Jaycee Community Center (JCC), is located at Jaycee Park, off of Wade Ave near downtown Raleigh. Dan Bacon and Amy Hayden (the community center director and associate director) are the two site supervisors and are the main employees involved in most of the programming that Jaycee sponsors. The community center is responsible for managing Jaycee Park, Fred Fletcher Park, and Glen Eden Pilot Park. Jaycee is in the public sector since it is a City of Raleigh park, so it receives resources from the city and all staff are government employees. The facility has a gym, multiple multi purpose rooms, and Jaycee park right outside, as well as a City of Raleigh Parks, Recreation and Cultural Resources administrative building. The community center additionally runs sports leagues, summer camps, and other programs throughout the year to attract the surrounding community.
The Jaycee Community Center’s mission is to promote community involvement and improve quality of life for people in the surrounding area. The mission of Raleigh Parks, Recreation, and Cultural Resources is: “to actively encourage, provide, promote and protect quality leisure, recreation and cultural opportunities, facilities, and environments that are essential for the enhancement of the lives of our citizens.” JCC is closely located to Mayview Apartments, a historically low-income housing area. While also being located in the middle of Raleigh, JCC serves higher income households. This means there is a wide gap between economic classes that JCC tries to close, by providing a community center for all economic classes.
Through the programs that our PRT 358 team have put on, we strove to meet the following desired outcomes that Jaycee shared with us:
(1) Increase the direct community’s awareness of the community center.
(2) Build rapport between the community and the community center.
(3) Build stronger relationships between family members that attend the program.
(4) Promote community involvement.
(5) Promote educational experiences.
- The target market for Jaycee Community Center is generally the individuals and families who live in the surrounding areas of the community center. JCC has struggled to engage the Mayview Apartment Community consistently. The Mayview community is a low income neighborhood located within walking distance directly behind the community center. The families have previously not engaged with the community center frequently, but our group desired to increase their involvement with the community center through our Popcorn and Pajamas event, in order to show that it does not take a lot of time, money, or resources to become a close-knit community with your neighbors. The community center is also there to serve anyone who lives near or far from the community center, or is interested in the services that the center provides. This is because Jaycee is also located close to the middle of downtown Raleigh, so there are quite a few higher income families in the area. This creates a unique challenge for Jaycee in trying to find a way to close the gap between economic classes, and provide a community center for all economic classes.
- Our first program, Adventures in Agroecology, was located off site and not directly related with the community that Jaycee typically serves, but still appropriate for JCC since JCC is a community center that serves the local community, especially children. Our target market was the K-5 Track out students at Lake Lynn Community Center. This promoted community involvement and education, two of JCC’s desired outcomes. The target clientele (track out kids) have most likely never had prior experience or knowledge of the agriculture industry. This program allowed the students to experience agriculture and gain exposure to where their food comes from and how sustainable farms work.
- Characteristics of Elementary School children
- They are looking for someone to admire, particularly people who have done things to improve the quality of human lives (Archive for Characteristics Elementary Students)
- Want to be accepted by their groups (Archive for Characteristics Elementary Students)
- Constant need for movement (The Elementary Learner)
- Tend to be competitive but can be easily upset if they lose (The Elementary Learner)
- These characteristics affected our program because we wanted to expose the children to someone they could admire (farmers), and address their need for movement and competition by taking them on a tour and doing a relay race.
- Our second program, a Popcorn and Pajamas evening, was located at JCC and specifically targeted individuals and families of the Mayview Apartment community.The event was open to all of the surrounding area but was heavily marketed toward the Mayview Apartment Community to improve relations.
- Characteristics of low income families
- Many are single parent families trying to raise their kids
- A lot of the parents work many jobs
- The families want the best for their kids so they work harder
- Many are struggling to stay above poverty levels
- These characteristics affected our program because we wanted to provide a time and place for families who struggle to have bonding experiences due to time constraints from possibly working more than one job, and to show them that the local community offers places where this bonding can occur, such as the community center.
References:
“Archive for Characteristics Elementary Students.” Clanmore Montessori School, http://www.clanmore.ca/tag/characteristics-elementary-students/.
The Elementary Learner. http://www.ed.gov.nl.ca/edu/k12/curriculum/guides/health/elementary/el.pdf.
YMCA. “Low Income Families.” Oct. 2015.