Resources:
Lee Van Roth's Feature Article: Nonprofit 826michigan moves to Ypsi with plans to create 25,000 new writers by 2030
826michigan Volunteer Application
Eastern Michigan University College of Education
Transcription:
Lee Van Roth: You're listening to 89.1 WEMU. I'm Lee Van Roth, formerly known as Rylee Barnsdale, and this is On the Ground Ypsi. While the name has changed, the mission hasn't. I'm still here to bring you stories rooted in the heart of our community. And after 20 years of cultivating young writers from inside a whimsical robot supply shop in Ann Arbor, the youth literacy nonprofit 826michigan is officially moving its headquarters to Ypsi--a move designed to deepen the non-profits relationships with institutions, like EMU and Ypsilanti Community Schools, and to maximize its impact in the communities it serves, especially right here in Ypsi, as it works toward the bold goal of helping 25,000 new writers by the year 2030. Joining me to talk about what this relocation means for students, families, and educators in Ypsi is Catherine Calabro-Cavin, grants writer for 826michigan, who has been instrumental in shaping the organization's educational mission over the years. Catherine, welcome and thank you so much for being here!
Catherine Calabro-Cavin: Oh, my gosh! Thank you so much for having me! I'm so excited to talk with you!
Lee Van Roth: So, like we mentioned, 826michigan has been around the area and has been located in Ann Arbor for a significant amount of time. Obviously, there's been presence in Ypsi as well as in Detroit. But now, this move is kind of solidifying this dedication to this local community here. Can you tell us a little bit about what led 826 to deciding that now was the right time for this move?
Catherine Calabro-Cavin: Like you said, the organization has been in Southeast Michigan for more than 20 years. And we've moved before, actually. Some 826 history--the very first location was out on State Street. And then, a couple years into our tenure in the area, we moved downtown to Liberty Street. So, I think that was around 2007. But we've been, like you said, very fortunate. We had our wonderful robot supply store for many years. And then, just in the past probably five years, of course, with COVID, the pandemic, things really changed pretty significantly for our organization, just in terms of...I mean, in terms everything, right?
Lee Van Roth: Uh-huh.
Catherine Calabro-Cavin: The downtown space, as an afterschool hub, have really shifted after COVID, and teachers and families in the community were asking for more services that would happen at schools. And we were finding that's never been strange that it's easier to meet students where they're already at and where they have points of access. So, a lot of our programs, and this was happening in Detroit as well, shifted from being in our writing lab, our physical writing space, to being in schools, either during the school day or through afterschool programs, through partnership programs, other community orgs, like the library, that are offering wonderful wraparound services where 826michigan could go and meet students where they are at. And so, it's a long time coming, and I think that, ultimately, some of the amazing partnerships that are able to deepen and to grow by physically shifting our writing lab space from Ann Arbor to Ypsilanti just seemed like the right time this coming academic year.
Lee Van Roth: What other community feedback have you received throughout this process of figuring out where to go, where the location is going to be, and how is that going to centralized in a way that best benefits the community? What have those conversations looked like?
Catherine Calabro-Cavin: Yeah, thanks! So, 826michigan, I said, is just kind of wrapping up our full 20th year of programming. And so, leading up to our 20th year, for the past two years, we've been embarking in this big strategic planning process. And as part of strategic planning, we did surveys with so many different groups of stakeholders: volunteers, with students themselves, of course, with families, with teachers, our community partners. We did a series of focus groups. We've done lots of meet-and-greets and opportunities for people in the community to come together and talk with us. And I will also say, again, as part of 826michigan's central to our work, we are in schools every day of the week, especially in Ypsi Community Schools. And we do have regular conversations with the administration in the school. And then, in each partnership school that we work with, we have meetings with the principal, either on a very regular basis or at least a few times a year, and then, of course, with our partner teachers. And I think in each one of these instances, we were just learning more and more from families about access being a real hurdle to participation. And so, is it possible that students could stay after school and still participate in a program, or is it possible that walking to the library made it a little bit easier for them to be able to go and come to a program? And we were hearing that again and again as we put together the strategic vision for the next chapter of 826michigan's future. And so, I know you were talking about our big goal of reaching that large number of students by 2025.
