Superintendent McNeal urges Wake educators, human service workers to help Wake County children

February 22, 2002 - Superintendent Bill McNeal called for commitment and compassion in meeting the needs of Wake County children and their families, as he talked with 350 people gathered for Wake County's first United for Student Achievement event.


Superintendent McNeal speaks at the United for Student Achievement conference, as Barbara Goodman looks on.

"The quality of life in our community begins with those who are in the least position to help themselves," McNeal said. "Today we are about action. There are children out there that are waiting for us to make it work."

McNeal and Wake Human Services Board chair Barbara Goodman spoke to the gathering of education and human service workers at the Raleigh Entertainment and Sports Arena Thursday (Feb. 21) in an event organized by Wake Education Partnership, the Wake County Schools, and Wake County Human Services. The event brought together educators and human service workers who often work with the same families.

"Five years ago we would never have thought about bringing service providers from the schools and human services together in a wrap-around approach for families and children," Goodman said. "There would have been no way that we would have all been here today. What a great step today is. It's a new beginning."

United for Student Achievement (USA) supports the community effort for 95 percent of students to work at or above grade level by 2003.

"The goal here today is to bring Wake County community organizations together to create synergy among the services they provide for children and for families," said Nicole Pride, USA co-chair and a member of the Wake Education Partnership board. "We want to help one another understand what different organizations are doing in the community so that we can leverage those resources in support of addressing the needs of the whole child."

There are a variety of opportunities offered to school children daily through churches, civic clubs, and local governments, according to USA co-chairs Pride and Joe Simpson.

"We thought it would be very good to get the community service organizations together, help them understand what is going on in the county, and then build a dissemination plan for this data," Pride said. "We're collecting data about the kinds of services that are available in Wake County and what age groups they address. We want to gather that information to build a report that will later support parents and educators in understanding the different types of services that are available."


More than 350 educators and human service workers attended the event.

Educators and human service workers must provide a holistic approach to meeting the needs of families, Superintendent McNeal said.

"We must look at the family as an entire unit," McNeal said. "If we look at the family as an entire unit, then we must provide that family with a system that wraps itself around the family and provides total services and support that will allow those children and the family to thrive. No one person or organization can do this alone. There must be effective and efficient support. This support must be there in function in a sense of harmony. We all have the same goal in mind."

McNeal noted as educators seek to help families who have children with high absenteeism, poor grades, and discipline problems, they often find human service workers are assisting the family. He said state law requires students to have immunizations complete at registration, provides a 30-day grace period to get students immunized, and requires schools to suspend students if they don't meet the requirements by the end of the grace period. He said having a nurse who can administer the shots at school resolves that problem.

"By bringing these resources together, all of a sudden, we start to make it work for the family," McNeal said. "You can see the commitment when agencies, departments come out of their silos. You can see compassion. You see collaboration, the school system coming together with human services."

USA organizers hope to build a child education resource network, create methods for getting resource information to parents and teachers of low-performing students, identify gaps in services and best practices among community service providers, and launch and coordinate specific interventions.