Congress and East Hills Partner in Community

If you journey into the East Hills neighborhood, you will see community ownership at work. And if you take a step further into the neighborhood school, Congress Elementary, you will experience the ongoing result of a relationship between a school and its community where mutual investment is making things happen.
 
The partnership between Congress School and the East Hills Council of Neighbors has been a longstanding one that was championed by former East Hills organizer Kathyrn “KC” Caliendo. She made it a point to build a relationship with the principal and staff of Congress as well as the students and their families in order to address the challenges that faced Congress throughout the 1990s and early 2000s. One of the main challenges that Congress faced was repeated attempts to close the school. Each time the neighborhood would rally to save their school, pointing out its importance to the community in addition to its necessity for the students in that the school served as a safe haven through the rougher years in the neighborhood.
 
There were other battles that the association championed, such as saving the Cherry Park pool, where the students of Congress and their families learned to swim and engage with one another.  Most recently, the historic preservation of the school has been a priority for both the association and the school. In every case, the relationship of the school to its community was reinforced, and that connection that Caliendo established inspired the association’s board to take up the reigns of maintaining and fortifying that relationship when Caliendo stepped down.
 
Cut to the present, where Congress is no longer in jeopardy of being closed. Rather, it is thriving under Principal Bridget Cheney and team Congress. Cheney, who grew up on a farm here in Michigan, understands the process of making something grow. She understands the time and energy that must go into cultivating the right environment for things to flourish. She gets the hard work, cooperation and team work -- the nurturing that has to happen in order to yield a bountiful harvest. That is what the partnership between Congress and East Hills is producing.
 
"Congress is great for so many reasons, including the wonderful residents that attend our neighborhood school," says Claire Fisher, of the East Hills Council of Neighbors, "[including it's] walkability, and the great leadership of Principal Bridget Cheney and faculty."

Wanting to begin the new year with a good start, the two entities got together to build a calendar of events that would reinforce to the community the idea that Congress is an anchor for neighborhood. The many events planned include the quarterly open houses for new and returning students and their families. These events introduce the families to the school staff that they entrust with their children eight hours a day, Monday through Friday. The ability to get to know one another on a personal level is the name of the game for this neighborhood. "I want the parents to see that when children are proud of their work and if you’re proud of it as well, it boost them to another level,” says Principal Cheney.
 
To further the initiative of making a true neighborhood experience, East Hills has collected the names of those within the community that would like to participate in supporting Congress and developed a volunteer database to utilize that willingness to meet the needs of their local school, doing whatever it is that each individual does best.  When asked her thoughts on the database, Cheney responds, "We want to throw the doors open! When we combine forces, there is no stopping us.” She adds, "Our partnership is combustible!” 
 
During this academic year, Congress has begun to see changes in the scores as well as the students. With her second year as principal nearly under her belt, Cheney is about goals, accountability and results, as is everyone associated with Congress Elementary. In this past academic year, the students participating in the MAP testing, a self-adjusting test that helps to identify exactly where a student is compared nationally to other students of the same grade level, achieved an increase in scores from the Fall to Winter testing period, as well as to the Winter to Spring period. She says that it has do to with the rigorous goal-setting challenge that was put to all of the students this year. Cheney’s voice contains an element of pride as she talks of the many students who came up to her quoting their increase from their original scores, or talking about how they not only got answers right, but truly understood the questions that they were expected to answer. It is the ownership that the children take over their success and the hard work that it took for them to get there that brings pleases Cheney the most.
 
If you have the opportunity to be a fly on the wall during one of the meetings between East Hills board members and Bridget Cheney, you will be privy to a community recognizing the importance of a school serving as an anchor in this "center of the universe."