- [Announcer] Live from your Public Media Studios WVIA presents Keystone Edition Reports, a public affairs program that goes beyond the headlines to address issues in Northeastern and Central Pennsylvania.

This is Keystone Edition Reports.

And now, moderator Larry Vojtko.

- [Vojtko] Serving the underserved and underprivileged.

We hear these words on almost a daily basis but what do they really mean?

How can we make a difference?

Tonight on Keystone Edition Reports, we meet representatives from two area organizations that specialize in helping the underprivileged with both one-on-one and community support programs.

Two organizations making the difference in the lives of area residents in both their respective counties through education, diversity, and acceptance.

WVIA's Paul Lazar tells us more.

- [Lazar] Opportunity and hope.

For many underserved in the region, these two things may be the missing piece to their puzzle.

Two very special organizations, the STARS program at Marywood University in Scranton and the Hazleton Integration Project look to take opportunity and hope and tie it together with education, acceptance, and diversity through both one-on-one and community based efforts.

Two organizations with common goals looking to make a difference in our region.

For Keystone Edition Reports, I'm Paul Lazar.

- [Vojtko] Let's welcome our guests who are here to share their expertise on the topic.

Joining us here in the Sordoni studio is Jenny Gonzalez Monge, the STARS program director that is headquartered at Marywood University.

And Bob Curry, co-founder of the Hazelton Integration Project.

Welcome, welcome, welcome.

It's great to have you at the table.

And it's going to be a wonderful conversation about these programs that have recognized or or did a needs assessment, saw a need in the community and then responded to that need and welcoming others to help them continue to respond to that need.

So Bob, I'm going to start with you.

I, I wanna know about the origin of the Hazelton Integration Project.

What spurred that?

When did it start?

Tell us about who started it.

- [Curry] Well, first of all, thank you for having us.

It's a great opportunity for us to share our story.

The Integration Project started about 12 years ago and it was founded by four people.

One is a very well known person, Joe Madden, Major League Baseball manager.

His wife Jay, his first cousin is my wife, Elaine Madden Curry.

And she was been a prominent politician in the whole Northeast PA area and myself.

And it was started because Joe in particular was looking at all the tension that was occurring in his hometown which he loves dearly: Hazleton, Pennsylvania.

And he said, there's just something wrong here.

And he was the first to point out that, with the tensions the miscommunication, all we really needed to do was break down those misunderstandings.

And we thought, why not a community center?

Why not try to get everybody together particularly the children?

And with that we could bring the entire community along.

And so that was the idea, the basic idea.

And we started with a pre-K program, an afterschool program.

And from there we kind of launched.

- [Vojtko] Well, one of the problems getting things started, of course, of- like, you- you have a facility, you- it takes, it takes funding.

How did the funding come about to start the program and how do you continue to fund the program?

- [Curry] Well, originally the funding came through hosting events.

It was exclusively funded through celebrities that attended some of the events that came through the Hazelton area.

And of course that's the Joe Madden part.

He and Jay committed to bringing people into the area.

And we had Yogi Bera, we had Bill Murray came in- the actor.

And we've had just a slew of celebrities who supported this cause even though it was so distant geographically from where they grew up.

But we had wonderful success in bringing people into the events.

And then of course, that spreads enough of your fame and what you want to do and then you take a look at grant writing.

And so we right away started writing grants to foundations and to other organizations and businesses.

And gradually we got enough money together to purchase a building.

We bought an old Catholic school building which is perfect for our, for our needs.

- [Vojtko] Great, and with the wisdom of Yogi Bera you're going to keep going 'cause it ain't over till it's over, right?

- [Curry] It ain't over till it's over.

And, and for sure, we, we learned a lot from Yogi in a very short time.

He's an utterly charming human being.

- [Vojtko] Now, Jenny, your story is a little bit different about the the funding structure of it in the beginning of it, so- so take us through that.

But first, STARS is actually a very clever acronym, so- so let's start there.

- [Monge] Yeah, so STARS stands for Students Together Achieving Remarkable Success.

So it's a mouthful and that's why it's STARS.

STARS really initiated with, in the spring of 2018 in a conversation with Dr. Susan Terrell, who was a provost at the time, who wa- who had moved from Texas and wanted to figure out how as an an institution we can better connect and work with the growing Hispanic and Latinx community in Northeastern Pennsylvania.

And at the time, I was a graduate student in the social work program and she asked myself and Emily Coleman, who worked with international students on campus to go out into the community and try to figure out what was the need in terms of educational needs.

What were the educational resources in the community that would empower this growing immigrant community in this area?

When Emily and I went into the community through church partnerships, we learned that a lot of families felt excluded from their children's education by the time they, their children got to middle school.

