Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: TUESDAY, August 15, 1995 TAG: 9508150089
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV2 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: PAUL DELLINGER STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: PULASKI LENGTH: Medium
When the PBS documentary "Eyes on the Prize" was over, Oliver Lewis encouraged them to talk about what they had seen and how they felt about it. They compared the overt abuses suffered by their forebears to the more covert forms of prejudice they encounter today.
Maybe they should be able to better handle what they sometimes put up with, some said, considering the violence and attacks others went through decades ago. Many of the viewers, ages 12-16, had not realized the full extent of what it took to bring civil rights to their present state.
The film was part of a recently completed six-week program called Cultural Awareness Redemptive Education, which grew out of a meeting in March where members of the black community in Pulaski sought ways to enhance the lives of their young people and give them summer activities.
Some 40 children attended sessions three times a week, directed by sisters Tammy and Nicole Boyers. Lewis' older group had 14 participants, 10 of whom made a trip to Washington, where they visited the Fox TV network studio, the Smithsonian Institution and the African-American Museum, among other stops.
"We've seen several incidents of youth trying to commit suicide," said Lewis, youth and music minister at Pulaski's First Baptist Church. He said the six-week CARE program gave him a "reality check" for the student teaching he will be doing next year.
"In the six years since I graduated from high school, everything has changed. The rules have changed," he said. "They have to be cool. They have to fit in." He said the culture has placed what sometimes seem insurmountable burdens on young people.
The skills they really need are conflict resolution, he said. That's what the summer program was about.
"We visited jails. We had cultural visits. We worked on education and, through this summer program, I think they learned a lot," said Tammy Boyers. They also learned about prominent figures in the civil rights movement like Rosa Parks, who refused to move to the back of an Alabama bus and found herself at the center of a major controversy in the South.
"The program sought to give our children a sense of who they were, and to find out what their culture was and be proud of it," said Leonard Johnson, pastor of the Pentecostal Holiness Church. "If we can give our young people the tools to be successful, they're going to make us proud."
CARE board member Cheryl Beverly said the program "hopefully has started to change the world for the youth of Pulaski County."
"We no longer see children jumping rope, playing hopscotch, or even playing marbles," she said, but engrossed in video games or television shows often pushing values contrary to those the Pulaski community wants to .
"After all, have we taken the responsibility of teaching them as we were taught?" she said. "I look forward to the day when we extend the six-week program to a year-round program."
"My vision of CARE is expanding our vision beyond our youth," said the Rev. Anthony Daniels, pastor at First Baptist and CARE board chairman.
"I see us having some health clinics. I see us having some field trips primarily for adults," he said. "I think it's time we gave back to our adults."
At graduation ceremonies where participants received CARE T-shirts, Nathaniel Slaughter Jr. was recognized as the outstanding volunteer and Chavon Rogers - a participant in the older group who helped with the younger - as most congenial youth participant.
Pulaski County Social Services Director Jim Wallis seemed surprised to get a special award from the CARE board. It was his social services board that came up with the original $6,000 toward funding CARE.
"This is to me probably one of the most significant recognitions I've received in 30 years of public service," Wallis told the participants and families at New River Community College. "I think the real heroes are the leaders and the volunteers of this organization ... I think this is something very special that's happened."
The CARE board has 17 members and Daniels estimated at least 30 adult volunteers had helped. Wallis said they built the program at the community level, just as state officials have been saying communities should.
"This fits every bit of rhetoric that I have ever heard," Wallis said. "They said 'Let's do it' and they did it."
Daniels said support from churches was crucial.
"Just to be a part of this program excites me. And what we have accomplished in six weeks is nothing to what we will accomplish," said Johnson. "We believe that through spreading the word, this program will grow. ... It was a real good program and we think this was just a beginning."
"CARE wants to give our youth a self-worth and self-esteem and help them feel good about themselves," said board member Roger Hicks. "We could become an example to the black community throughout this area, state and nation."
by CNB