Sunday Friends: ‘We are a community, not a service’
Life skills program participants earn tickets that can be redeemed for home essentials
Nearly five years ago, Maria Navarro faced the possibility of uprooting her family from the Bay Area. She loved their safe Santa Clara neighborhood and the good schools where her children were enrolled, but the high cost of living meant she could barely afford essentials like toilet paper and school supplies, much less Christmas presents for her three children.
“We were having a really hard time,” she said.
A neighbor told her about something called Sunday Friends. A few weeks before Christmas, Navarro brought her family for the first time. They have been coming to the weekly gatherings ever since.
On a recent warm October afternoon, Navarro sat at a table in the bustling cafeteria of Jeanne R. Meadows Elementary School in San Jose, writing an
essay that will be included in thank-you notes to donors. She was surrounded by several hundred parents, volunteers and children who gather each Sunday afternoon for classes and programs on personal finances and budgeting, nutrition and health, and college preparation.
Navarro earns points for writing projects and attending classes, which she can cash in during the week for essential home supplies at the Sunday Friends store. “What I’m earning here I will spend at the store [on] toilet paper, paper towels, maybe even pillows and comforters for the bed,” she said.
At the heart of Sunday Friends is its ticket-based economy. There are no handouts. Families and children who complete classes or activities earn tickets, which they can either spend at the store or save in the Sunday Friends “bank,” where their points earn interest.
Founded more than two decades ago, Sunday Friends calls itself “the working alternative to charity.” Its mission is to empower low-income families by teaching them practical skills and offering resources to achieve a better life. “It’s not about us handing out toys or backpacks or bags of food,” said executive director James McCaskill. “Breaking the cycle of poverty is the long game.”
To help them accomplish those goals, the program is seeking at least $20,000 in general operating support to help offset the cost of supplies and rent, as well as fund its programs for children’s financial literacy and parental support.
In Silicon Valley, the median household income is well over $100,000 a year, but more than 9% of the population lives below the poverty level. These families struggle to make ends meet in one of the country’s most expensive regions. And in many low-income households, parents don’t speak English and children attend low-performing public schools. Added barriers like these make it even more daunting for families to escape poverty. That’s where Sunday Friends steps in.
The program serves around a thousand people each year with its core sixhour programs each Sunday. Classes aim to equip parents to invest in their children’s education and success, and help students develop high academic aspirations and the tools to achieve them. That means nurturing the whole family’s mental, emotional and physical health, all integral to helping a low-income family climb out of poverty.
Poverty “is a complex issue and it requires a complex response,” said McCaskill.
Sunday Friends meets every Sunday at rotating sites that include Lowell Elementary in the San Jose Unified School District, Meadows Elementary and Santee Elementary in the Franklin McKinley School District.
For families who attend, the rewards can be life-changing. One student who received a scholarship from the program is now a senior at UC Santa Barbara. Another graduate is a senior at Harvard University.
In the cafeteria, some children work on art projects that will be donated to a local senior center. At one table, three boys are learning the basics of computer coding with a volunteer from Lynbrook High School. Others help to assemble a meal of chicken, bell peppers, hard-boiled eggs and cabbage distributed on trays to everyone at the tables. In a smaller classroom, a spokeswoman from a local credit union leads a room packed with adults through a worksheet on budgeting for and buying a house.
Sunday Friends falls somewhere between a very large extended family and a small town, with its store, bank, ticket currency, volunteer nurse’s station and cafeteria. “We are a community, not a service,” said McCaskill.
“Versus being a food kitchen, standing in line being handed your tray, we are all in it together.”
And since everyone works and eats side by side, it’s not always apparent who is a volunteer and who is a client. Some people, like Emmanuel Lopez, 12, are both. He has been attending Sunday Friends for two years with his mom, aunt and siblings. He also leads a math class for younger children, where he coaches youngsters in counting, multiplication and telling time. These days, he’s mostly interested in Camaros, Corvettes and Lamborghinis, but he says he’s thinking about becoming a teacher when he grows up. Even then, he doesn’t plan to leave Sunday Friends behind. “When I’m older I still want to volunteer here,” he said.
Far from being a deterrent, the work system at the heart of the Sunday Friends programs encourage families to return. With the points she earns each year, Navarro buys her children Christmas presents from the Sunday Friends store. Her eldest daughter Natalia, 18, is now in her first quarter at De Anza College, the first member of her family to attend college. Through Sunday Friends, she received a scholarship to help with the cost of books and tuition. Navarro’s 15-year-old son Juan and 10-year-old daughter Adriana are earning good grades in school.
“My biggest reward is this,” Navarro says, her eyes welling with tears. “My children going to school and being able to finish. That is my biggest goal.”
“It feels good to work for what we want,” she added, wrapping her arm around Adriana. “It makes me appreciate what I have.”