One Harford County pastor hopes lessons in math and leadership will steer middle school students from the dangers of the street to academic success.
“This clientele is the same clientele the gangs are looking for,” the Rev. Alfred Reeves said of the 20 “at-risk” students at his free Math and Leadership Academy. “You can have as many police as you want in the community, but you have to change the people?s mindset as well.”
For the last two weeks, the academy has offered the boys from schools in the Route 40 corridor an educational alternative to gang violence and low test scores in this area.
Drawn from Reeves? “Boys lI Men” mentoring program, the boys come from Edgewood Elementary, Edgewood Middle, William Paca Elementary and Magnolia Middle schools. Most have been identified as having academic problems.
In a Harford Community College classroom, the boys watched math teacher Christopher Anderson intently as he walked them through a lesson in probability, touching on equivalent fractions and the differences between theories and experimental outcomes. Even though the subject isn?t typically taught until later, almost every student had answers to Anderson?s questions.
“The goal primarily is critical thinking,” said Anderson, a former principal at Edgewood Middle. “We?ll take concepts that would be above their heads and get them comfortable with it … so when they get into it in class, they won?t be intimidated.”
“They have a lot of ways to learn stuff we wouldn?t get in our grades,” said 11-year-old Montrell Cade. “The instruction is better here.”
Julian Brookes, 12, said he enjoyed the daily “leadership thought” from Reeves, who is pastor of Carpenter?s House in Aberdeen, and would be more confident returning to school.
The math component of theprogram ended with Wednesday?s class, and Dr. John Jay Bonstingl, an author and consultant specializing in business and educational leadership, will teach the last two days.
Reeves plans to expand the program in years, eventually making it last for the entire summer and include lessons in reading and science, he said. The college would continue to host and offer its own teachers and resources, said Youth and Family Programs Coordinator Jackie Walsh.
