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In The News
By Craig Williams
Kutztown University
One of the first
things you notice as you turn onto North Second Street in Reading from
Buttonwood Street is that the road appears to come to a dead end.
Dominating the street are some friendly looking row homes on the right
and on the left sits the Opportunity House Community Services Center.
At the end of the street is an elevated railroad bed, with no apparent
crossing point.
At 3:30 p.m. on
any weekday, the street is cluttered with vehicles as parents drop off
their children for the after-school activities held at the Second
Street Learning Center, housed in the basement of the outreach center.
The traffic snarls
and passage seems impossible. There is no turning back. But as you
filter through the line of cars, buses, and minivans, you will find
that Second Street actually loops around the back of Opportunity House
and rejoins the main highway one block away. It is a fitting metaphor
for the lives that are turned around through help at the outreach
center.
Over the last two
years, students from the KU student chapter of the Pennsylvania State
Education Association [PSEA] have made this journey, leaving the
tree-lined Kutztown Main Street, to venture into the heart of Reading
to help the elementary students with their homework.
Christine Bradbury
’09, PSEA student chapter president, said she volunteered to intern in
the city for the opportunity to gain experience in a setting that no
college classroom can provide. More than just an after-school homework
service, Opportunity House provides a safe haven for children during
the hours when their parents may still be working.
“We took a survey
of the students in PSEA, and many said they were interested in
tutoring, so we started our after-school tutoring program at
Opportunity House last fall,” said Bradbury.
The Second Street
Learning Center is made up of many little classrooms tucked here and
there with gaily-painted walls decorated with posters and colorful
educational flyers. Children filter into the rooms, noisy and
boisterous as any group of second, third and fourth graders can be
after a day in school.
As the KU student
teachers arrive ready to teach one-on-one, it becomes immediately
evident that the kids treat their KU tutors as their own big sisters,
talking with them about everything and anything on their minds. In
addition to helping the kids with their homework, the KU tutors
supervise the playground activities and have pitched in to donate much
needed supplies including pencils, books and special holiday gifts.
Elena Castilla ’10
and Katie Saylor ’08, student teachers for the day, settle the
students and begin the task of working on homework. One young boy
fidgets over a page of math exercises. Castilla suggests a possible
new approach to the problem, and then a light bulb goes off, and the
correct answer comes out with a smile. It’s these “ah-ha” moments that
the student teachers live for.
“I really enjoy
getting to know the kids and the feeling that I have helped them. Many
of these kids have tough lives, and having difficulty with their
homework is the least of their worries,” said Castilla. “So it is also
a lot of fun to just ask them questions about school and who their
friends are, and just let them be kids.”
According to
Modesto Fiume, President of Opportunity House, the Second Street
Learning Center was started in the basement of the shelter
approximately 13 years ago in response to a need of the families from
the surrounding communities. Emeriti KU professors of education T.
Kelley Neyhart, Jr. and Dr. Susan A. Miller assisted with setting up
the project. At that time the agency was called the Reading-Berks
Emergency Shelter, but has since changed its name to Opportunity House
to better represent all the programs the facility offers. Over the
years, there have been numerous student teachers from KU volunteer at
the center offering an extra pair of hands during a very busy time of
day.
“The staff of
Opportunity House really appreciates the tutoring efforts of
students,” Fiume said. “We are all trying to get as much done as we
can with limited resources. And I think the experience with the
elementary students is good for the KU students as well.”
Castilla agrees,
and said the tutoring experience at the Second Street Learning Center
has reconfirmed her dedication to teaching and makes her excited about
starting her new career.
“Although I have
learned a lot of new skills while tutoring at the Opportunity House,
the most important thing that I have learned is that I definitely want
to be a teacher,” she said. “Any doubts I may have had about my future
in the profession vanished when I first sat down to work with the
children.”
Click here for story with photographs.
City center only 24/7 provider
of day care, night care
The Second Street Learning Center at Opportunity
House in Reading provides round-the-clock child care to serve second-
and third-shift parents.
