Power Hour sparks potential in kids

I am so thankful that the Daily American Republic has invited our club to share some insights on what we do every day and some of our very special days with kids throughout our area. Famed American author and educator Stephen Covey taught us to start with “First Things First” and the first thing our kids do first every day is Power Hour.

A bedrock program of the Boys & Girls Clubs of the Heartland that every member participates in is our award-winning Power Hour program.

Every day our kids are greeted by name by two trained youth development professionals and a state-certified teacher that helps focus on the lesson they were taught that particular day in their classroom. Each grade-specific teacher obtains the syllabus and knows when our kids have a test coming up, our staff also knows what some of our members might be struggling in school with and are able to laser in and give the attention to each individual child’s needs.

When I talk to parents about Power Hour, I tell them there is no reason their kids cannot be the smartest kid in the class. Our members will never have a homework problem that our incredible teachers and YDPs won’t be able to help them solve. Our teachers are absolutely incredible!

Some will split up the class of 15-20 kids into three smaller groups. The kids play games that reinforce lessons they learned that day in school. A typical class will have a math group, a reading group and a STEM group. We encourage our teachers to try new and different strategies to unlock the potential and the imaginations of our kids.

Over the years, many parents have told us how thankful they are for the program as struggling with their children to get homework done is a thing of the past and Power Hour has allowed the opportunity for quality time each night as a family.

The results speak for themselves and we share these accomplishments with our No. 1 partners in what we do, the Poplar Bluff and Neelyville school districts.

Pre-pandemic, we would regularly see seven out of every 10 Boys & Girls Club kids on the A or B Honor Roll. Many of our kids fell behind during the pandemic and our afterschool efforts are critical to enabling our kids to catch back up. With that in mind, we were leery of what last year’s report cards would reveal. We were ecstatic as 74% of our kids maintained or improved their grades. That’s a testament to our staff and our AmeriCorps volunteers, but most of all a resounding victory for our kids!

Power Hour reinforces teaching our kids a work ethic. We ask our kids to give us one good hour of learning and they will be rewarded with two and half hours of fun, enrichment programming that has them returning each and every day to Club. Every program we conduct at Club is filtered through our Mission, “To enable all young people, especially the ones that need us the most, to reach their full potential as productive, caring responsible citizens.”

We currently have over 130 kids on our waiting to be admitted list as we have a dire need for Youth Development Professionals. If you are interested in joining our Mission please apply today by visiting our website www.bgcpb.org

Chris Rushin in the chief executive officer of Boys and Girls Club of the Heartland, which currently serves Poplar Bluff and Neelyville school districts. Both are also served by the College Kids Program, as are students of the Doniphan School District.