Caring Ladies Assisting Students to Succeed is a structured support system for young women in urban Wichita schools, consisting of qualified women from diverse backgrounds. C.L.A.S.S. provides character building workshops, mentorship, life skills workshops and educational and aspirational guidance.

The women of C.L.A.S.S. meet with groups for approximately 2 hours each week. Girls face many struggles and tough decisions during adolescent years; many urban and underpriveleged adolescents face these years without the care and guidance of concerned, available, able mentors. C.L.A.S.S. offers them that extra support during this critical period of development.

Good intentions of caring persons is not always enough; in order to provide an actionable path of hope to youths who feel, with some justice, alientated from and neglected by authority structures, there must be common origin. This is the universal framework of the role model; thus, the paths of the teacher and student have visibly same starting places. Personal identification creates common ground, and the tangible successes of the teacher give credence to her words. She is her own proof of ability and mandate for empowerment.

Yet the achievement in question is one of breaking a perpetuated cycle with poverty. The successful upward mobility of individuals from such a background removes them from that common circumstance. Seeing the effect that this natural removal of exemplars has in sustaining an environment of fatalism and hopelessness, Lynn Gilkey and the women of C.L.A.S.S. have taken on the mission of filling this much-needed role. Their eventual success in the face of the myriad adversities of poverty forms a credible resource for empowerment of these young women.

In addition to the weekly sessions, the program schedules “sisterhood”-themed events, during which educators, professionals, and community leaders participate and share their motivational stories and empowering messages of overcoming.

The C.L.A.S.S. program currently has a presence in four Wichita high schools: Northwest, North, East and West High Schools. We also collaborate with the Gerard House, Hiawatha Salvation Army program, and Wichita Children’s Home.

For more information call the Urban League Community Learning Center at (316) 683-3315 or email Lynn Gilkey.