©2007 Reading Eagle Company
By Erin Negley
Reading Eagle
By the time Waniqua Williams picks up her sons
at the Second Street Learning Center, it’s after 10 p.m. and sleepy
music has replaced the playful sounds of daylight hours.
Williams greets the kids with a smile. She
hasn’t seen them since she dropped them off at 8:30 a.m. that day.
For Williams and other parents who work odd
hours, the learning center provides a safe haven for their children.
The center is part of Opportunity House, the emergency shelter at 430
N. Second St.
It’s the only 24-hour child care facility open
seven days a week in Berks County.
“I have a funny schedule because I work three
jobs,” Williams said. “They cover my kids from 6 a.m. to 12 at night.
They’re very important because I have nobody else.”
Williams is a home-health aide at Bayada Nurses,
Reading, and an aide at Columbia Cottage, a retirement and assisted
living facility in Spring Township. She’s also a server at Cracker
Barrel restaurant in Tilden Township.
Her older boys, Ibn A. White, 7, and Timothy
Craddock, 2, were wide-awake and bouncing around as they left the
center for their Reading home. Her youngest, Nassir Craddock, 1,
nearly fell asleep on the way out.
Most day care sites in Berks County are true to
that term and close at 5 or 6 p.m.
The state Department of Welfare, which licenses
child care centers, doesn’t track how many offer night hours, but
24-hour care is uncommon.
“It is very unique,” said Stacey Ward, a welfare
department spokeswoman. “There are very few places that offer it.”
About 95 percent of parents who use the Second
Street Learning Center receive state subsidies for child care. Fees
are charged on a sliding scale based on the subsidy and family income.
The base fee for an unsubsidized preschool child
is $125 per week.
At the learning center, bedtime starts at 9:30
p.m., and by on a recent night, 22 children were still there.
Juelz Alicea, 8 months, played with a stuffed
toy under the dim lights. An employee had 5-month-old Christian Seda
in a bouncy seat. Toddlers and older children slept on cots in
separate rooms, while the night staff started cleaning every toy and
surface.
A cell phone Williams accidentally dropped under
a cot rang loudly, waking up Jameer Battle, 21/2. He waved to some
visitors and fidgeted in his SpongeBob slippers.
“Lay down, buddy,” head teacher Denise Merritt
said.
Opportunity House opened the learning center in
1996 with 24-hour coverage, said Lorri G. Oziri, vice president for
development.
“There were and still are many people in the
community who work second and third shift,” she said. “As long as
there are businesses in the area that have shift work, then there’s a
need.”
The YMCA of Reading had offered 24-hour care on
weekdays, but decided several years ago to focus on staffing a
second-shift center because the need was greater, said Kim Johnson,
vice president.
The late hours through 12:30 a.m. are booked
with 50 children at the Reading YMCA, she said.
“There are so many single parents who work
different shifts,” Johnson said. “This is a way to allow them to work
without worry.”
At the Second Street Learning Center, about 60
children stay after dark, and more than a dozen often remain
overnight. As each parent comes to pick up their children, cots and
cribs empty until early birds start arriving shortly after 4 a.m.
Just before 11 p.m., Jeanette Seda of Reading
picked up her three children: Rey Noel Correa, 8; Sebastian Seda, 2;
and Christian Seda, 5 months.
“I work retail and this is the only place that
has flexible hours and weekends,” Seda said.
She usually works 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. at Lids, a
hat and cap store in the Berkshire Mall. But during the holidays, the
store’s open from 6 a.m. to 11 p.m., making flexible child care a
greater necessity.
After Seda and her children leave, a learning
center employee starts a load of wash and prepares bottles.
At 11:15 p.m., Martha M. Klinger of Reading
arrived and gathered up her 8-month-old son, Juelz Alicea.
Klinger works at ICR Survey in Cumru Township
and sometimes works late to earn a bonus. That’s OK as long as she
calls the center to inform the staff.
“I work late, to 11 or 12,” Klinger said. “It’s
convenient to have in case I need them.”
Soon, little Jameer is fidgeting again.
His mother, Aljaneen B. McBeth of Reading,
arrived a little later from her second shift job at Nurses Available,
a Reading nursing agency. She’s also taking classes at Reading Area
Community College to become a registered nurse.