And it was mostly because of the language barrier.

So yes, families wanted to help with their- their children with homework and other academic activities.

They wanted to participate in PTA meetings, they wanted to participate in board meetings.

But when no one speaks your language and no one looks like you, you feel out of place.

You don't feel like you belong.

And that was something that was reiterated in this needs assessment.

And so we took that information back to Marywood and we were able to apply for the Robert H. Spitz Foundation through the Scranton Area Foundation to start the STARS program.

And it started as a part-time program, a one-day program that has morphed in to many other things now.

- [Vojtko] And that was in 2018.

- [Monge] That was in the fall of 2018.

- [Vojtko] 2018 is when it started.

You go back your- yours, Hazleton Integration Project.

- [Curry] So we're about a dozen years now, but- - [Vojtko] Yeah, but I, I wanted to ask about, you know Jenny mentioned this, this- this challenge of the language barriers.

That's something that, that the- the people who are- founded Hazleton Integration project and those running it now and developing the programs that's a challenge as well in Hazleton as- as being identified that way?

- [Curry] Yeah, it sure is.

And I'm glad you brought that up because one of the most important things is to- to develop a context for what's happening within your community and what you said is absolutely true.

Now, imagine this, one of the things we found out early, talk about needs assessment.

We talked with our youngest kids and they told us how terrified they were to go to kindergarten.

And the first couple of weeks and months in kindergarten, you're sitting there, you're five years old, you come from a home where English may not be spoken and all you hear is blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

Because no one, you don't understand a single word.

And then as you move through kindergarten somehow you're supposed to achieve and take tests in the same way that children who speak the language are taking those tests.

And then when you're unable to do so there's a subtle branding that goes on.

And that is part of the alienation process that if you don't speak the language there must be something wrong with you whether it's intellectually or developmentally.

And of course that's not true.

It's just a question of it takes seven years.

Everyone understands that to fully learn a language.

And so yes, that is a challenge we face all the time.

And one of the ways that we have tried to counter that is everyone in our building speak- is bilingual.

All the people that work in our building, almost all of them are Latino.V And so they are able to express the the similarities with their cultural experiences.

They can speak the language with the children.

And we knew how important that was.

So I was glad you brought that up because that is at the basis of everything.

When your community is changing, it's- and particularly with the speed that Hazelton changed, you've got to address that.

You can't just sit back and say, well our grandparents never got that help.

Why not?

Let's help those right now.

It's a wonderful idea.

It's just an expression of your own humanity.

And so that's basically what is at the core of our entire mission.

- [Vojtko] Well, we've learned that one of the biggest challenges to the Latino, Latina, and Latinx community is the language barrier.

WVIA's Kelly Dessoye discovered this as well when she met with participants in the STARS program.

- [Juan, in Spanish] Well, in the education of my children, because one does not speak the English language, at home, she was accustomed only to Spanish.

- [Maria, in Spanish] It was difficult.

- [Monge] Our Latino and Hispanic community is the largest minority group with some of the lowest academic achievement rates.

Families felt like they needed that extra support outside of school and outside of the home.

And so STARS is an after school mentoring program for first generation Latino youth.

Our mission is to create a middle school to college or career pathway.

We offer weekly social and academic mentoring and assistance.

- You guys can jump in with your mentors, work on your homework.

- [Evelyn] The tutors, they explain my homework, which better than my teachers.

- [Monge] We also offer college and career readiness activities and workshop.

- I'm here to talk to you all about the first generation student experience.

This is an opportunity that is supposed to be one that is fun, one that's engaging.

- [Marisol] It helps you make choices.

- [Luis] People think there's more careers in other places like California, Florida, but sometimes it's more like, again, Scranton itself.

- [In Spanish] Hello, how are you?

- [In Spanish] Fine, thanks.

- [In Spanish] I am always explaining to him.

- [Monge] And we also offer these monthly parent workshops in Spanish.

I hope that through programs like this and community collaboration and inclusion we are able to empower the Latino community to, you know, pursue their dreams and to also feel like this can be their long term home.

- [Juan, in Spanish] Well, that they achieve their goals we are there so that they achieve it, and have a better future than us.

- [Vojtko] The STARS Program at Marywood University and the program director is with us here, Jenny Gonzalez Monge.

Now Jenny, we give, gave a really quick overview of all the services you're providing.

Do you wanna add to that or take a little bit- take one or two and and tell us a little bit more in- in depth about what you're offering?

- [Monge] Absolutely.

So on a weekly basis we meet at Elm Park Methodist Church in downtown Scranton.

We pair every youth that we work with with a mentor volunteer that provides academic assistance and social mentoring.

