Students in Service

High quality preschool experiences are much needed by children in Lexington’s Georgetown corridor/St. Martins village community, a high-poverty, high-risk area. Children in the community’s two elementary schools, Booker T. Washington and The Academy at Lexington, have not met locally targeted educational outcomes. The 2004 Academic Index score for Booker T. Washington was 56.2, second lowest in the district. The Academy had an academic index of 58.0, fourth lowest in the district. Poverty compounds the problem. In 2004, 89.0 percent of booker T. Washington students qualified for free or reduced lunch. 73.8 percent of Academy students qualified.

The UK Jumpstart Higher Education Affiliate, headed by Katherine McCormick from the UK College of Education, Sharon Stewart from the UK College of Health Sciences, and Sue Strup, Director of Experiential Education and the Stuckert Career Center, responds to this need by providing one-on-one UK student mentors for preschool students at the merged Booker T. Washington Academy. Student mentors work to improve students’ educational preparation by enhancing their language, literacy, and social skills.

The UK Jumpstart project brings the federal Americorps Jumpstart program to UK as a framework for helping prepare all preschool children—regardless of economic or cultural background—for entry into elementary school. Jumpstart places UK students in preschool classrooms at Lexington's Booker T. Washington Academy, most of whose students are low-income, African-American students. The program goal is to encourage greater success among mentored students in elementary school. Also participating in this project are the UK James W. Stuckert Career Center and the Fayette County Public Schools Early Start Program.

Who We Are

Jumpstart is a national non-profit early education organization that ensures low-income preschoolers enter school with the foundation skills necessary to their future success. Jumpstart directly combats the rising trend of school unpreparedness by pairing low-income preschoolers with caring adults in year-long, one-to-one mentoring relationships. The program operates at 60 sites nationwide, each supervised by a highly skilled site manager. Jumpstart's five regional offices support the work of these sites and ensure high quality implementation of the Jumpstart program.

Actions and Outcomes to Date

UK Jumpstart has established a rigorous benchmark for success. The goal is for children who participate in the UK program to exceed the average gain for 3- and 4-year-olds in Fayette County. The Jumpstart program also requires affiliates to evaluate children’s progress and compare it to that of other Jumpstart participants.

During the 2005-2006 school year, 28 UK students participated in teams in five classrooms, serving as one-on-one mentors at Booker T. Washington Academy (BTWA). One team was assigned to each preschool classroom. During 2006-2007, that number grew to 31 UK students in teams in seven classrooms at BTWA, Community Action Council Head Start, and Children’s Haven at Salvation Army.

In addition to normal classroom activities during 2005-2006, UK Jumpstart students completed three service projects. They conducted a successful book drive, created literacy kits for classrooms using book-drive books, distributed resource guides for parents of each preschooler, and made a garden on the school grounds. 24 of the students contributed over 300 hours each. In 2006-2007, UK Jumpstart students collected and donated toiletries to Lexington’s Hope Center and collected books for use in literacy kits given to students at year’s end. Finally, UK Jumpstart collaborated with the Lexington Explorium and Target to hold its first annual Jumpstart Family Night, with a pizza dinner and free admission to the museum. 30 UK students completed over 300 hours each, working with 140 children.

40 UK Jumpstart students are expected to participate in 2007-2008. Some shifting in Jumpstart classroom locations will occur, with a planned decrease at BTWA and an increase in classrooms elsewhere in the Fayette County Schools system.