As McBeth and others leave, their exits are
recorded by a security camera connected to a monitor on a nearby desk.
Most of the time, the children’s drowsy heads are resting on mom’s
shoulder.
“Hush, Little Baby” from a stereo lulls those
children still in the center to sleep.
Michelle Moreno of Reading breaks the silence,
fresh from her shift at East Penn Manufacturing Co. near Lyons.
“There’s my baby,” she coos to Isaac Allen, 2
months old.
Her daughters, Mercedes, 6, and Gissele, 7, wrap
their clothes and a blanket around themselves against the night air.
As a single parent, Moreno appreciates the
center’s flexible hours and the after-school program.
In the next room, center employee Nellie Eyrich
pats 3-year-old Jonathan Leader’s head and tries to coax him to sleep,
but he jumps onto his cot and instead complains about a bellyache.
By midnight, only two toddlers are left.
Eyrich’s daughter, Christine, turns up the
lights and starts painting colorful flowers on a glass door.
Three-year-old Fotis Amegangee’s mother calls
around 1 and says she’ll be working late. The child wakes, ready to go
home, so third-shift supervisor Karen A. Kissinger gives him a bowl of
cereal.
Fotis settles back into his cot.
Next door, Nellie Eyrich sets cereal on tables
for breakfast at 8 and pauses to pull a blanket over Jonathan Leader’s
shoulders.
He’s finally sound asleep.
Contact reporter Erin Negley at 610-371-5047 or
enegley@readingeagle.com.
Channel 69 News Berks Edition
"Berks Shelter Helps Homeless Cope with the Cold"
CLICK ON THE LINK BELOW FOR THE STORY:
http://www.wfmz.com/view/?id=57804
©2006 Reading Eagle Company
Senior Spotlights
Jeffrey Fazio:
Marketing |
Oscar Mejias watches a child on the playground of the Second
Street Learning Center in Reading where he volunteers as a foster
grandparent. |
Name:
Oscar Mejias
Age:
63
Address:
Reading
Family:
Daughter, Maricel
Mejias, Cuba; one grandson,
Cuba.
Employment:
After he came to Reading, Mejias worked in a local factory. Now, he
spends much of his free time volunteering at the Second Street
Learning Center in Reading as a foster grandparent.
Background:
Born in
Cuba, Mejias came to the
United States 11 years ago. He has lived in Reading for the
last eight years.
Community
Involvement: Mejias has been
volunteering as a foster grandparent at the Second Street Learning
Center for about three years. He spends time with the children at the
center from 7 a.m. to noon, Monday through Friday. Mejias said he
enjoys caring for the children at the center. They entertain him and
take his mind off any worries he has, he said.
Advice to
seniors: “Just to come, do
it, they would enjoy it,” Mejias said through a translator about
foster grandparenting. “It helps you so you’re not just at home, it
helps gets rid of stress.”
|
Jeffrey Fazio: Marketing |
Barbara Dawkins, a volunteer foster grandparent, feeds a child at
the Second Street Learning Center, a 24-hour child care service
operated by Opportunity House in Reading. |
Name:
Barbara Dawkins
Age:
73
Address:
Reading
Family:
Son, Jay Lowman, Allentown; daughter, Donna Williams,
New York City; son, Ralph Dawkins, Womelsdorf; son, Allen
Dawkins, Reading; son, Leslie Dawkins, Stevens; daughter, Gail
Dawkins, deceased; son, Jeffrey Dawkins, Reading; son, Kim Dawkins,
Alabama. Dawkins also has about 20 grandchildren, 10
great-grandchildren and three great-great grandchildren.
Employment:
Dawkins worked at
Berks Heim for 141/2 years. She also worked at Landy
Towel & Linen Service in Reading for 111/2 years. She also
did office cleaning.
Background:
Dawkins was born and raised in Reading. She attended Reading High
School and later raised her family in Reading.
Community
Involvement: Dawkins has been
volunteering as a foster grandparent for about seven or eight years at
the Second Street Learning Center in Reading. She spends her volunteer
time, Monday through Friday from 8 a.m. to 12 p.m., caring for infants
and toddlers, in addition to serving breakfast to preschoolers.
