Schools working together on mentoring program

PANAMA CITY — A mentoring collaboration between Bay Haven Charter Academy and Oscar Patterson Elementary School is paying dividends for students, faculty and staff at both schools, and has spawned a Saturday morning program to help some Patterson parents improve their lives.

The state awarded Bay Haven a two-year $500,000 mentoring grant in 2010 to partner with Oscar Patterson and share Bay Haven’s best teaching practices and technology expertise with the Panama City school’s faculty and staff, according to Tammy Graham, Bay Haven’s project manager.

“It just evolved into so much more than that,” she said of the grant.

The Bay Haven partnership with Oscar Patterson has expanded to include a Saturday morning program, initiated in November, that is designed to help interested Patterson parents learn how to better search for jobs, manage resources and raise their self-esteem, Graham said.

Six Patterson parents completed the 12-week program, which included use of the Phillip DeVol-written booklet “Getting Ahead in a Just Gettin’-By World: Building Your Resources for a Better Life.”

Pastor Rickey Rivers served as a Saturday morning facilitator for participating parents during the program, which lasted about two hours each session. He said the program emphasized putting the onus on the parents to tap into available community resources and improve their lives and mindsets.

Patterson Principal Angela Hutchinson stressed the importance of parental involvement with students and the school.

“This is one way for us to engage the parents,” Hutchinson said, adding, “When we’re all on the same page, great things happen for the kids.”

Rivers said one individual in the class walked three miles each Saturday to get to the school by the 9 a.m. start time. “She wouldn’t miss that class for anything,” Rivers said.

Positive changes

During the Saturday morning classes, Bay Haven and Oscar Patterson staff and Rutherford High School students volunteered their time to tutor the students of the participating parents.

Melissa Burch and Latasha Richardson are two of the six parents who completed the Saturday morning program. Burch said the class taught her how to put together a game plan and offered a good example for her children.

“They know with the positive changes with their parents, it makes their lives better,” Burch said.

Richardson, the parent of three Patterson students, said the lessons learned in the class made her determined to change her situation and make life better for her children. “They look to me for so much,” Richardson said.

Bay Haven staff member Mike Sumpter, who has been involved in the technology component of the grant, said Bay Haven staff had visited Patterson once a month since August and offered them some free Internet tools and advice on improving technology options and usage at the school.

He said the schools’ new relationship would endure, even after the grant expires in 2012. “We’ve made friends over here,” Sumpter said.

Patricia Eidson, a Bay Haven teacher/mentor that works on-site at Patterson during the week, said Bay Haven and Patterson teachers had visited each others’ schools and learned new ideas and things to use in the classroom.

“It has worked with both schools,” Eidson said.

Hutchinson said the school was looking to start a new Saturday class either later this spring or the fall of 2011. She said the school would send information out to Patterson parents through its monthly newsletter.

The principal said she hoped the number of parents in the program would increase through word-of-mouth.

Richardson said she and several other parents that completed the 12-week program plan to continue their weekly Saturday meetings.