When the first black residents of South Florida arrived in the 1880s from the Bahamas to work at the Peacock Inn on Biscayne Bay, they established West Coconut Grove, Florida. By the early 1900s the neighborhood was thriving.  Today, due to many years of decline and lack of investment, our beloved community is in disrepair and the residents, including our youth are struggling as re-gentrification looms.   

We have a strong desire to cultivate the whole child. Thus, as Educators born and reared in West Coconut Grove (Florida), we submit this campaign on behalf of The  Striving To Attain Remarkable Teens Program (The START Program). We are passionate about helping to cultivate the youth of our community, As adolescents, six of the seven facilitators were provided with the opportunity to participate in a youth servicing program geared towards college readiness.  Due to this experience, we have recognized the importance to instill, expose, and further develop an understanding of the following within our youth:

-Character Building
-College Readiness
-Community Service
-Continual Knowledge
-Environmental Responsibilities
-Financial Literacy 
-Goal Attainment
-Health & Fitness
-Independence
-Inter-dependency
-Networking
-Time-management

We understand as part of our efforts to create an initiative that best supports the youth of the community in which we serve, we seek to extend our services to include a START Lab. The START Lab is our “Community Resource Initiative” in which we have strategically planned to offer the disadvantaged youth of the community with opportunities to learn & access technology that drastically reduce the achievement gap crisis. Our facility will be outfitted with a plethora of technology daily, which would help aid in the effort to foster academic growth among the youth in the area. This is in direct relation to Miami-Dade County Public Schools Digital Convergence Plan: An initiative "to close the digital divide...[this] transformation will not only provide greater digital content in mobile technologies, but will help create a new culture of learning by promoting blended learning environments & increasing 21st century learning opportunities." In addition, it "will aid in developing independent, self-initiated learners; provide for collaboration & communication between students & teachers; and extend student learning beyond the classroom."

What We Need & What You Get
According to a recent study, only 56% of residents owned a computer, 28% owned a printer and 51% of these residents had access to the internet (Village West Community Needs Assessment Survey Responses, 2013). Of the households surveyed, approximately 37% of the parents are unemployed or underemployed.  Often times, parents are unable to provide the proper resources in order to properly nourish and meet their child’s academic needs.