Lee Van Roth: Yes, it's an ambitious goal for sure!
Catherine Calabro-Cavin: Yes! Right, right! And we also are really striving for balance and agility moving forward. Those are some of the things that we found when we were, I guess, doing some of the data collection from of all these stakeholders, right? We want 826 to be a place of belonging, a place of balance, and a place with agility. So, we wanted to be able to, I guess when I say agility, I'm talking about like, how can we adapt? How can organizations stay nimble enough to really adapt to the changing needs of each school and each district that we work in? And so, we work with students in Detroit. We work students in Ann Arbor. We work for students in Ypsilanti. And I think, unfortunately, it's bittersweet, but letting go of that physical space opens us up to be a little bit more agile and to be physically in the spaces where more students are. And balance is another important thing that came out of that strategic work, like I said, from all of the interviews and feedback from stakeholders. People want us to really focus on making sure that the quality of our programs is strong instead of trying to stretch ourselves too thin and offer more than we can staff or more than we have to make that adult-to-young person ratio really strong. Belonging also came up again and again. We want to be able to grow our programs deeper and longer, so that, when a young person starts with us, they have a few touch points with us in elementary school, hopefully multiple touch points over the course of their K-5 experience. And then, when they get to middle school and they get to high school, they are able to continue their work with us and train to be mentors to younger student writers. And so, that's an initiative that we are able to give more time and to when we don't have the physical space. We're able to turn some attention to developing these longer-term alumni programs.
Lee Van Roth: This is WEMU's On the Ground Ypsi. I'm talking with Catherine Calabro-Cavin, the grants writer for the nonprofit 826michigan. Catherine, I know how being a nonprofit, 826michigan is very heavily dependent and reliant on its broad community of volunteers. There are a lot of folks that want to see this program succeed and see the youth participating in the program succeed. And I'd love to learn a little bit more about how Ypsi residents, now having 826 being so close by, how can Ypsi residents--parents, educators, other community members--get involved with the organization now that you're in their backyard.
Catherine Calabro-Cavin: So, we would love to have as much volunteer support in the Ypsilanti community as we can. It's gonna be similar to the past in that, if you just go to 826michigan.org, there's a very easy link for you to sign up to be a volunteer. You fill out a volunteer application, and then, we do all of our application processing, we run our background checks, and then we invite volunteers to join us for an information session. And now, the information sessions have been virtual, they have also been in-person, and they'll be able to take place in the community in Ypsilanti, so either on campus or at the library, but either way in spaces that we hope will be very accessible, as well as online opportunities to train to work with us. And we're also very excited about academic service learning partnerships. That has been at the heart of 826michigan's programs for so long that we work with university faculty and university students who train with us and then have the chance to get real-life experience working with young people through our programs. And the young people really benefit from that as well, from exposure to college and exposure to these wonderful college-age students. So, it's a win-win situation, and we're really excited about the new ASL partnerships that will be possible through our residency at EMU!
Lee Van Roth: Well, Catherine, I want to thank you so much for joining us here today. This is such an exciting new chapter for 826michigan. And I know I can't wait to see how this move helps grow this next generation of young writers. And I'm really excited for whatever capacity the robot shop, whatever aspects of the robot shop, that whimsy or what you bring here to Ypsi, too!
Catherine Calabro-Cavin: Oh, thank you! And people who love the robot shop can still visit us at onwardrobots.com and buy our student publications. Buy a robot toupee. Buy a robot party hat. All of those things are still available, and we are grateful for the support from the community!
Lee Van Roth: For more information on today's topic and links to the full article, visit our website at WEMU.org. On the Ground Ypsi is brought to you in partnership with Concentrate Media. I'm Lee Van Roth, formerly known as Rylee Barnsdale, and this is your community NPR station, 89.1 WEMU-FM Ypsilanti. Celebrating 60 years of broadcasting at Eastern Michigan University!
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