While an 8-year-old may think they’re as self-sufficient as an 18-year-old, parents know how important it is to have a responsible adult with them at all times.
For South-Western City Schools parents with early morning and late afternoon obligations or those with children who wish to socialize outside of school hours, before and after-school care programs are offered through the district’s community partnerships.
Through these programs, parents can rest assured that their children are not only safe but physically and mentally engaged when they’re not around.
Connecting for kids
Y.M.C.A. of Central Ohio and Grove City Parks and Recreation
The Hilltop Y.M.C.A. staff host before and after-school programs at several of the elementary and intermediate schools in the district. According to Kisha Swift, vice president of marketing and communications at Y.M.C.A. of Central Ohio, the organization has supported the Grove City community for 36 years.
Grove City Parks and Recreation has also partnered with the district for more than 30 years to offer its program, known as Programmed After-school Recreation for Kids (P.A.R.K.).
Each day, the childcare program staff go into the schools to conduct the activities so the students can go to the programs right before or after school lets out.
“We collaborate with the schools to identify; What do their students need? Is it transportation so that they can have access to another program? Is it social, or emotional development? Is it help with summer learning loss? And so, we’re really proud of those collaboration pieces in our partnership,” Swift says.
Making new friends
Outside of convenience for parents, one benefit of these programs is that the kids can interact with peers differently than they do during the school day.
Students of all ages mix and mingle and they have the opportunity to meet students from different schools or classes to form friend groups based on shared interests.
Y.M.C.A. of Central Ohio and Grove City Parks and Recreation
“Everybody plays together, and it’s very cool to watch all of them grow socially and be able to accept each other,” Kelly Sutherland, Grove City Parks and Recreation deputy director, says.
Apart from having fun and building friendships, younger students learn skills and become socialized through watching and interacting with older kids.
“For their emotional growth, it really does help when they’re around kids of different age groups learning,” Sutherland says. “Like having the second graders and third graders teach the kindergartners how to share.”
Through the interactions and relationships students form, they also learn how to positively handle conflicts and manage their emotions under site workers’ supervision.
“A student that once acted out with frustration when losing at a game has learned ways to come to the teacher first or ask for time away from the group to settle down and then rejoin the group,” says Mandy Bealer, a former supervisor in the program and current executive director of school-age childcare at Y.M.C.A. of Central Ohio.
For information about other schools in the district, check out the district page at www.swcsd.us/before-andafter-schoolprograms.
Time to play
While the majority of the school day is spent sitting quietly at a desk, these before and after-school programs allow kids to get active and creative through crafts, coloring and dynamic games such as tag and dodgeball.
These programs often allow kids to choose how they’d like to spend their time. They also offer homework help and periodically have extracurricular lessons and guest speakers as well as seasonal parties for holidays such as Valentine’s Day.
Students even learn about caring for others by giving back through creating cards for senior citizens, fundraising for hurricane relief and collecting food and supplies to donate to homeless shelters, showing them how to serve their community.
“I think it’s really important, especially with this nowadays and the screen times and everything, we don’t have screens. They can bring stuff, but this is strictly just hands-on learning and socializing that you don’t see all the time anymore,” Sutherland says.
While play is the main focus of the programs, these programs infuse fun ways kids can learn about the world around them.
“We do have STEAM-based planning,” Sutherland says. “We also bring outside speakers in, for example, central Ohio theater groups come in. We have Franklin Soil and Water come in and talk to the kids about conservation and soil and how it works.”
Y.M.C.A. of Central Ohio and Grove City Parks and Recreation
Y.M.C.A. of Central Ohio and Grove City Parks and Recreation
Y.M.C.A. of Central Ohio and Grove City Parks and Recreation
Y.M.C.A. of Central Ohio and Grove City Parks and Recreation
Further impacts
For Amy Clarkson, P.A.R.K program site manager of Richard Avenue Elementary for more than 20 years, her favorite part of her job is seeing former students in the program return to work for P.A.R.K. years later.
“To date, I’ve had eight kids in the program come back to be leaders. Two of them even had their children enrolled in the program,” Clarkson says. “The kids always say, ‘When I grow up, I want to be a P.A.R.K. leader,’ so it’s fun to see some of them actually return as a leader. I guess it shows we are doing something right by having fun and making a positive impact for them to want to come back as adults.”
Y.M.C.A. of Central Ohio and Grove City Parks and Recreation
In 2024, the Y.M.C.A surveyed parents with children in the program on whether or not they agree or disagree with three statements:
Their child is physically and emotionally safe.
Their child is surrounded by positive and caring adults.
Their child has an opportunity to develop positive relationships with peers.
Overall, they found a 95 percent satisfaction rate.
The Y.M.C.A. can also offer resources for parents and families outside of their childcare needs, and the organization secured $197,000 in funding to assist parents with affording childcare and helping to fill the gap in transportation for students bused to different schools.
“As a parent, you have that guilt of like, ‘I’m going to work or school, and my kid’s now by themselves.’ In an after-school program, they don’t have to worry about that. That guilt is gone because the kids are having fun in a program,” Sutherland says. “If mom and dad get off work, a lot of kids are like, ‘Go home. I don't want to go home yet.’ That’s a really nice feeling.”
Maisie Fitzmaurice is an editor at CityScene Media Group. Feedback welcome at mfitzmaurice@cityscenemediagroup.com.
