Problem & Solution

Problem

56% of children living the South Ward live in poverty—nearly two times the national rate (22%)
Over 50% of Newark’s students do not graduate from high school
In the South Ward only 8% of adults have a college education
Only one 1 of 3 childcare slots in Upper Clinton Hill were located at high-quality care centers
Only 67.6% South Ward students graduated from high school

Solution

Children need and deserve: 1) high quality programs at every developmental stage and in every domain (academic, social-emotional and physical and behavioral health); 2) strong families; and 3) a safe and healthy community in order to succeed as adults.

OUR MISSION

Our mission is to dramatically improve the trajectory of children’s lives, making it possible for them to succeed to and through college and career.

VISION

To ensure the South Ward community has an integrated continuum of high quality schools and services for children and families from birth through college and career.

The SWCA two-generation cradle-to-career educational pipeline is a systematic organized approach to ensure that all young people and their parents/guardians have ongoing access to and participate in high quality services and learning environments across the child’s developmental years to achieve educational success.

Our vision for our continuum of solutions starts with heavily investing in the earliest years in both parents and children by strengthening parenting skills, ensuring children have a medical home and access to high quality early childhood programs and services. To address academic proficiency, the SWCA network of schools will ensure children: have great teachers and tutors, implement proven curriculum, and launch interventions strategies to promote school attendance. In addition, SWCA and partners will fill gaps so that all children can attend high quality after-school programs. SWCA and its partners will blanket the neighborhood with resources to counter the high prevalence of adverse childhood experiences and the resulting trauma that contributes to poor school performance and behavior, and risk for later negative life outcomes. All adolescents in the community must have multiple pathways to excel whether its through a college preparatory track or programs and schools to reconnect or learn in a way that better suits them. To ensure youth make it to the finish line of college and career, supports will need to be put in place while they matriculate to achieve a college or vocational degree or certification that enables them to break the cycle of poverty and thrive as productive citizens.

The Zone

The South Ward Children’s Alliance (SWCA) focuses on the South Ward of Newark, New Jersey. Concentrating on the South Ward allows the SWCA to provide intensive quality services to a specific community, including those who are hardest to reach- where impact can be measured. The South Ward is a racially concentrated area of poverty. As with many other communities like the South Ward, many residents lack access not only to good schools and health care, but also to quality child care, banks, jobs, and healthy foods and they frequently pay more for basic goods and services