BAWCC Past Programs
Library Program
Tenderloin Community School’s Library, set up by BAWCC soon after the school opened, is a colorful and welcoming “home” for books with up-to-date technology for cataloguing and for the students to do hands-on research, which they are taught in their library classes.
The students listen to book readings, learn library and research skills, and choose books to check out and take home. For some of our students, these are the only books they have at home!
BAWCC has been working to build the school’s library collection since the year the school opened. It is made up of books specifically chosen for our very diverse student population. Many books represent the cultures and languages of the families who make up the school.
Tenderloin Family Fair
Another of BAWCC’s favorite projects is the Tenderloin Family Fair, which we have sponsored annually since 2001. On a beautiful spring day, we have more than 500 children, parents and other family members come to Tenderloin Community School to enjoy a great festival with carnival games, craft activities, yummy food and terrific prizes.
Many kids go away with six or seven brand new books as well as other coveted prizes that they have “won”. BAWCC collects thousands of new children’s books throughout the whole year so that most of the children can take home plenty of prize books from the Family Fair to read during the summer.
The Family Fair also helps BAWCC raise funds for many of our year-long programs for low-income kids and their families. Proceeds help fund: after-school clubs, the school’s technology program, the learning garden program, dental program, and others.
BAWCC’s Academic Enrichment Program
Several years after Tenderloin Community School opened, BAWCC staff was approached by the school’s principal and teachers and asked if we could designate some resources to work with students who needed more assistance with reading.
Many students were below, or far below, their grade levels in reading and comprehension, and although the classroom and resource teachers were working hard in this area, there were still many unaddressed needs.
Since that time, BAWCC has had various staff members working one-on-one and with small groups of students on literacy. In addition, BAWCC joined in the school-wide literacy initiative, and successfully secured donations to help send a group of teachers from Tenderloin school to Columbia University in New York to participate in their Readers Workshop training.
If students are not learning to read by the time they are in their upper elementary years, they are not reading to learn. BAWCC is committed to continuing our literacy work with these young students.
Harper for Kids
In the summer of 2010, BAWCC joined this young non-profit in the City to bring a unique program to low-income kids, a youth sports program based on a character education curriculum. The Grand Slam Tennis Camp-SF, held at the San Francisco Tennis Club, teaches skills in a sport that these children will be able to enjoy for the rest of their lives, and it also instills daily lessons from Coach John Wooden’s Pyramid of Success, such as the importance of: hard work, cooperation, and giving 100% effort. We also brought Harper for Kids to the school to reinforce to the students how important it is to always do your best!
