{"id":571241,"date":"2021-04-24T08:01:00","date_gmt":"2021-04-24T12:01:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.the74million.org\/?post_type=article&p=571241"},"modified":"2021-04-23T15:46:30","modified_gmt":"2021-04-23T19:46:30","slug":"oakland-schools-have-a-bold-simple-idea-for-helping-students-struggling-families-raise-money-for-them","status":"publish","type":"article","link":"https:\/\/www.the74million.org\/article\/oakland-schools-have-a-bold-simple-idea-for-helping-students-struggling-families-raise-money-for-them\/","title":{"rendered":"Oakland Schools Have a Bold, Simple Idea for Helping Students\u2019 Struggling Families: Raise Money for Them"},"content":{"rendered":"
This article originally appeared at <\/em>The Oaklandside<\/em><\/a> and is published in partnership with <\/em>the Solutions Journalism Exchange<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n A<\/span>na Carpio, a mom of three, lost her restaurant job last year as Oakland and the Bay Area went into lockdown, forcing restaurants to close or drastically reduce their hours. Carpio was the primary income-earner in her household, which at the time included her 18-year-old son, 10-year-old daughter and newborn granddaughter. Carpio\u2019s older daughter, who normally would have been able to help out financially, wasn\u2019t able to work because she had just given birth.<\/p>\n Not knowing where to turn, Carpio got help from a place she hadn\u2019t expected: her younger daughter\u2019s elementary school, Bridges Academy at Melrose. She received $500 from the school last April and an additional $250 payment in June, which she put toward rent and groceries.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s like it fell from heaven,\u201d said Carpio, who was unemployed for five months. \u201cIt happened during a really critical time when I wasn\u2019t working, so it was very helpful.\u201d<\/p>\n Over the past year, some schools in Oakland have stepped into a role that most didn\u2019t have before the pandemic: fund-raising and providing cash payments to struggling families. What began as emergency relief for mainly newcomer and immigrant families who weren\u2019t eligible for federal stimulus payments has continued for more than a year. Schools are helping to pay rent, housing deposits, phone bills and more for families in Oakland that are still recovering from the economic and health impacts of COVID-19.<\/p>\n \u201cIf the family is in distress, the student cannot learn,\u201d said Anita Iverson-Comelo, the principal of Bridges Academy at Melrose, located in East Oakland. \u201cIt\u2019s hard for us to turn our backs when families are on the phone crying.\u201d<\/p>\n When school buildings shuttered a year ago, teachers and school staff knew it would impact far more than just their students\u2019 education, and started conducting wellness checks \u2014 making phone calls to students\u2019 homes to ask what families needed: Did they have food at home? Was their housing situation stable? Has there been a loss of income? How about internet access? Was everyone healthy?<\/p>\n Alyssa Baldocchi, who teaches humanities to newcomer students \u2014 immigrants who have been in the country for fewer than three years \u2014 at Elmhurst United Middle School, would often connect with students and their families over Instagram because they didn\u2019t have phone service. Baldocchi, along with fellow teacher Marisa Mills, launched a fund-raiser<\/a> to collect donations to help support their immigrant students and families.<\/p>\n Around the same time, Iverson-Comelo decided to donate her stimulus check to one of her students whose father had just died. She suggested to some of her colleagues that they do the same with their stimulus funds, and soon it became a larger campaign when Iverson-Comelo\u2019s husband created a website, stimuluspledge.org<\/a>, to receive donations from the public.<\/p>\n