internship this year in our sound and video program. So, you can be a sound engineer or a video producer. These new programs offer even more opportunities for students after they graduate. Knetsch continues, "We teach music and every great musician needs somebody behind the board to mix and master and bring magic. So that's what we're doing here. And so we decided to start an internship in sound engineering and video production because those two were trade opportunities that don't necessarily require a four-year degree but require lots of experience and can be learned on the job and there are certifications you can receive. And so we begin to open up that as an opportunity as our very next chapter of New City Kids.
Helping students write *their next chapter is what NCK is all about. They learn how to receive positive feedback, how to endure a growth mindset and what they can bring to the table, it’s all about empowerment. Knetsch says, "Our after-school center can't run unless teenagers are involved, we depend on them. And when you have a teenager who comes every single day and they're excited about teaching their class they want their kids to know how to play the instrument they are excited to make sure that math hurdle is achieved. With the kids at their tutoring table they begin to see themselves as leaders.
The success of this program is easy to see. It started in 1994 and came to Grand Rapids in 2014. Today there are also locations in Detroit, plus Paterson and Jersey City, New Jersey. Since it’s inception, 100% of the students involved in NCK have graduated high school, out of that group, 94% of them go to college, trade schools or the military nationally. In Grand Rapids, out of the 100% who went on to college, 75% went debt free. Knetsch says this is impacting not just the students, but their friends, families and communities. "Those students are passing on knowledge to the generation behind them and then they leave our doors and they're here in our communities every day. So, if the work that they're doing here impacts their home, their neighborhood, their school in their community our city thrives.”
