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With COVID-19 infecting more than just our headlines, concern amongst the community is rising exponentially. In the same fashion, we're seeing a proportionate rise in the need of those in our community, with no sign of slowing down. Three weeks into closures, Connected Community Schools continues to head up its boot-on-the-ground Community Response Team.

It Takes a Village Community


Amid mass closures, the Connected Community School  district referral system, where struggling students and families are connected to needed resources, remains open and the CCS team is on call to assist and support wherever possible. If you know of a family in need, alert your counseling or admin staff to have a LINK referral submitted.

Additionally, community members in our schools are encouraged to use the Response Team helpline, directing calls or texts to 315-982-2520; they can also call 315-534-5648 or reach out on the Connected Community Schools Facebook page.


To address food insecurity in Rome, the original plan was for CCS to operate two food pantries, with possibility for a third location, right in the elementary schools, and run 3 days a week, while schools were out. Families would be able to go every other week, in addition to getting daily grab and go meals from the district's Food Service Program. Precautionary measures were in place to ensure the safety of both the team and the community - food packages would be placed one at a time outside the door where the family would then approach to pick it up and the process would repeat. 

Within the first hour, the Staley site was out of food and team members were running back and forth to Gansevoort to replenish their supply. By the end of the day, after only 4 hours, over 1000 families were served, amounting to over 12,000 pounds of food, completely wiping out both pantries. To give some perspective, our holiday initiative handed out a comparable amount of food after a full week of serving families.


In response, a new plan for food distribution was enacted: Gansevoort is now the sole pantry location and runs Tues/Thurs from 10am to 1pm. As of Thursday March 26, over 2000 families have been given food assistance. In our Brothertown Connected Community Schools location, at the Waterville CSD, our Community Response Team brought FOOD DROP to the WCS Jr/Sr High School on Tuesday March 31 and passed out 450 food packages, including over 80 deliveries to seniors and more than 30 deliveries to those with special needs. Food bags will included meat, easy to make meals, fresh produce and dairy products.

        For both locations, assistance is not limited to families of students enrolled at those schools. There are no eligibility qualifications or identification needed.Our Community Response Team Help Line has assisted and triaged over 800 phone calls from within our Connected Community. 

        Our team is also actively accepting any donations for nonperishable/shelf-stable food products and hygiene products, as well as monetary donations (checks can be made out to Rome Alliance for Education, or you can find us on venmo). Donation information can be found at 315-292-3250. To date we have received over $6,000 in donations from the community and countless food donations, all of which goes right back to the community faster than we can write thank you notes.

        To maintain other aspects of the community schools model, the team is also training in google classroom to continue to provide learning and engagement activities to our students and families in this time of crisis.
 
“We will get through this as a Community”  
Community Response Team Helpline
315.534.5648 – call or text
315.982.2520 – call or text
Questions About Donations?
315.292.3250 – call or text
Melissa Roys, Executive Director
Rome Alliance for Education
CONNECTED Community Schools
melissaroys@romecomunityschools.com
Miranda Majewicz, Project manager
CNYHHN Inc.
CONNECTED Community Schools
mirandam@romecommunityschools.org
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