Noble Street Alumni at Summer Adventure
The Noble Network of Charter Schools encourage their students to lead exemplary lives and support their community through service. This summer, four Noble Street College Prep alumni, through the AmeriCorps: Project YES! program, are working for the Summer Adventure Program. This eight-week program, run by Northwestern Settlement, provides summer activities and supervision to 183 students, ages 5 to 15.
Summer Adventure focuses on enriching activities to prevent summer academic loss and provide a safe space for scholars during the summer months. With a focus on social-emotional and academic development for students, Noble alumni, along with other trained and qualified adult group workers, provide guidance to kids to conquer academic and life challenges by focusing on positive building blocks.
Martha Castillo, coordinator of After School and Summer Adventure programs, said, “Junior AmeriCorps not only provide additional counselors for camp, but role models the scholars can identify with. We are grateful their help, and see so many Noble alumni come through the program.” The Noble Street College Prep alumni help facilitate students’ participation in new food experiences, gym time, neighborhood walks, art projects, reading for fun, computer time, STEM projects, science experiments, trips to the pool and more during the summer months.
Northwestern Settlement’s Summer Adventure includes theme weeks, which bring new activities. Superhero Week empowered scholars through crafts and teamwork exercises. During STEM Week, our scholars experimented with science projects and visited the Museum of Science and Industry. Summer Adventure also takes the students on recreational and educational trips, fitting each age group. Field trips provide fun, exposure to new environments, and educational experiences, as well as opens scholars to a wider city and world. Scholars have visited the Chicago Bears training camp to see how their favorite players, and learn how to stay healthy and fit, a local fire station to learn about fire safety and the career of a fireman, and the Brookfield Zoo and Shedd Aquarium to explore animal habitats.
Summer Adventure helps students improve social-emotional skills, such as independent learning, responsibility, and teamwork. Endeavors and passions such as these are exactly what Noble strives to instill in its students. The Noble alumni working with this program are helping shape young scholars just as Noble helped in shaping them.