Our primary mission is to provide a fun, safe, and enriching afterschool environment for 5th - 8th grade students in the Arlington area, and to strengthen the fabric of the Arlington community while doing so.

Description:
Our primary program is an EEC licensed afterschool program which serves 5th - 8th grade students in afterschool care, where we both do some of the traditional afterschool care things like help with homework, play games, get them outside for fresh air and activity, . . . . and we offer a full schedule of enrichment workshops on such topics as a variety of fine and performing arts, science (not your typical middle school science), math, fantasy role playing -- as an enrichment tool, writing in a variety of contexts -- from a literary magazine they produce to a fantasy writing course to a scriptwriting/playwriting course, to an improving your daily writing course, sports of various kinds, computer courses and animation, video game design, things of that nature, robotics, video/cable news production, a humanitarian/environmental/world issues club, and the list goes on and on.

We also go on field trips, take the kids to interesting summer activity locations, and develop strong mentoring relationships with them, as well as help them develop some microenterprise models themselves.

Finally, we try to encourage the participation of high school students as volunteers in a variety of capacities and we actively give them training in general job skills as well as in specific skills related to this type of child care/youth worker service industry job. This is a program we would like to make more formalized over the next several years.

We do actively participate with area colleges and universities in accepting students who need to do community service or internships or practicums for various programs and are happy to customize placements for these students as well as for any and all volunteers.

History:
Founded in the summer 0f 2006, Parents came to the Director of AEC and said that all the current elementary school providers were saying a middle school program could not be done, but that one was desperately needed, and so would I do it please! With blood, sweat and tears we were able to get a program up and functional in the fall of 2006, and now in the spring of 2008 we are looking forward to moving into the middle school itself for the fall of 2008 and expanding our program's capacity significantly, but also needing significant more volunteer assistance to run the program.

Contact people:

Kim Holt, Director, (phone), (email) Kate Wisnoiski, Site Coordinator, (phone), (email) Cindy Starks, Director, (phone), (email)

Address:

1100 Massachusetts Ave, 2nd Floor Arlington, MA 02476 (See a map)

Directions:

We are just past Arlington Center if you are driving north on Mass Ave, in the building right across the street from Jimmy's Steak House. Our building is at the Corner of Mass and Quincy, and Arlington Tire is. . . (more)   Nearest Bus Stop: 77 from Harvard/Porter, 2 or less minute walk For maps or information, please see http://www.mbta.com