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Rebuilding JeffVanderLou
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Above Left:
The Vashon Education Compact includes 10 schools in and around
the JeffVanderLou neighborhood on St. Louis’ near northside.
Above Right: Vashon/JeffVanderLou Initiative Executive
Director Yvonne Sparks Strauther at Dunbar Elementary School.
St. Louis businesses are working on one of the region’s toughest
issues, and giving residents of the City’s near northside reason
for hope.
On the way to work one rainy Friday morning, IBM Senior Location
Executive Joyce Blackwell passes by block after block of deteriorating
brick buildings and closed businesses. It’s not the route Blackwell
typically takes to her office. Today, Blackwell is going to work
at Dunbar Elementary School.
Dunbar is a public elementary school in the JeffVanderLou neighborhood
on the City’s near northside. Located in the middle of a neighborhood
that is home to the highest average unemployment rate, the highest
percentage of families living below the poverty line, and the third
highest crime rate in the City, Dunbar has its challenges. Seventy
percent of students are not reading at grade level. But Blackwell
and Dunbar principal Christopher Petty see reason for optimism.
The school is one of 10 participating in a unique public/private
partnership aimed at sparking community revitalization and increasing
student achievement in one of the lowest income areas of St. Louis.
Blackwell represents one of several companies that has “adopted”
Dunbar as its contribution to the Vashon Education Compact. Led
by developer Richard Baron of McCormack Baron & Associates and Robert
Koff of the Danforth Foundation, the Vashon Education Compact is
a public/private partnership joining area businesses with 10 St.
Louis Public Schools.
Baron says the goal of the Compact is simple: “People want to live
in communities with good schools. Unless we do something to improve
student achievement in neighborhood schools, we will never create
an economically and socially integrated community that will serve
a broad cross-section of the market.”
The Compact aspires to raise $14 million, of which $7 million has
been committed to date. Compact resources will be used for (1) physical
renovation of school buildings, including air conditioning and computers,
(2) professional development programs to improve teaching effectiveness,
(3) incentives to retain and recruit certified teachers, and (4)
after-school, summer and early care programs for neighborhood children.
In addition, the Compact seeks to better engage parents and community
members in the schools. Annual report cards will monitor school
performance by tracking test score results, teacher qualifications,
and parent involvement.
The Compact is one part of the Vashon/JeffVanderLou Initiative,
a comprehensive 10-year effort to bring sustained improvement to
the lives of individuals and families living in the JeffVanderLou
neighborhood. The Vashon/JeffVanderLou Initiative is focused on
four key areas: housing and infrastructure, economic development,
health and human services, and education. During 10 months beginning
in November 1999, more than 500 people who care about the future
of this once-vital neighborhood worked together to create a plan
for renewal.
The catalyst for the plan was the new Vashon High School. The state-of-the-art
$40 million facility is being built in the middle of JeffVanderLou.
It is scheduled to open in May 2002.
The new high school and nine feeder schools comprise the Vashon
Education Compact. One of the Compact schools, Jefferson Elementary,
began piloting this approach three years ago. Since then, the school
has seen improved student reading levels and increased parent participation.
Above:
The Board of Education has unanimously endorsed the Vashon Education
Compact. Here St. Louis Public Schools Superintendent Cleveland
Hammonds, Jr. (left) discusses the Compact with Energizer Holdings
CEO and Civic Progress Education Chair J. Patrick Mulcahy.
The Vashon Education Compact has been endorsed by Civic Progress
and has received funding support of some 20 corporate and philanthropic
organizations. That support has come in the form of grants, in-kind
contributions—including American Airline tickets to enable teachers
to attend out-of-state conferences—and special incentives like Commerce
Bank’s 1¼2 % reduced mortgage rate and the CitiMortgage/St. Louis
Public Schools Employer Assisted Housing program providing up to
$7,000 in down payment and closing cost assistance to St. Louis
Public Schools teachers.
Missouri Governor Bob Holden and the State Department of Economic
Development are very supportive of the Compact. The State of Missouri
is providing the Compact with nearly $1 million in Neighborhood
Assistance Program (NAP) and Youth Opportunities Program (YOP) tax
credits.
The City of St. Louis has supported the Compact with $2.2 million
for the new Vashon High School and 19th Ward Alderman Michael McMillan
has arranged for $800,000 for capital improvements in the area.
Above:
Mayor Francis Slay voices his support for the Vashon Education
Compact at a press conference in May.
The St. Louis Public Schools Foundation, a non-profit organization
that supports student achievement programs in the St. Louis Public
Schools, is serving as fiscal agent for the Vashon Education Compact.
“The Vashon Compact just makes sense,” says J. Patrick Mulcahy,
chief executive officer of Energizer Holdings, Inc., and chair of
the Civic Progress Education Committee. “It is comprehensive in
its approach. It works on every aspect of life—housing, jobs, health
care.
“The Compact also has accountability,” he adds. “With the St. Louis
Public Schools Foundation as fiscal agent and with the oversight
of the Governing Board, we know that the funds are being used wisely.”
Yvonne Sparks Strauther is executive director of the Vashon/JeffVanderLou
Initiative, the non-profit charged with overseeing the implementation
of the neighborhood’s redevelopment plan. Strauther emphasizes the
significance of the Initiative’s long-term view.
“In 10 years, JeffVanderLou will be a neighborhood of choice for
African-Americans in St. Louis. We are putting all the pieces in
place to build on the proud history of this neighborhood and make
it vibrant once again,” she says.
The business community has embraced not only the Vashon Education
Compact, but other aspects of the JeffVanderLou renaissance as well.
A group of minority business leaders, including St. Louis American
Publisher Dr. Donald Suggs, Merisant Co. CEO Arnold Donald, World
Wide Technologies CEO David Steward, and Urban League President
Jim Buford, are advising the Initiative on its economic development
strategies. The group went to Detroit last year to learn how that
city approaches minority business development and to generate ideas
for developing companies and creating jobs in JeffVanderLou.
In addition, the St. Louis Equity Fund, a housing tax credit fund
largely supported by Civic Progress companies, is renovating 250
units of low-income rental housing in the neighborhood.
Above:
19th Ward Alderman Michael McMillan, (left) meets with JeffVanderLou
residents at a community planning meeting.
Adding to the momentum in JeffVanderLou is the recent announcement
of a $35 million U.S. Housing and Urban Development (HUD) Hope VI
grant for the adjacent Blumeyer public housing complex. A similar
grant spurred the redevelopment of the former Darst-Webbe housing
site on the City’s near southside.
Those involved in the Compact point out that progress will not come
quickly. But they are energized by the commitment of so many, including
business leaders like Blackwell and Mulcahy and the participation
of many JeffVanderLou residents who developed the Compact plan.
Mulcahy says, “St. Louis cannot afford to lose this community, to
lose another generation of children.” |
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