Program Highlight:
Perquimans County Schools (PCS)
A McKinney-Vento Consortium
Perquimans County Schools (PCS) and Currituck County Schools (CCS) submitted a McKinney-Vento subgrant application to work together as a consortium. To learn more about their process of working together, NCHEP spoke with Ms. Latonia Johnson, PCS' local homeless education liaison. According to Ms. Johnson, she met Ms. Monique Wilkins, CCS' local liaison, at a community meeting eight years ago when she first began working as PCS' local liaison. They struck up a conversation and have supported each other ever since.
Ms. Wilkins used her experience as a local liaison to help Ms. Johnson “learn the ropes” so that she could be an effective liaison. Their working relationship has been very supportive and, over time, they developed the idea of collaborating as part of a consortium to be able to share information and resources. According to Ms. Johnson, they bounce questions off of each other and help each other understand the implementation of the McKinney-Vento Act, especially in regard to how to spend funds appropriately.
To compete for a McKinney-Vento subgrant as a consortium, Ms. Johnson and Ms. Wilkins each wrote their own section and then combined their work into a single, cohesive application. Perquimans County Schools serves as the subgrant's lead/fiscal agent. This arrangement worked very well for them and it created a strong grant with which NCHEP was impressed. In June 2011, NCHEP notified PCS's consortium that it received a 2011-2014 McKinney-Vento subgrant.
Additional Grant Funding
Writing the subgrant application gave Ms. Johnson the confidence to write another grant, this one for a program called Social Thinking Options Program (STOP). This grant will fund a program that works with court-referred students that she will case manage and work with their parents in an effort to keep these students from further involvement with the criminal justice system. Ms. Johnson is particularly excited about this program because it will help students envision a possibility of new options after being convicted of a crime.
Collaboration with the Faith Community
PCS is also pleased to report a new collaboration with the local Ministers’ Council for Education, a local group of churches that works together to act as a referral source for Perquimans County. Because they are a council, they are better able to combine and offer resources to families in need than if they were working individually. In January 2011, the Council created an emergency fund to assist needy students and families. Ms. Johnson has referred one family to them thus far and the Council has helped them obtain permanent housing. Families are most often referred to the Council by Ms. Johnson because she knows the history of the area and the families in need. In addition to providing financial resources to families in need, the Council also serves as proctors in schools and offers support to the school system.
Congratulations from NCHEP!
Ms. Johnson has been PCS' local homeless education liaison for eight years and enjoys her work, particularly because the new areas of collaboration and growth present exciting opportunities to serve homeless children and families. Ms. Johnson is proactive in thinking about what families and children need and has even done outreach in the community to raise awareness. As a result of her outreach activities, local groups have supplied her with food to distribute to homeless children. NCHEP congratulates Ms. Johnson on her work and commend her for everything she does to help children in transition!
