Parents, Kids Meet A Fitness & Reading ​“Challenge”

Eighty New Haven Public School (NHPS) students, parents, teachers, and administrators gathered for a summer afternoon focused on fitness and reading.

The occasion Tuesday was the second installment of a NHPS ​“Summer of Fun” initiative. Schools Superintendent Iline Tracey took participants on a two-mile walk on the Farmington Canal Trail through parts of Dixwell and Newhallville.

Chief of Youth, Family and Community Engagement Gemma Joseph Lumpkin organized the gathering, which started at Scantlebury Park with books, T‑shirts, and program sign-ups for open summer activities. (Read about the previous challenge hiking up East Rock here.)

The summer challenge is in partnership with New Haven’s Free Public Library (NHFPL) and New Haven Reads, which provided boxes of free books for youth.

At the center of the event was NHFPL’s ​“Read” mobile bus, where families picked up free books from a dozen overflowing boxes. The bus was stocked with reading level-labeled shelves of books for families to check out from the library.

Starting July 1, NHPS launched its Summer of Fun program, which is hosting a variety of summer camps and activities throughout the city with designated federal Covid-19 relief dollars.

WYBC FM set up camp at Scantlebury Park to greet participants and cheer families on after completing the challenge.

Westville father Mory Cisse’s three kids, ages 6, 8, and 16, were waiting eagerly on him when he got off of work Tuesday to join the fitness and reading challenge. The kids picked up custom ​“Summer of Fun” T‑shirts and browsed the book boxes for the perfect picks.

First-grader Malika picked up the three most colorful books she could find, including Me & Neesie by Eloise Greenfield and a geography book about France.

After picking their books, the trio couldn’t help but to find a seat right in the middle of the park to start looking through their picks.

Supervisor of Youth Development and Engagement Kermit Carolina brought a group of about 20 students from the Career Pathways and Social Justice Summer Camp based out of Hillhouse High School. Nearly half of the 140 students enrolled in the camp were selected because they missed at least 50 percent of this past school year.

To reengage the students with chronic absenteeism grades six to 10, the five-week camp is using Youth Connect related intervention methods to offer extracurricular and academic lessons, including facilitated dialogues about social justice in partnership with the University of New Haven, credit recovery, carpentry, fitness, poetry, photography, story writing, and cooking.

After the two-mile walk, Carolina celebrated with the students with a pizza party.

Mother of two Joyce Baker brought her kids Payton and Prince and nephews Cameron and Carter to the event after picking them up from summer camp.

At the end of this past school year, Prince’s teacher told Baker that he was beginning to fall behind in reading. Tuesday’s event ​“came at the perfect time. He’s seeing other kids and me getting books, so he’s more interested I hope,” Baker said.

Baker took her family inside the Read mobile bus to pick out books and to have an occasional dance party.

Baker was told by Prince’s teacher that he was at reading level M, which she easily found and picked from on the shelf.

Baker was also able to get new library cards from the bus after learning that hers and the kids’ cards had expired. This past year, her two kids attended school in person two days a week, which Baker said was not effective enough. ​“They missed out on those social situations kids need, so I couldn’t miss out on the chance for them to be around more kids” Tuesday, she said.

In all, Baker checked out more than eight books for her family.

Many kids rode scooters and skateboards down the trail with the group. Other families skipped the two-mile walk and stayed in the park reading or playing.

Before starting the walk down the trail, the group made a stop at the William Lanson memorial statue placed along the Farmington Canal Trail and Locke Street where educator Malcolm Welfare shared about the legacy of King Lanson in New Haven. Welfare was brought aboard the Career Pathways and Social Justice Summer Camp as an instructor.

“When you look at this city and you notice that it’s a coastal city, that it’s a city that thrives off of its water ways, you have this great man to thank for that,” Welfare said while discussing the diving, landscaping, and demolition work of Lanson while building Long Wharf.

“The historical record of black people doing excellent things is long,” said Welfare. ​“This is something that if you work hard to do you can do too.”

The group started on the Farmington Canal Trail at the corner of Canal and Webster Streets past the Newhallville Learning Corridor. The walk ended at Ivy Street. Participants walked back as a group to complete their second mile.

“We are now free to get out here to exercise safely and engage,” said Tracey. ​“Not only is physical welfare important, but these kids’ cognitive pathway.”

The summer initiative is working hand in hand with the NHPS summer camps and programs to address the negative effects of remote learning on the youth’s physical, social, emotional, and mental wellbeing. The challenge also brought dozens of school staff out the classroom.

Tracey said New Haven Promise plans to sponsor the next fitness and reading challenge for students.