Augusta

Capital Kids, a Community of Promise, created The Edge: The Scene for Teens, a popular teen center that has already served over 2,700 youth, and, with the Augusta Schools, has obtained a 21^st Century Learning Centers grant which will provide $300,000 per year for the next three years to develop after school programs to serve its children and youth.

With the Children’s Health Collaborative of the Maine Medical Center, Capital Kids created the Downtown Children’s Coalition. This collaboration joined with two other C4C Partner Communities to obtain a three-year grant from the federal Center for Substance Abuse Services (SAMHSA) that is aimed at developing infrastructure to support prevention efforts in all three communities. Each C4C community grantee will put in place a prevention continuum that serves all children from birth to age 18. This is the PRISM grant (described in Chapter 1) and Augusta’s share is $70,000 per year for three years to support staffing and program development.

Capital Kids is an example of a Partner Community that started from scratch with a group of youth from Project Hope, a local support group for teens involved with substance abusing families. With 51% youth representation on the Capital Kids board, this community exemplifies the critical involvement of youth in each step of planning and implementation.

Capital Kids completed a Search Institute Developmental Assets Survey of students in grades 6, 8 and 11 in May of 2000 and is currently preparing survey results for public dissemination and use. Its goals are to provide 500 youth with a safe place, 50 youth with caring adults, 25 with a healthy start and future; 500 with a marketable skill and 100 with the opportunity to give back through service. It also plans to create six after school programs.

Capital Kids has worked closely with the Augusta school system and other area school systems. It has worked with the business community, through the Kiwanis, Rotary, and the United Way. It has involved Big Brothers/Big Sisters, the university, library, city council, and the children’s mental health collaborative and is developing closer affiliations with the Department of Corrections Juvenile Services, the Department of Human Services, and the Department of Mental Health, Mental Retardation and Substance Abuse Services.

Capital Kids has obtained more than $100,000 of in-kind donations from community supporters and grants of $6,000 from the Kiwanis, $1,000, from the Rotary Club, and $5,300 from the United Way of Southern Kennebec County. In addition, it was awarded $3,000 from the Regional Children’s Cabinet and $14,000 from the "tobacco money" to create publicity by teens for teens to discourage smoking and develop healthy lifestyles. The fund raising experience of this C4C illustrates that local resources are available to efforts that support children if the community can develop a "collaborative center" that involves broad representation and has a strong vision and real accomplishments to attract them.

Capital Kids developed a plan to market its projects to both adults and youth. This will extend the reach of the Children’s Leadership Council and of The Edge, the teen center that has demonstrated the power of youth-designed activities to draw youth participation.

The Edge averages 80 youth for its 3-4 concerts and dances per month and will be targeting more middle school youth in the coming year. An increasing number of youth bands inquire about performance and recording time and the center can now pay bands a percentage of the door and still pay the rent. There are designations for membership and leadership at the Edge and three student staff positions: Student Office Assistant, Student Plant Manager, and Student Accountant. This, with the 51% youth participation on the board, assures that the center attracts youth.

During the last quarter of 2000, three youth were referred to services for homeless youth and Capital Kids has been involved in homeless youth issues. (In the last year, there were estimates from Cony High School that 40 to 50 students a day didn’t know where they were going to spend the night.) With the Kennebec Valley Mental Health Center, Capital Kids received a $100,000 grant in April 2001 from the Maine State Housing Authority to develop safe, supervised housing for youth aged 15-19 who are "actively engaged" in education. This represents the first time that housing in the Augusta area has ever been tied to education. Programming will include outreach services to identify those at risk in the community, life-skills training, vocational development and family support, with an emphasis on resolving family conflict whenever possible.

Capital Kids has benefited greatly from Communities for Children VISTA Project. The VISTA helped to create inroads with the community and to build long-term sustainability. In addition, as this Partner Community has grown, so has its need for more permanent staff to coordinate its diverse activities and implement its many planned efforts on behalf of children.

Contact Augusta C4C