“I’ve been around
children all my life,” said Dawkins. “It’s what I know.”
Dawkins enjoys
spending time with the children at the center, caring for them and
giving them love and attention.
“I’ve got them all
spoiled,” added Dawkins of the babies she cares for.
Advice to
seniors: Dawkins suggested
friends and loved ones of seniors should allow them to pursue things
that will keep them busy.
“If they are in
good health and they can go out and do something for themself, let
them go,” said Dawkins.
To the seniors,
Dawkins encouraged others to contact the Office of Aging about
different opportunities that are out there to bring more fulfillment
to their lives.
According to
Dawkins, it is easier than one might think to do: All it takes is
sitting down and thinking, “what can I do for myself?” and then
getting out and doing it.
©2006
Reading Eagle Company
Persons of the week
Reading Eagle: Ryan McFadden
Carol Miller of Alsace Township waters plants at Opportunity House
with resident Keith Reidnauer. Miller is a member of the board of
directors at Opportunity House.
n
Name: Carol Miller.
n
Address: Alsace Township.
n
Occupation: Miller is a retired family and consumer science
educator.
n
Making a difference:
Miller has helped Reading's Opportunity House become a strong and
vibrant community force that provides hope and assistance for people
of all ages.
She has been volunteering with Opportunity House, formerly the Reading
Emergency Shelter, since 1989.
"Since that time the shelter has just grown and grown," said Miller,
who initially helped to feed shelter residents through her church,
Trinity Lutheran, Reading, and registered shelter guests on a weekly
basis. "When I started, we had 10 employees, and now we have more than
100."
She is in her second six-year term on the board of directors, where
she formerly served on the program and policy committee. She serves on
the governance committee, which works to recruit new board members,
and the property committee.
Through the property committee Miller is in charge of the shelter's
garden, which gives community members the opportunity to purchase and
maintain plots of land.
The garden is one of several throughout Reading that were established
through the Berks County Conservancy's Berks Urban Greening (BUG)
Community Gardening Program. BUG sponsored the Opportunity House
garden, located on the corner of Beech and Pear streets, along with
many other community partners including the Penn State Cooperative
Extension Berks County and the Colonial Oaks Foundation.
Outside of her work at Opportunity House, Miller serves as treasurer
of the Penn State Cooperative Extension Berks County board and is an
active member of her church, where she serves on the vestry, or church
council.
n
Rewards: Miller said she has enjoyed meeting so many new people
through the course of her volunteer service and feels good about
reaching out to those who are less fortunate.
n
Advice to others: Miller encouraged others to find an area
where they can give back to their communities.
"Find something you are interested in," she said. "Whatever your
interests are, there is something out there for you."
n
Recommended by: Delia McLendon, vice president of shelter and
housing services, and Lorri G. Oziri, vice president of development.
On Monday, July 18, 2005, Opportunity House President Modesto D.
Fiume addressed Reading City Council regarding financial and space
challenges that The Shelter program faces in the coming year. Below
is a copy of a Reading Eagle article that covered that meeting.
Opportunity House needs your help.
Please click here
to make a donation.
©2005
Reading Eagle Company
Homeless shelter lacks space, cash, City Council told
Without remedies, people in need could be forced to fend for
themselves this winter, says the president of Opportunity House.
By Don Spatz
Reading Eagle
The president of Opportunity House told City Council on Monday that
its homeless shelter may have to turn away people for the first time
this winter because it long ago ran out of space and the facility
has run up deficits of several hundred thousand dollars a year.
“We have to come up with a plan for what happens to these folks when
we tell them, ‘We can't let you in tonight,' ” Modesto D. Fiume told
council.
The homeless shelter at 430 N. Second St. is only one of the
Opportunity House programs that also include community child care,
job-readiness training and other programs for children under a $3
million budget.
Fiume said it costs about $600,000 to $650,000 a year to run the
shelter, but it gets only about $400,000 from a variety of sources.
