Family Resource Center looks toward new school year

The Painesville Family Resource Center proved to be a crucial component during the 2019-20 school year for Painesville City Schools.

The center, located with the district’s Elm Street Elementary at 585 Elm St., provides food assistance, and health and wellness services.

With students learning remotely due to social distancing regulations related to the novel coronavirus, new needs must be met.

“We try to remove the barriers that impede students from succeeding in school,” said Family Resource Center Coordinator Maribel Young.

Typically, the center offers free wi-fi signal so students can continue to work on their assignments. With the center closed along with the schools for social distancing Chromebook laptops were loaned to students in order to complete their coursework remotely.

In addition to providing access, Painesville instructors like Kenan Irish went a step further.

“I was distributing Chromebooks,” he said. “I also had to switch roles a bit and become tech support for some families who never used Chromebooks or stuff of that nature before.”

This personalized approach seeks to address student

needs in and outside of class in a more specific manner.

“I’ve made a lot of phone calls in the last couple months,” Irish adds. “It’s a lot of reaching out. I miss the face to face interactions.”

Part of the reachingout process involves the inception of the Harvey Hub. New to Harvey High School this past school year, the hub is ostensibly a student lounge in the school’s library that Harvey students can access after their school day ends.

“It’s a safe place to go after school,” Irish summarized.

From the Hub students can study and reach out to tutors. There is also careerbased guidance counseling available. Irish highlights leadership conferences that are gaining interest among the students that frequent the Hub. While school was still in session and in-person, he estimated the Hub would get 30-35 students at a time.

He looks forward to enhancing what the Hub can offer students, intimating a desire to work with trade schools and vocations to provide a link for interested students once the next school year begins.

“We’re also calling a lot of families, checking in on students we haven’t seen been active,” Irish said.

While the Family Resource Center is closed during the summer, staff are still checking their messages and are able to reach out to anyone with specific concerns. They are also actively seeking uniform donations for students, which Young says is always in high demand.

“We’re always trying to do our best to address the needs of Painesville students,” she added. “We want to remain flexible. We want to make sure we’re addressing as many needs as possible for students and their families.”

The Painesville Family Resource Center can be reached at 440-392-5548.