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The Back-to-School bash was hosted with the intention of building an exhaustive resource hub for Bronx families.\u00a0Photo by Maurice Burbridge<\/p>\nTwo nonprofits joined forces to ensure that Bronx children, and their caregivers, made the most of a few hours: providing free haircuts, backpacks, groceries, community resources and a screening of beloved family film \u201cEncanto.\u201d<\/p>\n
On Aug. 27 at the Bronx Music Hall, Women\u2019s Housing and Economic Development Corporation (WHEDco) and Fortune Society once again co-led a Back-to-School bash, with the intention of building an exhaustive resource hub for Bronx families.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Kerry McLean, Vice President of Community Development at WHEDco, emphasized the importance of helping entire families, rather than solely children, during the back-to-school season.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cAnything that happens with a child at home is gonna affect what they\u2019re doing at school,\u201d McLean said. \u201cIt really is about supporting families and supporting what\u2019s happening at home so that our children can thrive when they go to school.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Prior to the family-friendly film screening, attendees were encouraged to take advantage of resources available from organizations tabling throughout the Bronx Music Hall.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s really crucial for our philosophy to just bring a lot of resources together in one place, so that people don\u2019t have to go to 10 places to get the same thing,\u201d McLean said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Some of the present local organizations included VNS Health, the Bronx People\u2019s Federal Credit Union, the South Bronx Early College Academy, as well as the Mayor\u2019s Office to End Domestic and Gender-Based Violence and the NYC Administration for Children\u2019s Services.<\/p>\n
The Back-to-School bash was hosted with the intention of building an exhaustive resource hub for Bronx families.\u00a0Photo by Maurice Burbridge<\/p>\n
Patrick Gaughan, Peer Specialist at VNS Health\u2019s Safe Pathways, used the event as an opportunity to inform families and youth about their suicide prevention and mental health based resources.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m getting into this work really because I feel that there\u2019s a need for this kind of support for people, I feel people don\u2019t always get the right kind of support when it comes to mental health. I want to be someone who can be there to help the whole person get on the right track,\u201d Gaughan said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Laron Rogers, Program Director of Outreach at The Fortune Society\u2019s Atlas Hope initiative, expressed his joy at seeing the improved number of resources and community partners, having returned for a third-year to help organize the Back-to-School Bash.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s great. We have some repeat families. We have some new families coming in. Kids are smiling. We have face painting, so they\u2019re happy about that,\u201d Rogers said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
One local parent, Lisandra Oramas, says she found out about the event through an Instagram post highlighting free family-friendly activities in the Bronx.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n
\u201cI like that it\u2019s very organized. They have a few stations for kids. It\u2019s a good time for the kids,\u201d Oramas said.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n
Guillermo Acquino, known as Mr. Willie at Friendly\u2019s Barber & Spa, was one of many local barbers helping to give free haircuts to children.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n
\u201cI love helping people. I like to make smiles on kids, and that\u2019s why I\u2019m here. I just want to say that what I\u2019m doing is just to say thank you to the neighborhood and trying to make them believe in themselves and be happy,\u201d Acquino said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Ultimately, children and parents alike were left with smiles as they were directed into the Bronx Music Hall\u2019s theater for a screening of the beloved Disney film Encanto.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a family treasure. People love it, but we know sometimes too, given the dearth of movie theaters in the Bronx, that oftentimes our families can\u2019t go to movies or don\u2019t have access to the movies as some of us did growing up. And also, movies are not cheap. They\u2019re expensive. So we\u2019re like, you know what? We have this Bronx Music Hall, state of the art theater \u2026 It just seemed like a perfect fit for us to bring something in that has a little spice to it and just really reflect the spirit of our community,\u201d McLean said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Two nonprofits joined forces to ensure that Bronx children, and their caregivers, made the most of a few…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":344056,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38],"tags":[128,128940,55580,128941,48716,128942,128943,128944,9,24,63,128945,128946,129,131,130,73300,128947,116448],"class_list":["post-344055","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-the-bronx","tag-bronx","tag-bronx-peopleu2019s-federal-credit-union","tag-bronx-music-hall","tag-encanto","tag-fortune-society","tag-guillermo-acquino","tag-kerry-mclean","tag-mayoru2019s-office-to-end-domestic-and-gender-based-violence-endgbv","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc","tag-patrick-gaughan","tag-south-bronx-early-college-academy","tag-the-bronx","tag-the-bronx-headlines","tag-the-bronx-news","tag-vns-health","tag-whedco","tag-womenu2019s-housing-and-economic-development-corporation-whedco"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/344055","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=344055"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/344055\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/344056"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=344055"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=344055"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=344055"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}