We started with an AFCOST Ways of Being BINGO activity, where folks introduced themselves to each other and shared a story related to the Ways of Being on the bingo card. 

​That was followed by the “Stand up, Sit down” activity led by Greg and Tyrique that helped attendees get to know each other through personal stories. Khari then discussed the broader purposes and objectives of the Networks, its programs, shared information and updates about the OST Expansion Study, and recognized programs supporting this initiative.​

DeeDee Cetoute - Cambridge Camping: Cambridge Camping's Saturday Camp is starting Saturday, Sept. 21st. Camp is for ages 6-13 and there are spots open! Contact DeeDee for more info: [email protected]

Matt Meyersohn - Cambridge Basketball Lab: Basketball Lab is happening at PAUS this school year. Open to middle and high school students. It's 4x per week and starts Tuesday, Sept. 24th. No cost! Contact Matt for more info: [email protected]

Sarah Lincoln -  Cambridge Public Health Department: CPHD is looking for middle and high schoolers to develop campaigns around substance abuse. This is a paid, remote position for about 3-4 hrs per week. Reach out to Sarah for more info: [email protected]

Skye Edwards - The Robo Hub: The Robo Hub is offering after school programming for K-8th graders. Parents are welcome to attend programming, as well! Financial aid is available for students. The Robo Hub can also offer workshops at program sites or can host students on a field trip. Reach out to Skye for more info: [email protected]

Tagesech Wabeto - Commission on Immigrant Rights & Citizenship: Danehy Park Family Day is happening on Saturday, Sept. 21st, 11am-3pm.

AFCOST is seeking a new Middle School Network Coordinator!
The MSN Coordinator Position - posted by the Cambridge Public Schools as an "Out-of-School Time Partnerships Assistant Manager" - coordinates, convenes and builds a network of Cambridge out-of-school time providers, schools, community partners and others who work together to provide and ensure equitable access to quality learning experiences beyond the school day and school year for 6th-8th grade children and youth living throughout our city. Check out this job posting  for many more details.

Looking to attend Back-to-School Events?
​Check out this schedule for all Cambridge Public Schools Back-to-School Events.

"e" inc.: Introducing STEAM to Your After School Program
Looking to bring STEAM into your after school program? “e” inc. can come to your after school site once-a-week to lead students through science and action lessons that help students better understand our planet and work to protect it. After school science is parsed into three trimesters. Sites can choose whether to offer the program, as one science program to 3 sets of students across the year or three different programs to three distinct age groups. Typically, after school is every day and the “e” inc. science program occurs once-a-week. There are many topics sites can choose, from Backyard Habitats to Our Changing Climate, with many more also available. This program will be paid for by the City of Cambridge as long as your program resides in Cambridge! Interested? Contact Greg Green at [email protected] or Tyrique Kittrell at [email protected] to learn more.

Bridge Scholars is Looking For Program Sites
Bridge Scholars is a tutoring program, started and run by CRLS scholars, that gives high school students the opportunity to tutor and play with young kids around Cambridge! Bridge Scholars is looking for program sites to send CRLS students to:

• Do you have homework time at your site?
• Would you like a chance for students to have a 1-on-1 or group tutor to help out with homework support while also gaining a mentor?
• Need extra support for activities? 

Click here to sign up! Questions? Email Tyrique Kittrell at [email protected]

The Back to School Basketball Tournament for middle schoolers is happening on Sunday, Sept. 15th, 10am-2pm at Donnelly Field.

Are you a parent or caregiver of an elementary school-aged child? Learn how to support positive youth development and explore Cambridge resources at the Building the Foundation for Youth Wellbeing  event on Monday, Sept. 30th, 6:30-8pm at the King Open School.

​Mass Audubon's  Nature in the City Festival is happening on Saturday, Sept. 21st, 12-5pm at 668 Memorial Drive.

Our network meeting in March 2024, focused on our middle schoolers (6th-8th graders) - particularly the older rising 7th and 8th graders that are often hardest to recruit and maintain in summer programs, yet are also critically important to have in programming. Our big question for the meeting was: What does it take to engage middle schoolers in the summer? 

Because only so much can be covered in any 90 minute meeting, we focused on two elements: what trends we are seeing among the 6-8th grade post-COVID (in schools and programs), and what we are naming “the culture challenge”: how do you create a pathway so that 5th graders want to stay enrolled and eventually become the 8th graders in your program? 

