Peggy Meeks said Cross Walk to Life, the Christian Women’s Job Corps site she leads in Las Cruces, New Mexico, has one common need — English classes.
“Our group really is non-English-speaking people,” she said. “They’re comfortable in our smaller setting, whereas so many of them can’t go sign up for something at the community college — it frightens them. We want to take them as far as we can, so then they have the confidence to move on.”
One big tool in that process is a new curriculum that Cross Walk to Life implemented this past school year.
“The other curriculum we were using, people weren’t advancing,” Meeks said. “We had a new volunteer who is a retired ESL teacher come in and say, ‘There’s much better curriculum out there than what you’re using.’”
Since Cross Walk to Life made the switch, students are advancing and gaining confidence, Meeks said.
Offering opportunity
And thanks to a grant from the WMU Foundation, they’ll be able to broaden their class offerings even more.
“The grant allows us to purchase four levels,” Meeks said.
In addition to the grant given to Cross Walk to Life, the WMU Foundation gave seven other grants to CWJC sites, which offer women the opportunity to reach their full potential and improve their situation through job and life skills training in a Christian context. Christian Women’s and Men’s Job Corps are compassion ministries of national Woman’s Missionary Union and have more than 100 sites across the US.
CWJC of McLennan County in Waco, Texas, plans to use it to provide support for students working toward their GED who may need qualified learning disability testing to receive accommodations for their needs.
Helping them get their GED in this way can “change the narrative of their education experience for the rest of their life” and “shift the education journey for an entire family,” said Paula Winstead, testing administrator of CWJC of McLennan County.
Gulf Coast CWJC in Bay St. Louis, Mississippi, also plans to use their grant to help participants take the HiSET high school equivalency test and help with transportation to and from classes.
CWJC of Nacogdoches, Texas, plans to use their grant to purchase laptops for program participants to use in a computer lab. Christian Job Corps of Gregg County in Longview, Texas, also plans to use the grant to update a computer lab for the new Christian Men’s Job Corps component of their ministry, as well as hire a CWJC assistant who would focus on caring for alumni and former students.
RISE, a CWJC site located in Hattiesburg, Mississippi, and SWC Transformation Place in Chattanooga, Tennessee, both plan to use the grant to support their general operations and expansion as their participant numbers are growing.
And Women’s Learning Center in Monroe, Louisiana, will use their grant to purchase more curriculum for their students so that each participant can have her own workbook. They also want to provide small rewards for their students’ accomplishments.
How to ‘change lives forever’
Peggy Darby, president of the WMU Foundation, said the gifts that support these grants make a big difference.
“Your gifts to the Sybil Bentley Dove endowment help to support Christian Women’s Job Corps by providing scholarships to participants, program development grants for sites and a grant for Dove Award recipients,” she said. “Whether you make a one-time gift or become a monthly donor, your support will help to change lives forever.”
For more information, visit wmu.com/jobcorps.
