Preschoolers Get a Boost from Pioneering Jumpstart Program at Rutgers–Camden

For Immediate Release

CAMDEN – College students Bashawn Moore, Jonathan Perez, and Michael Bouve are preschool pioneers, and proud of it.

They’re among a group of  40 Rutgers–Camden students helping to launch New Jersey’s first Jumpstart program, in which rigorously trained tutors work closely with very young children for an entire school year. Focusing on language, literacy, and social skills, the Rutgers volunteers began meeting with preschool age students at the LEAP Academy University Charter School on Oct. 29.

“We can’t let these kids down,” says Perez, 18, a freshman who intends to major in business at Rutgers-Camden, and a 2008 graduate of the innovative LEAP charter school. “I want to give back to the place I graduated from,” the Camden resident says. “And I want to do something beneficial for the community.”

Following 35 hours of training, Perez and his Rutgers-Camden classmates now are members of the Jumpstart Corps, a component of the AmeriCorps national service program. Jumpstart was founded at Yale University in 1993; the program is operating at nearly 70 other colleges and universities nationwide.  Rutgers–Camden is the first New Jersey university to host a Jumpstart program.

“Rutgers–Camden’s Jumpstart is the first in New Jersey, in a city with so many needs. But I had no idea about the enthusiasm we would generate,” says Gloria Bonilla-Santiago, a Rutgers Board of Governors Distinguished Service Professor of Urban Studies and the founding director of the Center for Strategic Community Leadership at Rutgers. The LEAP Academy University Charter School is one of the center’s signature projects.

“There’s an incredible interest at Rutgers in both early childhood education and in community service,” Bonilla-Santiago says, noting that approximately 50 Rutgers students applied to participate in Jumpstart.

“We expected to recruit about 30 students, but the response from the Rutgers community has been tremendous,” says Tatiana Poladko Alleyne, site manager for Jumpstart. The students are making a major commitment; corps members will spend a total of 300 hours with their young charges.

“Research has shown that a solid relationship between a child and a caring adult can have a major impact on literacy and other skills in very young children,” Poladko Alleyne notes. For that reason, “it’s critically important” for Jumpstart Corps members to work closely with parents of their students, she says.

“I’m honored to be a part of the pioneering Jumpstart group in New Jersey,” says Moore, a freshman from Hamilton Township in Mercer County. A Hamilton High School West graduate, he plans to major in English and education at Rutgers – and to return to his hometown as a teacher some day. “Jumpstart ties in with what I want to do with my life,” he says.

Moore, 18, believes there’s an advantage in being young when working with preschool-age children. “I’m someone who’s not quite an adult  but that they (the preschoolers) can look up to,” he says. “It bridges the gap.”

Michael Bouve, a 20-year-old junior from West Deptford, graduated from high school at the Gloucester County Institute of Technology. An accounting major at the Rutgers School of Business, he signed on for Jumpstart as a way to serve his community.

“Since high school, I’ve always been involved in service,” says Bouve, who was active in the Big Brothers/Big Sisters program. The intensive training and the skills development focus make  Jumpstart a different sort of community service, he adds.

“I want to give (my student) a kind of informed attention – not just be a smiling face – but someone who is actually interested in him and intends to help him grow,” Bouve says.

According to Bonilla-Santiago,  a total of 100 Rutgers students already are involved at the LEAP Academy in various capacities. She sees Jumpstart as “part of the whole initiative of Rutgers engaging the community and doing public service.”

Jumpstart also dovetails with LEAP’s plans to build an $8.5 million Early Learning Research Academy adjacent to the Rutgers-Camden campus. Difficulties in learning “can be tackled early on, and we need the best-trained people” to help do that, Bonilla-Santiago says.

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