We also provide monthly youth workshops on various college and career readiness opportunities and resources.

We provide monthly parent workshops in Spanish on various educational and community opportunities and resources, not only for their children, but for the family as a unit.

We have incorporated educational trips to various educational institutions in Northeastern Pennsylvania to introduce our youth and families to growing industries and career- in diverse career paths.

Wraparound services is something that we've recently added in this expansion of our program where we have partnered with local food pantries to offer biweekly groceries.

We're also working with nonprofit organizations where we're planning a free healthcare clinic and legal screening clinics for various legal needs because we know this is a huge challenge in growing immigrant communities especially with mixed immigration status backgrounds.

So we, I, we know these are needs and we know that we're able to offer some of- support, but we need community partnerships for all of that.

So yeah, that's- it's morphed into many more things than we ever imagined it would- it would've.

- [Vojtko] So you make some of your facilities, so you're making use of the Elm Park United Methodist Church.

Do they, do you have to pay a rent to them for that?

- [Monge] A rental fee, yes.

- [Vojtko] Rental fee, okay.

And that's the- that's the big church that when you're coming down, when you're coming down right into Scranton and- and you have the- the old train station off the left, the Elm Park is right there, so it's right downtown, right on the bottom of the Scranton University campus.

Now you, Bob, tell us about your facility which you said was an old Catholic school.

- [Curry] It is indeed.

And it's set up very much like every Catholic school in Northeastern Pennsylvania.

You walk in, there's a gymnasium facing you, Mother Superior's office is to the left.

A place where I frequented too often when I was growing up.

- [Vojtko] That's where we didn't wanna be.

- 20- 20 classrooms, and so it's a great facility for what we need.

We have a commercial kitchen as well and a cafeteria that seats 275.

So we, we are just an incredibly busy facility from sun up through sundown.

Some of the other things that we do, we have a pre-K, we have the afterschool but we also have athletic programs going on from the moment our af- our afterschool ends until 8:00 PM every evening.

We have high school kids in there utilizing the gym.

We also have cultural activities.

We recently had, we partnered with a local theater organization and did "The Wizard of Oz", which was a joy.

We ha- we teach Adult ESL.

We have 160 enrolled currently and this is a nine month program so it's really a fairly extensive program.

We teach citizenship.

We've had over 400 new citizens come through our program.

We also are in the food distribution business as well.

And right now we are serving about 250 families per week in terms of providing enough food for them to get through a week.

We envision seeing that grow to 1000 families by sometime next year.

And so we're involved just like you in a lot of different things.

All of them we believe are critically important to bringing our community together and making it possible for everyone in a community to feel like they're part of something bigger than themselves.

- [Vojtko] I have a question for, for both of you and we'll- Jenny will start with you and then Bob if you want to chime in anytime- I know that you will do that at your pleasure.

We know that we have this growing Latino, Latina, Latinx community.

It's, it, it's growing bigger and bigger.

What is it about our region that's so attractive?

- [Monge] I think a lot of people find this place as a safe place to raise children.

A lot of the immigrant families that we've worked with have moved from inner city, New York, Philadelphia Connecticut, and they have found that this is- this is a safer place, a safer environment for their families.

Also, economic opportunity, low cost of living.

We live in an area, all of the 81 corridor where there are, you know, industries and warehouses, just various industries that give an opportunity to families in terms of, of access to jobs and diverse jobs.

There's also a huge construction and roofing and landscaping.

- [Vojtko] So Bob, it's about opportunity?

Is that what- - [Curry] Absolutely, absolutely about opportunity.

I think that when you talk about why people are moving here, it's for the same exact reasons that our grandparents moved here.

It is a better place for them to raise their families.

The economic opportunity is wonderful.

Right now you see an explosion.

Now it's clear that the impact of the immigrants is something that is also often overlooked because not only is it a good place for the immigrants to come because of the low cost of living and availability of jobs, but the impact that they have had on the Hazelton area is so wonderful.

And now people are starting to understand it.

Where we had a dwindling population previously, now we have a younger population, a growing population and what that brings with it are the economic benefits of businesses and the latest kinds of businesses locating in your area.

So we've seen also with property values.

In the Hazelton area, it's, it's a double edged sword of course, but property values have suddenly skyrocketed.

But what that means in terms of generational wealth for people that are are moving into the area is really substantive.

It's an enormous advantage to own a home and pass that home on.

And that's what we're seeing in the Hazleton area.

- [Vojtko] Well, let's, let's visit the Hazleton One Community Center and meet some of the people being served by the Hazleton Integration Project.

- [Elaine] No young person should have to walk away from their dreams because they don't have resources.

12 years ago, we started to see an influx of many Latino families.

