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Queens Library Nabs Grant

First public library to win federal 21st Century after-school grant

Kathleen Isaacs -- School Library Journal, 10/1/2003

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New York has awarded Queens Borough Public Library a $109,000 21st Century Community Learning Center Grant, the first such federally-funded after-school grant given to a public library. The library celebrated the news in mid-September by launching events for the community at its Far Rockaway and Peninsula branches, where the funds will support a variety of after-school programs for sixth to eighth graders from local school P.S. 43.

The program provides mentoring, homework help, school outreach, and special programming aimed at teens who are in need of positive role models and after-school activities, says library spokesman Joe Catrambone. Special seminars focus on career exploration, building self-esteem, creative writing, and health, and one-on-one online tutoring is available in real time from Tutor.com. The money also pays for a new young adult librarian at Far Rockaway to help coordinate the project and a youth counselor at the Peninsula branch.

The library system, along with Tutor.com, chose P.S. 43 because it was designated by the state as needing improvement, a requirement under President Bush's No Child Left Behind Act.

"With staff devoted to [kids'] interests, we hope to create an atmosphere that not only welcomes them but provides help for all their needs, educational, recreational, and cultural," says Catrambone.

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