By Susan Dickson
Staff Writer
Ten years ago, Bishop Gene Hatley started thinking about a program run through the church to help educate the members of the African-American community.
The program would reach out to children and adults who needed help with reading, math or other skills.
Although Hatley – who serves as pastor of Barbee’s Chapel Missionary Baptist Church – tried to launch such a program several years ago, it was too small to succeed. But about a year ago, Hatley and other volunteers started work on a new program, Barbee’s Chapel Harvest Word Community Resource and Enrichment Centers, which will launch next month.
On Monday – Martin Luther King, Jr. Day – Hatley invited community members to the church to learn about the program.
“I’m just so excited,†Hatley said. “I’m trying to contain myself.â€
Harley announced the launch of the program at a meeting of school and community leaders earlier this month, where Chapel Hill-Carrboro NAACP and Interdenominational Ministerial Alliance leaders called for changed and improved achievement for black students in Chapel Hill-Carrboro schools.
Prior to the meeting, the groups distributed a report card to school officials outlining failures in 11 categories, including eliminating the minority achievement gap, decreasing the dropout rate of black students and more.
According to Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools, about 44 percent of black elementary school students passed both reading and math End of Grade tests, compared with 93 percent of white elementary school students.
Closing the minority achievement gap has been a repeated goal of school board members, administrators and teachers alike. According to Superintendent Neil Pedersen, who has served in his current position for 8 years, the district has made slow progress, but rescaling of test scoring has made that progress less apparent.
“We’re not talking about a problem that’s unique to Chapel Hill — it’s all over the nation,†Hatley said. “In most every school district, the problem is exactly the same.â€
To remedy that problem, Hatley says the program will start with reading skills.
“Number one is going to be dealing with their reading skills,†he said. “That is key. That’s basic.â€
The program will be run entirely by volunteers, including several former teachers.
“We are people who have been successful in teaching kids,†said Hatley, a former teacher.
He added that the support from the community has been a huge help in starting the program.
“We have people calling every day to volunteer,†Hatley said.
According to Brother Robert Muhammad, one of the program’s coordinators, volunteers will first assess each student in order to determine his or her needs and to “chart them on a course, our course.â€
At first, the program will have just one class a week on Saturdays, but eventually it will expand to several classes a week, at several locations throughout the area, so that the program can serve more children and adults.
For adults and children, the program will offer computer classes, which will teach participants not only how to use computers and fix problems, but to build computers from scratch.
“We must do everything that we can to bring the community together,†Muhammad said.
Parents of children in the program will be required to be involved, and will help to serve as a link between the program and the child’s school, in order to better determine how best to teach the child.
“[The schools] cannot require parents to participate in a child’s education and learning,†Hatley said. “They can ask, but they cannot require it. We can.â€
To enable parents to be more involved, program classes will be recorded and streamed on the church’s website. If a student can’t make it to class, he or she can participate online, according to Muhammad.
“We’re trying to cut out the excuses now,†he said, adding that the program will offer transportation for its students as well.
“We want to catapult our community to another level, and I think this is the way to do it,†Muhammad said.