Youth Leadership Applications For The 2009-2010 Year Are Available

Leadership Buffalo has announced that it is accepting Youth Leadership Applications for the 2009-2010 year. Current high school freshman and sophomores in Erie County are eligible to apply. Leadership Buffalo has made some exciting changes to the program, including the addition of a Summer Challenge Camp facilitated by Erie 1 BOCES, which takes place in July for 4 days and 3 nights.


If you know of a high school freshman or sophomore with leadership potential, please make this application available to them. The application and program overview are below and are also available on the Leadership Buffalo website (http://www.leadershipbuffalo.org/).

If you have any questions about the program, please contact Sara Emhof at semhof@leadershipbuffalo.org.

OVERVIEW:
http://www.leadershipbuffalo.org/documents/fission_blast/09_04_24/SE.doc

APPLICATION:
http://www.leadershipbuffalo.org/documents/fission_blast/09_04_24/SE2.doc

Applications are due May 19th, 2009.

DROPOUT PREVENTION LEADERSHIP SUMMIT – MAY 6, 2009

The Committee for Dropout Prevention in conjunction with The Academic Talent Search Program at Canisius College, and the City of Buffalo will host its First Annual High School Dropout Prevention Summit on May 6, 2009 at 8:30 a.m. – 4:30 p.m. at Canisius College 2001 Main Street Buffalo, NY 14208. Andrew Moore of the National League of Cities will be the Keynote Speaker.

Nationwide, nearly 1 in 3 high school students drop out before graduating. In total, approximately 1.2 million students drop out of school-about 7,000 every school day, or one every 26 seconds!

The primary goal of The City of Buffalo Dropout Prevention Leadership Summit is to spotlight the problem as a community concern and to bring public awareness to the challenges we face in ensuring that “at-risk” students stay in school and graduate.

The first objective is to foster consensus among stakeholders and the public concerning the urgency of the problem and the need for a collaborative effort to alleviate it.

The second objective is to induce business leaders, community leaders, faith-based institutions, educators (P-12 and higher education), healthcare providers, policy makers, nonprofit organizations and youth to commit to a city-wide dropout prevention call to action.

The City of Buffalo Dropout Prevention Leadership Summit will serve to raise public awareness of the day-to-day challenges faced by students “at risk” to obtain a high school diploma and in so doing create a sense of urgency to reduce Buffalo's drop-out rate.

Sponsors include the United Way of Buffalo & Erie County, Kaleida Health, the Western New York Law Center, Buffalo Public School System, True Bethel Baptist Church, Erie 1 BOCES, Buffalo Teachers Federation and Senator Antoine Thompson. The summit is “free” to participants. Attendees may register for summit workshops on the City of Buffalo Dropout Prevention Leadership Summit’s website; www.bflodropoutprevention.org.

Organizations and individuals are welcome to sponsor this worthwhile project. For more information please call (716) 855.0203 or visit: http://bflodropoutprevention.org/default.aspx and http://bflodropoutprevention.org/schedule.aspx.

DROPOUT DATA

Contact(s):
Joy McDuffie (Chair)

(716) 855-0203 ext 103

Elizabeth Caffee (Coordinator)

(716) 888-3281

Legal Internship Program for Inner City Youth Under Development

The Buffalo Law Journal has recently published an article about a legal internship program being developed by State Supreme Court Justice Hon. Paula Feroleto and her husband, John, a trial attorney, for inner city youth. This sounds like a great initiative.

ARTICLE LINK

6th Annual Kids' Choice Book Awards!

It is time for the BAE's 6th annual Kids' Choice Book Awards! We are asking you to please help us get the word out to our local school librarians. The Kids' Choice Book Awards allows students from grades 3rd-8th to become "book critics." All they have to do is go to our website and vote on their 3 favorite books for the year.


Once we have all of the ballots in we will create posters and flyers for schools to display the top books. This helps to encourage students to get into reading, and also the books on the list were chosen by their peers.



Click here to be directed to the voter ballot:
http://buffaloalliance.org/programs/kids_choice/index.php


If your student is unable to vote online, please have them fill out a ballot and mail it to:

Buffalo Alliance for Education
275 Oak Street, Suite 220
Buffalo, NY 14203

The Deadline for voting is June 1, 2009.

All students have to do is vote online and we will automatically receive their ballot.
Thank you for your time and effort!!

Montessori School Partnership

Our present goal is to develop a business partnership for Buffalo's Bennett Park Montessori School. We are planning a meeting with the school principal later this month.

If your company is interested in getting involved in this partnership please contact Pat Jensen at (716) 845-6500.

http://www.buffaloschools.org/BennettPark.cfm
http://www.buffaloschools.org/MontessoriSchool78.cfm
http://www.buffalonews.com/cityregion/story/621665.html
http://www.buffaloschools.org/CommunityRelations.cfm?subpage=40361