A number of different groups within and outside the Greenwood and Leflore County school districts are trying to head off dropouts, but there isn't one true remedy, says one program director.
"I think it's a combination of all these things," Dana Garrard Dees, Children's Services Coordinator at Life Help Mental Health Services, explains. "I don't think one particular program is going to do it. It's truly going to have to be communities and community agencies working together with families and kids."
At least two community organizations are teaming up with the school systems and each other to prevent kids from dropping out. Life Help and Communities in Schools of Leflore County believe in going into the schools to keep the most fragile students there.
Drop-out prevention is the ultimate focus of CIS. All of its programs - abstinence education, drug prevention, after-school tutoring and enrichment, arts-based initiatives - add up to that goal.
The non-profit pursues funding sources and uses them to run after-school tutorial programs that include family functions. CIS counselors take the students and their families bowling on Monday nights. They play basketball with them. Meanwhile, CIS tracks the students' grades each marking period.
The program has a history of success, says Linda Whittington, executive director of CIS.
"Last year, at Leflore County High School, we ran an after-school tutorial for 125 students in grades 7-12, and 73 percent of them improved their grades," Whittington said. "The two seniors who were in the after-school tutorial would not have graduated had they not gone."
Leflore County Superintendent Cedell Pulley says CIS has been a "tremendous help" in keeping students engaged in school.
"Things have worked really well, and I think it's been a great benefit to our children," he said. "They've even had older students go to the elementary side and tutor our younger children."
While Life Help Children's Services doesn't tutor the children, its approach also focuses on intervention and family involvement. The program combines individual counseling sessions and biweekly group therapy with home visits. Right now, counselors are visiting Greenwood Middle School and W.C. Williams and East elementaries, with plans on expanded in the fall.
The glue that holds it all together, keeping the children motivated, is the incentive program, says Dees. "We work intensely to try to motivate the kids to come to school."
The ones who have good attendance and behavioral records earn points that they can save up and exchange for items in the "token store." Monthly rewards include pizza parties, bowling trips and Mississippi Valley State University basketball games.
But if there's one possible panacea to counter the urge certain students have to quit, Whittington believes it's the arts. CIS has a number of arts-based programs that attempt to engage students with activities completely apart from the classroom.
Another after-school program at Leflore County High offers art instruction to 24 children who keep their grades up Cultural Partnerships for At-Risk Youth.
While the arts are a reward for students with good grades in that program, they're a lifeline in another for students who are perhaps struggling the most. The Core Arts Initiative is a joint effort of CIS and Life Help's Adolescent Offenders Program.
Through Core Arts, children who have been remanded to A.O.P by Youth Court get the opportunity to work with clay, to knead it and manipulate it and shape it, all with their hands. Then, they paint it. They get to see a finished product and display that at an art show. Some even make a little money if they want to sell their work.
The children really seem to respond to the attention, says potter Sheila Clark, an instructor in the program.
"It's successful in that somebody's coming in there genuinely caring about them, and I'm getting positive feedback on that."
Whittington believes so much in art and its restorative effects for a number of reasons. First, art is hands on and a complete change of course from academic work. It allows them to express themselves freely. It also builds up what she believes most at-risk students lack - self-esteem.
"The arts allow a child to feel successful when many times they haven't found success in an academic setting, and so they have this perception of themselves," said Whittington. "If we can get them to believe they are good and do have abilities, I think that can translate into what they do in the classroom."
Whittington hopes it will translate on the page next year when CIS introduces a writing program to students at the Delta alternative schools. This offshoot of the program will address another major factor that she says directly affects self-esteem - literacy.
"If we can keep a child's imagination engaged in something he believes is relevant to his life, like telling his story, then I think we can keep them away from reasons they think about dropping out in the first place," Whittington said.
Right now the Leflore County chapter is the only functioning CIS program in the state as far as Whittington can tell. She has been trying to open one in Jackson.
When it comes to improving education, though, one larger group is more important than any one organization, Whittington says.
"Anytime you can get the community involved in providing resources to your schools, you will have a happier, healthier, more economically viable community," she said.