Check out the slide deck from the meeting here: What Does It Take to Engage Middle Schoolers in Summer? ​

We also heard stories from families and students, and shared demographic data and examples from our summer follow-up initiative, where we work with schools and community members to assemble a list of priority young people and work individually with them to get them registered for summer programs. These highlighted the HOW: how we try to ensure equal access (and overcome the barriers involved) to high-quality out-of-school opportunities for everyone, from our team’s vantage point in the schools and across community programs. ​

Weren’t able to make the meeting? Check out the rest of the slides here!
​
Please get in touch with us if you have questions and want to talk more - as always, we want and need everyone across our networks to be part of the effort to challenge inequity, and all have roles and actions (large and small) that can be part of the solution. Feel free to use the data shared here (the demographic data and the Cambridge OST data) with sources cited (see slides) as we continue the long term work of overcoming barriers that affect the future of young people. ​

Shilpa (Cambridge Camping): Summer camp registration for Adventure Day Camp and Daybreak Day Camp is now open. There is also a low cost cooking program available! Cambridge Camping offers payment plans. To learn more visit their website. ​

Thank you to the many of you who joined our School Partnerships Gathering! We had over 100 people in the room and the energy was palpable. Thank you again to the Foundry for hosting (please reach out to them about booking space – they have so many amazing resources available!) 

After our meeting, we had a chance to connect with folks and asked them, “What's something you learned today?" Here are some of the responses we received:
​

• Title 6 concerning federal funding and language equity
• Opportunity fatigue is a thing!
• That a citywide ost timeline would be helpful to families, programs providers, and program directors (planning)
• Who people are at the district
• There’s a Basketball Lab!
• About the existence of RAY!
• How the portal works
• That CPS has a new SEL tool they are integrating into schools as an evaluation metric, and that there is a portal for information sharing across programs!
• Learned about different teen programs at Russell
• New people in New positions
• So many community groups
• Many providers concerned about engagement levels of youth
• new summer
• The social emotional questionnaire our students take
• There is a lot of support for high-school students.
• Learned about new resources, new connections
• After school program timeline
• I learned about the ways we are connecting afterschool programs to best share information together.
• I think it is really valuable to get all 3 networks together. Maybe there should be 1, and then have "subcommittee" networks for the different ages.
• There are SO many resources Cambridge offers, it’s tough to get them all together. But this was perfect
• I didn't know schools had SST's (Student Support Teams)
• A new help line has launched to help our multi lingual families.
• All the different resources around the city and point persons.
• I learned the difference between CET and CDD
• I learned that there's a lot of information that my community does not know about within Cambridge

To facilitate ongoing learning and networking, we've created a directory of all the meeting attendees, which you can view here.

Below are announcements - and some amazing language related resources from Crystal Rosa (thank you!)

Also, be sure to check out the upcoming 2024 ESON/MSN Network and 2024 RAY meeting dates/topics!

With gratitude for all that you each do,
Nadia & Annie

Many of you asked if we could specifically share the notes from each of our breakout groups with names and emails - here they are!

We encourage you all to reach out to each other to continue these conversations - or start new ones! We will also be reviewing notes to see what we can continue to work on in our networks and across organizations.

Check out the Breakout Group Notes & Participants below:

• Social Emotional Tools Breakout Group
• Career Connected Learning Opportunities 
• All Things Space
• Ways to Circle Up about a Child/Family
• Let’s Talk Timelines
• Who Participates Where
• Getting the Word Out
• All Things High School​​

Language Resources
From the Language Barriers breakout group a few things emerged. Here are resources on those needs:

The need for teachers to use plain language in their communications to families:

• The next plain language workshop is scheduled for Thursday, December 14 from 10 am to 11:30 am. Anyone can register using the link.

​
Although an organization may have bilingual staff available, their skill is not at a level for helping native speakers adequately. Interpretation services should be available to bilingual staff too:

• This slideshow details the federal law requirements regarding interpreter and bilingual staff use. It lists the civil rights laws that require students and families to have language access in schools and other activities managed by recipients of federal funding.
• I encourage everyone to cite Title VI of the 1964 Civil Rights Act when advocating for language access resources in their institutions.
• For bilingual staff who feel their skill level can help broker the help families need, there may be bilingual incentive pay available if they belong to a union. Testing is usually required to get that additional pay.
• I’m hoping to recreate this model for nonunion employees . . . TBD on those developments.

​Please inform the event participants that they can always Schedule a Meeting or Submit a Request for Assistance to discuss how to get their work translated or have interpretation at a community meeting.

We also shared some flashbacks to what we talked about last year at this time (particularly the tensions that come up when building new connections with middle schoolers) - see the slide deck for those flashbacks (and other info shared in the meeting). ​

The highlight of the event was the inaugural Impact Awards, recognizing members of our community (nominated by colleagues) who made significant contributions in their OST spaces.

We also celebrated Dee Spinkston and Daniel Weinstock, who are both moving on from their roles facilitating in the COP spaces:

• Dee, who has held the role as COP facilitator since October 2020 who created a safe and supportive space to grow and who built strong connections with so many of us.
• Daniel, who has held the role as COP facilitator since the fall of 2007(!), and has played a huge role in the career and professional development of countless members of our community. Daniel will still be around in AFCOST and QIS (Quality Improvement System) spaces, while he will be missed in the Wednesday COPs! 

​
If you want to feel the love all over again (or you missed it) check out this highlight reel on the Agenda for Children website.

As we look forward to another year filled with exciting possibilities and challenges, we are grateful for the support and enthusiasm you have shown us throughout the past year. Your continued presence and involvement are invaluable to us, and we are excited about the journey ahead.