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BGCPR Covid-19 response
Published on October 15, 2020 by Boys & Girls Clubs of Puerto Rico

COVID-19 has exacerbated educational and social inequity, a situation that has prevailed in our vulnerable communities for decades. But, with the distance learning and virtual services we have provided to our children, youth and their families, we have continued closing the education and opportunity gaps they face on a daily basis. During this period of uncertainty, we have also offered hot meals in the grab and go modality since food insecurity is a primarily consequence of the poverty.15,574 Interactions with children and youth - Our professionals continuously helped our participants with their homework and tutored them using video conference platforms like Zoom. To support distance learning, we created “Edúcate en casa” (Education at Home), a digital platform to reinforce education and close the education gap. Located within our website, it gives access to virtual educational, recreational and free content to continue learning and having fun during this period. The warp around service services include education (tutoring, assistance with homework and and career exploration), social (hot meals, leadership development, and prevention of risky factors) and economic (entrepreneurship and employment readiness). Any kid or teen, being a Club member or not, can use this platform’s content as part of their learning and development experiences from home. All virtual modules were designed to be accessible by phone. The interactions mentioned above include 1,196 children and young people who participated in our Brain ZOOMer Program (our first virtual summer experience); the celebration of Youth of the Year 2020 (our main leadership and recognition program) and our Virtual Leadership Summit. This Leadership Summit impacted 120 members from our Keystone and Torch Clubs (two leadership programs within our Clubs) who presented their projects to solve a community issue and discussed poverty data from our allied organization, the Youth Development Institute of Puerto Rico (as part of their advocacy preparation). The Summit also included the Voice of the Customer initiative, a space dedicated to connecting with former Club members in which they discussed challenges faced by youth and needs to succeed in life based on their personal experience. 16,262 Interactions with parents

Services provided to them included family emotional support and healthcare orientation sessions to prevent COVID-19. As organization, we were able to keep our staff on board, including our education coordinators and social workers. 30,506 People benefited from our Food Program

This program offered hot meals to families in the grab and go modality distributed through our 11 Club sites.