The Gridley Unified School District had two grants renewed for an additional five years - Drug Free Communities, and School Community Violence Prevention. These are the final five year periods that the district will be eligible for these grants.
Drug Free Communities is a federal grant, which means the money is guaranteed. It's through the Substance Abuse Mental Health Services Administration (SAMSHA).
The school district is merely the fiscal agent for this money given to the community in general. The Gridley GUARDIAN Coalition combines with the city and schools to do community education and outreach. It's also responsible for the teen center activities.
Drug and Alcohol Community Development Facilitator Clarissa Pfister has a drug and alcohol group for kids on probation, an anger management group and parenting class.
The two grants meet at the Mason's Student Assistance Program for when students are struggling in school. Pfister said students with behavioral problems aren't necessarily unintelligent.
A lot of times they're very intelligent, and they've got other issues," she said. "So what the Student Assistance Program does is it brings in outside agencies like mental health, the police department, probation, medical doctors, to look at what's going on in this child's life outside of school that's impacting their ability to learn."
The Drug Free Communities grant is for $125,000 per year for the five years.
The School Community Violence Prevention grant, which counselor Cynthia Soares operates under, is for $500,000 for five years, and was awarded because of the gang element in Gridley and because it's a rural community.
There is staff development, and they are implementing a second step program for violence prevention in middle school. This program will teach empathy and communication skills, problem solving and analysis, and will aim to prevent bullying, fighting, and alcohol and drug use.
Another aspect of this grant is the use of a School Resource Officer (SRO), who would be on campus at Sycamore during lunch a couple times a week. They're hoping to have this person in place soon.
"If students can build relationship with law enforcement at times when they're not in trouble, then they will have a little more respect for law enforcement," Soares said.
The California Healthy Kids survey, along with city data and SRO data on suspensions, expulsions and citations will be one of the ways to evaluate the effectiveness of both grants. Graduation rates at Esperanza (alternative education) can also be used. Graduation numbers have gone up over the last couple years.
