Take Stock in Children provides bright futures for so many students

Chuck Licis-Masson, County Program Coordinator for Take Stock in Children and the Executive Director of the Monroe County Education Foundation, joined Good Morning Keys on KeysTalk 96.9/102.5FM this morning to talk about the program.

It’s so amazing how quickly time goes – the first quarter of school is already over.

Licis-Masson said, “Our grading period ends tomorrow. That’s the last day of first quarter and students have no school on Monday because of Columbus Day, but teachers are working because it is a records day. As of now, our kids are done with the quarter at the end of this week, so Friday and grades will be out then next week. So we have been working with our current students in the program, but we just went through 160 applications for Take Stock in Children. We were supposed to meet yesterday and today, and now we’ll meet tomorrow to wrap up those decisions. So those students who applied, they should be receiving notification by mid next week whether they met the eligibility requirements or not.”

What are the eligibility requirements?

Licis-Masson said, “There are two sets of requirements. The first one is the income eligibility requirement. So the family cannot make more than a certain amount per household and to give you a rough estimate, a family of four cannot earn more than $77,000 during the last tax year, and that is their gross income. So we require submission of taxes from last year and other income verification documents to be sure that the family is in fact, economically eligible for the program. The reason why we have that stipulation, we purchase Florida Prepaid scholarships through the Stanley Tate STARS program, that’s a state matched program that allows us to purchase those scholarships at half the cost. They’re specifically tied to students of low income families, so we have to have that stipulation on the application. The second set of criteria for eligibility is academic, so the student has to earn A’s, B’s and C’s in previous quarters, so a minimum of 2.0 grade point average, good attendance, good behavior and a commitment to remain crime and drug free. So once they complete the application, provide all that information, we assess the application and determine if they’re eligible or if they’re not eligible. We even have some students who may not be quite there yet academically, so we put them on a wait list, and we dangle that carrot, so to speak. So they work hard the end of this quarter, next quarter, and we’ll take a look at their application again in mid winter or early spring to see how they’re doing.”

How old are the applicants?

Licis-Masson said, “We have them from all grade levels, sixth grade through 10th grade, and we even have a couple of 11th grade applications that come through, but predominantly 6 through 10. We like to focus on sixth through ninth grade, just because it is a mentorship program. The students who come into the program, they are assigned a volunteer mentor. That mentor is a community member who meets with that student one day a week during the school year, during the school day and that is really the foundation of our program. It’s not the scholarship. It’s more of a mentorship. So if we bring them in early enough, they have full advantage of that mentorship throughout their middle school and high school career, whereas, if they come in later in the year, they’re only getting a couple of years of mentorship. So it’s not quite as effective.”

Do students stick with the program?

Licis-Masson said, “We tend to lose, I would say, probably between five and 10 students a year. It depends on a variety of factors. It could be grades, and we have an extensive probation period process, if you will, where each quarter we look at the grades of all of our students. If they earn a D or an F, we drop them a level of probation. So from active status to warning status. The first drop is warning. The second drop then would be probation one. The third drop would be probation two, and much like baseball, you have three strikes to try to hit the ball, and if you can’t do it in those three quarters, we may ask the student to leave and remove them from the program, or give them one more chance, depending on the situation, the circumstances, each step of the way the coach is working with the student. We don’t leave them out in the cold. We provide them safety nets. We provide them strategies to improve, and our goal is to maintain their status in the program and help them work towards active status. Other situations, we have students who transfer out of county, and if they move out of state, they forfeit their scholarship because it’s only valid within the state of Florida. They could move to another city in Florida in a county with a Take Stock program, and we can transfer them to that county, but if they move out of state, unfortunately, they lose their scholarship opportunity. Then we have some students who pull out of the program. They just they feel that it’s not right for them and or there might be too much pressure and we part ways that way, so that’s few and far between, but predominantly it’s going to be grades or behavior or they move out of the county.”

How many students will graduate from the program this year?

Licis-Masson said, “We have a huge class this year. Last year we had 64 and this this year, we’re up to 78. So it’s a bit daunting, but we have scholarships for all those students, so we’re ready to go, and our coaches and mentors are ready to go as well, to get those seniors to their post secondary school of choice or career opportunities. With the students coming in, we’ll probably have another 360, 370 kids in the program county wide. So right now, I’m doing a dual function. We’re recruiting for mentors, I’m fundraising for scholarships, and we’re going through the applications to bring these kids.”

Mentors are definitely needed.

Licis-Masson said, “We cannot bring a student into the program without a mentor. They may qualify academically and economically, but without a mentor, I cannot bring that student in. So we’re going through our list of mentors and looking at the number of students we have coming into the program and we do need mentors here in Key West, and we’ll need some mentors at Marathon, as well as in the Upper Keys. We have a huge number of applicants in the Upper Keys. That area seems to be growing each year, so we cannot bring a student in without a mentor. Mentoring, you’re not a tutor, you’re not an ATM or an Uber driver, you are a caring adult who meets with that student one day a week during the school year, while school’s in session. So no summers, no spring break, no winter break. You’re not meeting during those times. It’s 30 minutes. You go into the school, you meet with a student for 30 minutes. We train you, we provide you the materials necessary to work with the student, and you basically listen and ask questions and help that student learn important self advocacy skills and finding solutions to challenges and problems.”

For more information, click here:  https://monroecountyedfound.com/about-take-stock