Focus on the Future
Date: September 27, 2004

At the end of the sixth grade, Shantez wasn’t doing so well. Her grades were not good. She had no interest in reading, and math problems were difficult at best. She was promoted to middle school by the skin of her teeth.

Her guardians knew that Shantez could improve and even thrive with the right kind of support, but a plan for an academic summer camp at their church, Lovejoy Baptist, had fallen through due to a lack of funds.

In an office near downtown, Virginia Saunders, youth programs coordinator for Floyd Healthcare Foundation, also wasn’t doing so well. Charged with presenting a program promoting abstinence in local schools, Virginia was meeting with red tape roadblocks.

A magical idea, both simple and profound, was born when the needs of Shantez and Virginia came together: Take Floyd Healthcare Foundation’s abstinence program and its funds to Lovejoy Community Services Inc., located in the heart of South Rome, one of the places where teen pregnancy is most prevalent.

The result was the Summer Explosion camp for children ages 10 to 14, and the results were dynamite. Lovejoy provided the site for the program and the Foundation — using interest accrued in the Focus on the Future campaign fund — sponsored it, trained teachers to teach the abstinence curriculum and provided other as-needed support.

The program took middle-school-aged students into the church annex from 8:30 a.m. until 3 p.m. from mid-June through July, giving them a supervised and safe place to stay and learn during the summer break from school. Camp participants worked on academics, learned to play golf, heard from role models about career choices, took on community beautification projects and learned about abstinence.

As word of the program spread, campers from outside the South Rome community began to come and the population of attendees became more diversified. By the end of the season, Summer Explosion was serving white, black and Hispanic students from all across Rome.

The program already has made a difference.

One parent said had it not been for this program her child would have been in the house alone while everyone worked all day.

Many of the students strengthened their academic skills.

Now a seventh-grader, Shantez’s grades have improved. She’s discovered math isn’t so bad and she actually found that she likes to read a good book on occasion. Perhaps most importantly, when asked which element of Summer Explosion made a lasting impression, Shantez said it was the abstinence message.

"I learned how to say, ‘No,’ and to wait to have sex until I meet that special someone," she said.

Virginia said she learned something as well.

"They know they are supposed to say, 'No,' but being able to say it is difficult because they don’t want to hurt somebody’s feelings. We want them to express themselves in a forceful way, but in a nice way. We need to build on that."

And that, Virginia said, is where she, Floyd Healthcare Foundation and Lovejoy Community Services hope to start at next year’s Summer Explosion.

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