Bridges After-School Program: Helping kids thrive amidst the unknowns of COVID-19
The Bridges Program at Chicago House has provided enrichment programming to Chicago House’s young residents since its founding in 2001. Bridges offers after-school homework help and on-site classes with an emphasis on instilling self-esteem, individual responsibility, social and emotional competence, and an ongoing commitment to learning. Children and families living in the Family Support Program (FSP), as well as those who live in the surrounding community, reap the benefits of the stability and enrichment provided by Bridges: in 2020, the majority of participants reported having strong relationships with peers and trusted adults, performed at or above their grade level academically, and adhered to healthy behaviors like eating breakfast and not smoking.
As Chicago braced for the looming unknowns of COVID-19 last spring, Bridges rapidly changed course to keep its participants safe. “When cases really started getting bad and people started getting very concerned about what was happening, we decided to switch to virtual programming,” says Keith Partyka, Youth Program Coordinator at Chicago House.
Initially, the greatest challenge that arose from the virtual format was simply getting participants acquainted with interacting online. Partyka notes that nobody—including himself—had ever used Zoom before. Homework help frequently meant coaching children through how to open and complete digital assignments. The pandemic became a central focus of weekly virtual check-ins with families. Younger children understood that schools were closed, but not necessarily why.
As the pandemic wore on and the needs and wants of participants became clearer, Partkya began to upload how-to videos to YouTube with topics spanning in-home workouts to cooking tutorials to simple DIY science experiments. The challenges of virtual learning and engagement shifted over time; many students began to experience digital fatigue as they spent upwards of six hours online every day.
In the midst of these challenges, Bridges also celebrated numerous successes over the past year. Six participants, three of whom live in FSP, graduated from eighth grade in the spring. Staff members uplifted spirits and helped create a sense of normalcy at holidays with socially-distanced festivities at Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Christmas. Partyka also points to the incredible adaptability of families as they committed to navigating new technology on a daily basis and remained flexible amidst changing health and safety guidelines.
Bridges even successfully resumed some in-person programming over the summer as Chicago saw a lull in COVID-19 cases, the first time in months that the children in the program had interacted with anyone outside of their households. “At first, resuming in-person programming was a challenge because of all the new health and safety protocols for the kids,” Partyka notes. “But they adapted and did a great job learning how to protect themselves and other from COVID.” Families enjoyed a party at the end of summer to mark a successful end to summer programming. As citywide case numbers began to swell again in the fall, Bridges successfully transitioned back to virtual programming, with limited in-person activities.
Partyka relays another surprising recent success amidst the fear and fatigue of the pandemic: “Our high schoolers don’t usually sign on to check in after school even though we encourage them to. The other day, one of the older girls texted me out of the blue asking if she could come down and talk to me. Even though we’re virtual, we always have one person in the office. This girl was able to come down and talk to me about what was going on in her life, with school and family. I realized that even if a student doesn’t really show up to after school programs, they know we’re there with a safe space for them, and we’re there for them if they need anyone to talk to.”