Helping our Young Children:



Helping our Young Children:

 

Before we created the disadvantaged young adult, we were handed an innocent child through the grace of God.  They did not ask to come on this earth because none of us did, but they were born and came to us as babies unable to support or even take care of themselves.  They therefore had to go through a molding process in order to function as upright American citizens, with the responsibility of someday being caretakers of America themselves.

 

Highlands County has some of the worst performing high schools in the state of Florida.  Only six Florida districts had lower graduation rates than Highlands County in 2011-12.  While the graduation rate was about 74% in the state of Florida, it was only 61% in Highlands County in 2012.   And Avon Park is the worst performing high school within Highlands County.  And the residents of the Southside Redevelopment Area and poor communities like the public housing complexes in Avon Park, are on the forefront of academic failure, which transcends and becomes a community filled with street crimes, violence, and intellectual vegetation.  This is an after effect of long term poor economic conditions.

 

Meanwhile our young children see our young adults on the streets 24/7 being unproductive or trying to survive. They live in a community whereby illegal drugs is the number one commodity. They see a community of victims being slaves to poverty and eventually see themselves as forever victims also, without any real option to gaining a part of the American dream, but often end up within a life of crimes, jails, institutions, long term addictions and death.  Our children need to feel safe, loved and protected and believe it or not and this is very important, they need to feel needed, because the reality is one day will depend on them or self-destruct. 

 

We believe as a community we must be the caretakers of our younger children, who are under 18 years old and are not emancipated. If we as a community do not raise our children properly, we as a community has failed tomorrow already.  Part of the cause of our current social and economic problems and conditions are our past failures in the molding processes of our children. It is due to our past failures as a community in education, crime prevention and community economics that this program we are presenting now has become a program of community need and not community convenience. Operation Solution and Response is a SRA community need.

 

We want to insure that every child in our community has a fair chance in life and will be able to grow and enjoy the Declaration of Independence in America as adults.  Something too often taking away from our youth due to their responses to the conditions of poverty.