Besides, he added, the shelter was built to house as many as 75
people, but averaged 90 in January 2004 and 110 in January 2005, and
once reached 130.
The shelter has cut staff to help make its budget. Fiume said if
more money could be found, it may rehire those people and raise the
per-night client capacity to 100. But he said the shelter is not yet
sure what it will do about the space problem.
He said the limits won't be specific, because the shelter doesn't
want to turn away people when the weather turns severely cold.
“But we can't keep losing hundreds of thousands of dollars each
year,” he said.
The problems come at a time when more people are in need of
services, he added.
“We're dealing with a core group of people who have kind of lost
their way,” Fiume said, noting that most of the people coming to the
shelter have not completed school, or became parents too young or
don't have supportive families.
The two biggest factors leading to homelessness seem to be a history
of mental illness, reported by 46 percent of the shelter residents,
or some history of drug addiction, reported by 73 percent.
However, Fiume said most experts believe the percentages are higher
than those reported by the residents themselves.
“We're holding out that for the first time we might be seeing
homeless people on the streets of Reading,” he said. “With all the
other good things happening in the city, that might not be good.”
Fiume said he was not specifically asking the city for money, but
letting council and the administration know of the problems
Opportunity House is facing. He has already spoken to county
officials and other agencies, he said.
Councilwoman Marcia Goodman-Hinnershitz, who also works for the
Council on Chemical Abuse that awards contracts to a number of
agencies including Opportunity House, said it's known to be an
efficient steward of the money it gets.
Meanwhile, city Managing Director R. Leon Churchill Jr. said the
administration plans to get the city Human Relations Commission back
up to full strength, and would no longer wait for the county to join
it.
“There's business to get done,” Churchill said.
The city and county had discussed a regional commission but
Churchill said there seems to be no movement by the county so the
city will go it alone.
The city commission has four openings among its nine member slots.
Churchill said nominees will soon be announced for the vacancies.
The commission's mission is to prohibit discrimination in housing,
employment and public accommodation.
Specialist sees
plenty of hope for victims who get help fast
©2003
Reading Eagle Company
By Dan Kelly Reading Eagle
Though there may be no cure for sexually violent predators,
professional help can assist victims to significantly ease their
trauma.
Provided a victim of sexual abuse gets treatment soon after the crime,
the prognosis for a full recovery is very good, said Ann E. Gaulin,
director of the Children’s Alliance Center of Berks County.
The Alliance Center, which opened Tuesday at 222 N. 12 th St., is set
up to help victims of sexual abuse and their families.
She said the center coordinates a response to abuse and prevents
future abuse.
The best way to treat sexual abuse victims is cognitive behavioral
therapy, Gaulin said.
It may sound like a mouthful, but Gaulin said it means helping the
child relive and think through the abusive episode until it no longer
frightens them.
Responses to sexual assault are similar to other traumatic incidents.
Victims suffer from post traumatic stress disorder. They have
nightmares, flashbacks and often withdraw socially.
The most important reason for getting prompt treatment is that
statistically child victims of sex abuse are more likely to be abused
a second time.
"If a child doesn’t get the appropriate treatment, the next time
someone attempts to assault them they have what are called
nonproductive reactions, like freezing out of terror," Gaulin said.
"They won’t be able to help themselves."
"If we treat the stress disorder right away, then the children will be
better able to handle other challenges later on in life," she said.
Past Articles
Center opens for abuse victims
Donors
leave hungry at city charity event
Ex-addict shows convicts they can succeed
Center aims to ease ordeal for children in sex-abuse
cases
Feb 22, 2004 - PDF version
The hidden homeless
Feb 8, 2004 - PDF version
Group hopes to find
good use for a former city trouble spot
Jan 20, 2004 - PDF version
Eagles kicker, announcer swoop into celebration
Dec 24, 2003 - PDF version
Inside
Opportunity House
December 5, 2003 - PDF version
Woman, son find a
new life at Opportunity House
October 28, 2003 - PDF version
Facility changes name to reflect its mission
7/21/03
Opportunity House is located in Reading, Pennsylvania and serves residents of Berks County. Our goal is to help families and adults become and remain independent members of our community.
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