Boyd/Berry students aspire to visit Yale this summer

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Local elementary school students may be heading to Yale this summer if enough money can be raised to pay for the trip.|ret||ret||tab|

School staff and community leaders, have raised just more than $5,000 of the $21,000 needed to send the 15 students and their chaperones to the week-long Yale University Comer Kids Leadership Academy in New Haven, Conn. If enough money is raised, the two alternate classmates will go, too.|ret||ret||tab|

Boyd/Berry Elementary was one of only five schools out of more than 700 Comer schools in the country invited to participate in this year's Leadership Academy. The students qualified for the opportunity through a lengthy process of interviews, essays, personal recommendations, scholarship and citizenship appraisals.|ret||ret||tab|

The Comer Leadership Academy is designed to teach lifelong performance skills by exposing the students to a variety of developmental experiences. |ret||ret||tab|

The leadership skills and the means to implement those skills, which will be taught at Yale this June are intended to be brought back into the community.|ret||ret||tab|

The Comer program began in Spring-field four years ago when Drury University became involved with nearby Boyd/Berry. Departments on the Drury campus asked how they could contribute to the classroom experience in order to help children succeed in an exciting learning environment. In a collaborative effort, Drury University, Springfield Public Schools and Yale University modeled a partnership based on the School Develop-ment Program created by Dr. James Comer at Yale's Child Study Center.|ret||ret||tab|

"The Comer Process is one of five leading school reforms initiated since 1968," said Alana Lyles, principal of Boyd/Berry Elementary. "It combines the learning process with community relationships to foster ownership responsibility and accountability in the community. The result is that the children feel good about themselves. They know they can succeed."|ret||ret||tab|

Evidence of the success of the partnership became apparent from the beginning according to Drury literature. Test scores climbed, there were fewer disciplinary problems, teachers stopped transferring out of the district and parents and other adults from the community became more involved in improving the classroom experience. Since then, Pipkin Middle School and Central High School also have joined the program.|ret||ret||tab|

"It's a community thing," said Lyles of the Comer partnership. "Boyd/Berry is the most diverse school in the district. Economically the students range from middle class to homeless. Forty percent are of color. Through the partnership, Drury students work one on one with Boyd/Berry students. Boyd/Berry children go to Drury for physical education and computer labs. Everyone involved is benefiting," she added.|ret||ret||tab|

Lyles noted that if there's not enough money raised to send all the children, she'll have to choose just a few of them. She hope to have the money raies by mid-May for the July trip.|ret||ret||tab|

"Not being able to send these children on this once in a lifetime opportunity (to attend the Yale Academy) would be the ultimate downer for the end of my career," said Lyles, who will be retiring as principal at the end of this school year.|ret||ret||tab|

"So many people are always complaining about what's wrong with education. This is the opportunity to make a real difference. To truly prepare future leaders as employees, start with an 8-year-old and train her as a leader. It's the chance to make an investment in the future to give a child the opportunity for what they may never have had in their lifetime."|ret||ret||tab|

Individuals who want to help the Comer program as community mentors or with funding toward the trip may call Lyles at Boyd/Berry.[[In-content Ad]]