- [Curry] The new immigrants are coming for precisely the same reasons that our grandparents came here.

- [Rossanna] We are hardworking and we only want to improve our life, we want to grow.

- [Lilibeth] One of the main struggles is not being able to communicate with the newcomers.

- [Curry] So we felt that if we could open a community center and bring everyone together, particularly the young people, we would be able to make the entire city a little bit more welcoming.

(children playing) - [Elaine] Right now our school district is over 60% Latinx and yet our school district doesn't have a lot of bilingual teachers.

We were the first pre-K in the city that had a bilingual teacher.

(speaking Spanish) Then we decided we were gonna have an accredited after school program.

- As an educator, HIP does stand out because most of their staff is fully bilingual.

- [Rossanna] Even when you had a teacher that is not bilingual, the other teacher bilingual can help.

That made the sense to the student that, that they belong.

They find people that understand them.

(speaking Spanish) - [Vanessa] Sometimes we even have the same background.

So I came here around like 12, 10 with my parents.

I understand how difficult sometimes it is to come to a new country.

- [Elaine] You need to make a concerted effort to meet a child where they are and make them blossom where they are and be proud of who they are and, and know that they can be successful.

- [Vojtko] What a vibrant place.

You see all those faces that are just so full of joy and happiness.

They, they look at home, Bob.

They look like they, they just want to be there, want to learn, want to have that experience.

- [Curry] One, one of the great joys of my life, Larry, and I know you for a long time, I have to say, 3:30 to 4:00 on every school day afternoon, when those kids come into our building, they are there because they want to be.

You hit on it perfectly.

They come running in, they hug you, they're happy to be there and you just can't imagine anything bringing you more joy, more satisfaction than being a part of that.

And you see the- we have a great advantage here because all you gotta do is show those kids and everybody gets excited about your mission.

And we've just been thrilled with the support we've gotten from our community, from businesses.

And we talked about sustainability and that's what has occurred in the past four or five years.

We're on much more solid footing every year that goes by.

We feel that we are more entrenched.

We are part of the fabric of the Hazleton area society.

- [Vojtko] Well, I'll tell you, you also hit on something.

You see those faces.

You want to get involved, you want to do something.

- [Curry] Yeah.

- [Vojtko] What can we do?

And, and Jenny, how if- if if someone wants to get involved with the STARS program, maybe be a mentor, how, how do you go about it?

- [Monge] They would get in touch with me.

I mean, they can call me, they can email me.

They could go to Marywood and ask about STARS and someone will be able to direct them to our program.

We're always looking for mentor volunteers who are interested on- in helping our youth on a weekly basis or on a monthly basis.

We're always looking for community partnerships to be able to take our children and expose them to diverse career paths, to areas like museums that might introduce them to new skills or passions that they would've never even thought about in the past.

So community partnerships is a- is something we're always seeking.

- [Vojtko] So I noticed that there is an extensive website on the Marywood, on the Marywood website.

So it's marywood.edu.

marywood.edu is where you would go.

And the easiest way I have found is go to marywood.edu and and just search on STARS and it pops right up.

And you can learn all about the staff and all of your, all of your activities and- and people can be involved a little bit or- or a lot too, right?

They can be involved on a weekly basis, on a monthly basis.

- [Monge] Correct.

On a weekly basis if their time allows, on a monthly basis if it's more limited.

And like I said, even if it's just, you know, once in a, in a while through community partnerships.

- [Vojtko] And Bob, you're taking volunteers.

- [Curry] We certainly do take volunteers.

And the level to which you participate is really up to you.

We- because we have so many different kinds of programs we can find programs to suit everyone's interests.

And the same thing is true with the amount of time that we're open during the day.

We're open from 8:00 AM till 8:00 PM, so it- and we would really encourage people, if you think that you might wanna become involved, give it a try.

Just walk in our door and we will- we will make it as easy as possible.

And our lifeblood is our community support.

That is through volunteerism, through the support we get through our partners.

And we really do depend on it.

We can't do any of our mission, we can't do anything without the support and generosity of our community.

- [Vojtko] And do you have an- a website as well?

- [Curry] We do.

Our website is HIP, hip, Hazleton Integration Project- hip1.org.

- [Vojtko] It's a hip place to be.

- [Curry] It is a hip place to be.

- [Vojtko] Well, I would like to thank you so much for participating.

Our time is up and thank you.

Thank you for joining us.

Now, for more information, please visit WVIA.org/keystonereports.

And remember that you can watch- rewatch this episode on demand anytime online or on the WVIA app.

WVIA.org or the WVIA app.

For Keystone Edition, I'm Larry Vojtko.

Thank you so much for watching.