One of the first steps in helping Waco children in poverty may be as simple as getting everyone to work together on the issue.

This idea arose from a Waco Independent School District strategic planning meeting Wednesday as district officials spoke with local poverty advocates. The district invited members of the local poverty focus group — Jimmy Dorrell, executive director of Mission Waco; Teri Holtkamp, Waco homelessness coordinator; and Ashley Thornton, director of professional and organizational development at Baylor University — to discuss how WISD might fit in to the greater community’s efforts to address poverty.

In the past, WISD has addressed the problem of poverty by offering workshops on the topic to educators.

“I think the thought is, there’s got to be more to it than that,” said WISD strategic planning committee Chairman Pat Atkins.

Thornton said sharing information and resources between entities, including the school district, is going to be essential in addressing the issue.

Dorrell talked about Mission Waco’s urban teen program.

“The kids we are dealing with have lost hope. They don’t think they’ll ever graduate and that it won’t get them anywhere anyway,” Dorrell said. “Their lives are just an incredible disaster. It’s amazing the issues they’re dealing with at home.”

Dorrell said many of the teens Mission Waco works with already have dropped out, and the organization is helping them seek employment. It might help to widen the net for high-school credit recovery programs and expand the opportunities for these teens to change their minds and finish school, he said.

“We’d love to see all our kids go to college. . . . We also realize that’s not going to happen,” Atkins said. Waco ISD has made an effort to add more workforce training, Atkins said, but she questioned how the district can make sure kids know about those opportunities.

The kids aren’t going to get the message while sitting in a classroom, Dorrell said.

“We have the relationship with them,” he said. “That’s the piece missing for the average kid who gets disillusioned.”

Agencies even could help each other when it comes to simple human necessities, Dorrell said.

“We have kids who don’t eat,” Dorrell said. “We’re dealing with basic human needs in a way you can’t imagine.”

And Waco ISD has at least 18 sites around the city that are serving free meals to children this summer.

But it might take someone going with a kid to one of the feeding programs for that child to actually take part in it, Dorrell said.

“It all comes back to relationships,” he said.

Holtkamp said the poverty focus group, which has met just a few times, is looking at how to bring existent poverty-fighting efforts together.

“How do you take resources you already have without spending a dime and connect the dots?” she said.

Kay Metz, WISD director of development and community partnerships, said the Greater Waco Education Alliance could be a useful vehicle for circulating some information about poverty and children. She suggested that WISD have someone on each of the alliance’s committees, sharing information about the district.

Thornton, who is involved with the alliance, agreed, saying the groups could use someone who can share current, accurate information about WISD.

Dorrell said he is glad WISD is joining the conversation about poverty and that now is the perfect time, while there is a “political will” to address the issue.

wgragg@wacotrib.com

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