About

On September 10, 2009, Mayor Cory A. Booker pledged that Newark would help the country achieve the historic goals of the Senator Edward Kennedy Serve America Act and joined Mayor Bloomberg along with 15 other Mayors to launch the Cities of Service coalition. The founding mayors met for a half-day summit at Gracie Mansion where they signed a Declaration of Service, forging their commitment to find innovative ways to tap the power of volunteers to address their city’s most pressing challenges. Mayor Booker promised to engage more Newarkers in service and to develop a comprehensive action plan to increase civic engagement. This plan builds upon the committed service of Newark’s residents and community stakeholders, and the experience of local organizations that effectively utilize volunteers.

Newark’s comprehensive service plan, entitled “Brick City SERVES — A Blueprint To Increase Civic Engagement” seeks to engage more Newarkers in service by channeling volunteers towards two of the Mayor’s key priorities: 1) Education, targeting mentoring and 2) Health and Wellness, focusing on childhood obesity.

Creating schools of excellence along with safe and healthy communities have been top priorities of the Booker Administration. In partnership with the City Council, Newark adopted a Bill of Rights for the Children of Newark during the first days of Mayor Booker’s Administration. The Bill of Rights, which was the first of its kind in a large American city, set bold expectations to guide the empowerment of families by stating what children need in all areas of life to have a reasonable chance to fulfill their potential. The Bill of Rights targeted three areas: Early Childhood Success; Positive Youth Development; and Strong Families, Strong Neighborhoods.

The Mayor is committed to innovative programs and strategies that provide young people with opportunities to excel in school. Newark, like most urban cities across America, is failing to provide the city’s most precious resource, its children, with a quality education. Schools are failing to meet adequate yearly progress (AYP) standards and have been classified as “In Need of Improvement.” Many school-aged children are not meeting grade-level milestones.

To help reverse these trends, Brick City SERVES will partner with the Newark Mentoring Coalition and its member agencies to provide one-to-one literacy based mentoring to 180 2nd and 3rd grade students, and group mentoring to 300 5th grade students attending schools within the Newark Global Village School Zone, a cohort of seven Newark Public Schools located in the city’s Central Ward.

Mayor Booker is also committed to improving the health of Newark’s children. On April 19, 2010, the Partnership for a Healthier America named him as one of the honorary vice-chairs of First Lady Michelle Obama’s Let’s Move! campaign to end childhood obesity within a generation.

Recent data shows that one in four Newark children are obese and that their Body Mass Index (BMI) falls at or above the 95th percentile. Acknowledging these alarming facts, Brick City SERVES will partner with Playworks to utilize volunteers to promote play and physical activity to of children throughout all wards of Newark. Playworks is a national nonprofit organization that supports learning by providing safe, healthy and inclusive play and physical activity to schools at recess and throughout the entire school day.

Playworks has been a leading voice in promoting play and physical activity as essential components in addressing the physical, social and emotional health and well-being of children. Their vision of success is building an educational system that values play and in which every child in America has the opportunity to be physically active every day. Together, Brick City SERVES and Playworks hope to build on the spirit of service that already exists in this city by expanding volunteers involved in play. The Playworks Recess Program takes place during the school day for the entire school year; the program is currently in eight Newark Schools, serving 3,000 students. Brick City SERVES will partner with Playworks to recruit recess volunteers. Wanting to expand upon their current model, in an effort to provide even more Newark youth with increased access to physical activities, Newark’s Chief Service Officer approached Playworks with the innovative idea to create Let’s Move! “Play Nights” at local community recreation centers throughout the city. This new initiative will engage more children in play after school and provide conflict resolution skills. The collective goal is to serve 4,000 students during in school and after school time.

Through these two initiatives along with the launch of a new website to highlight the city’s priority volunteer projects, Brick City SERVES will make Newark the easiest and most rewarding city in the nation in which to serve. Brick City SERVES will continue to develop strategic partnerships with Newark agencies to address other citywide challenges and pledges to work collaboratively with nonprofits; community and faith-based organizations; corporate and business stakeholders; along with schools and institutes of higher learning to plan, promote, implement and champion the objectives of our service plan. Newark will set a new standard for community involvement and promote service as a core part of what it means to be a citizen. It takes all of us…residents, students, parishioners, employers, employees and all those who care deeply about this city.