Some 5 to 8 percent of Whalley Avenue merchants can’t read. Kids no longer can sound out words because no one teaches phonics. And the only caregiver one neighbor could afford, her aunt, had her charge watching too much TV, so the child may not have been ready for kindergarten.
How to fix those problems and countless others was the subject of a brainstorming session held at the Union Temple Church on Platt Street Tuesday night. The aim was to give birth to a transformative new vision for a New Haven neighborhood: Dwight’s version of the vaunted Harlem Children’s Zone in New York City.
Allan Appel Photo
The first step in that thousand-mile journey was taken as 25 neighbors gathered with consultant Cynthia Newell (pictured at the top, and here with Florita Gillespie, left)) and staff the Greater Dwight Development Corporation (GDDC) to solicit public input for a “Promise Neighborhood” planning grant.
The grants, which come out of the federal Department of Education, are designed to provide “cradle to college” services for kids living within the zone.
To pump up the participants, Newell asked people to visualize a child in the womb of a woman in the Dwight, West River, and Edgewood “zone,” target area for the project.
“Twenty-three years form now people will be talking about what happened here, and that child will have graduated from college, and hopefully be living here in Dwight,” Newell said.
By Newell’s most recent count, 941groups are applying. New Haven’s “social and academic capital” make it competitive, she argued. The grant is due June 24.
The first-step grant, which requests funding for more detailed strategy and planning, is ongoing fulfillment of the GDDC’s master plan, written originally in 1997, revised in 2007, envisioning an “education corridor.”
GDDC’s grant writers, the consulting firm of Holt, Wexler, and Farnam, were soliciting ideas as well as data on kids’ school readiness, sense of safety, as well as family and community support.
It was noteworthy how often the kid problems to be solved turned on adults, parents and community-wide attitudes.
That’s why Sheila Masterson (pictured), the board president of the GDDC, mentioned the 5 to 8 percent of Whalley merchants who cannot read. “I’m sensitive to how embarrassed they are,” she said.
Newell replied that programs to teach adults and parents in a sensitive way could be part of the picture as long as the grantwriting “dots” are connected to show how this impacts kids’ outcomes. After all, thriving businesses are also key to a promised zone where kids can succeed.
What’s the data on the not so literate merchants? Newell challenged the audience. The grant to get a grant obliged the community to go out there and talk to the merchants. Find out what they need, she urged. Don’t make assumptions. “Assumptions are dangerous,” she added, and would be flagged as such in Washington.
Susan Monroe teaches writing and developmental English both at Housatonic Community College and Southern Connecticut State University. “We need a solution to the bias against intellect and learning,” she said. “We almost need a marketing campaign that shows it’s okay to be literate at all levels.”
Why not a campaign that says, in effect: It’s OKif you can’t read to your kids, we know you’re embarrassed, but here’s how you can address it, suggested Newell.
People were encouraged to dream big, but have the data to back up the vision.
Mark Abraham cited studies showing that kids can’t study well if their neighborhoods are full of screeching cars, and suggested quiet zones and quiet hours within the new “Promise Neighborhood.”
Through his project ctdatahaven, Abraham was helping collect all the Dwight data extant on the range of issues.
Residents of Dwight, West River, and Edgewood are being urged to answer a survey of ten questions that can be accessed through the following site: The information will be used in the submission to Washington.