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MissionSAFE is a non-profit community organization that works with families in the Mission Hill/Roxbury area of Boston and focuses on at-risk youth. MissionSAFE provides a range of opportunities for our participating families, including job training, academic tutoring, GED classes, music, dance and art programs, special field trips and community-building events. MissionSAFE is particularly interested in recruiting tutors for our middle school and high school aged children.

Description:
MissionSAFE provides a range of opportunities for the community, which include multidimensional after school programs for youth between the ages of 7 and 18, and a new initiative to older youth over 18 who have dropped out of school and have been court involved. Youth participate in community service internships, job training programs, life skill workshops, and receive tutoring and mentoring. The program includes art, music, dance, sports, theater, police-youth activities and field trips, both during the week and on weekends. During the course of the year, MissionSAFE also sponsors intercommunity tournaments and other events designed to strengthen community relations. MissionSAFE's youth program is based on developing strong, trusting relationships with children, so that children may feel that they are special and safe and can claim MissionSAFE as a place where they are cared for unconditionally. Using this relationship as a foundation, youth are supported in developing and strengthening life skills that can serve them in the larger world. MissionSAFE can help youth in setting goals and broadening their horizons.
This year, MissionSAFE will begin an intensive, comprehensive tutoring and mentoring program for a core group of its junior high and high school aged children. This program, the Explorer's Academy, is designed to supplement and support the schools, and to provide MissionSAFE youth with an academic safety net, emotional supports and career mentoring they will need to help the successfully negoatiate their school and life goals. This program will be staffed largely by volunteers, who will assist with tracking the students' progress in school as well as with the actual tutoring.

History:
MissionSAFE began as a simple contract for safety trainings in the Mission Main Housing Development. As residents came together to discuss how to approach their safety concerns, it was clear that there was need for community-building process, before safety and quality of life issues could be addressed. Mission Main had for years experienced the blight, physical decay and despair that accompany poor housing conditions, a drug- and crime-infested community, and the lack of resources, skills and community cohesion that enable people to take another step in their lives.

Families here, who are 60% Latino and 40% African-American, have faced the trauma of family poverty within an already physically impoverished neighborhood. They have faced street and domestic violence; lack of education, with many residents having stopped their education between the fourth and eighth grades; and health issues. Mission Main is home to an epidemic of asthma, diabetes, high blood pressure and depression--most likely direct results of ongoing stress and trauma, and blighted environmental conditions. The majority of residents with whom we have worked are women and their children.

MissionSAFE grew out of taking the simple first step of going out to knock on doors and ask residents what were their needs, concerns, hopes and assets--both individually and as a community. From this initial outreach process which involved knocking on over l50 doors, community residents surfaced an agenda of concerns that they felt they wanted to address as a community as part of the approach to creating safety and improving the quality of life. MissionSAFE, since its early days, has grown into a resident-driven program with a mission of improving safety and quality of life in Mission Hill and the surrounding neighborhood by focusing on community-building, individual and community empowerment, interaction, capacity- and skill-building. All Mission Hill residents are welcome to participate in MissionSAFE. Our mission is focused, but we remain flexible and adaptive on strategies to address issues and concerns as they arise.
In l998, in recognition of its work, MissionSAFE was a finalist for the Harvard Award for Excellence in Children's Programs. In September l999, MissionSAFE received the Youth Services Award from District B-2 of the Boston Police Department

Contact people:

Anne Carrabino, Co-Director, (phone) Nikki Flionis, Co-Director, (phone)

Address:

1455 Tremont St. Roxbury, MA 02120 (See a map)

Directions:

(Note: Mailing Address is: P.O. Box 201060, Roxbury, MA 02120) Take rt. 9 to Brigham Circle (Next to the Brigham and Womens Hospital). Take a right onto Tremont Street, and drive approximately six blocks, one block past the Mission Church. MissionSAFE at. . . (more)   Nearest Metro/Subway Stop: Roxbury Crossing,   Walk distance (in minutes): 2   Nearest Bus Stop: Roxbury Crossing, 2 minute walk For maps or information, please see http://www.mbta.com