|
• About Our Kids • For The Parents • Make a Donation • Contact Us • Directions | |
|
See a TV40 News video of the event here! Published Friday, October 12, 2007 in the ATLANTIC CITY PRESS Covenant House getting new home ATLANTIC CITY - Some troubled youths are getting a better place
to help build a better life. Inside the 16,000-square-foot building, young adults will make the transition from homelessness and dependence to healthy, productive and independent adult living. The building is scheduled to open in late spring. During the months in which they will live in the facility, the residents will obtain full-time employment, further their education by completing high school and starting college, and learn and practice the social and life skills needed to live on their own. "The principal function is to teach social and independent living skills," said site developer Brian Nelson. That means teaching the residents something as basic as learning how to cook, something they'll keep doing "until they get it right," he said. And, Nelson said, shopping. "When we take the kids shopping, and they've never been shopping before, they come back with 20 boxes of cereal and no milk," he said. There's also another important lesson learned in the Rights of Passage facility: Getting along with each other, something that Covenant House officials say the residents must build on to make it in the world. For instance, with two residents sharing a room, there's bound to be disagreements, Nelson said. "We want to help them resolve those issues without getting into a fight," he said. Covenant House New Jersey Executive Director Jill Rottmann said the project couldn't be pulled off without the help of various federal, state and local officials and agencies. "Their commitment to making this project happen demonstrates their tremendous belief in and commitment to New Jersey's homeless kids," Rottmann said. "Our young people have been given very little of that, if any. Employers decline their applications. Landlords refuse to rent to them. People on the streets fear them. Even their own parents have lost hope in their futures. "These heroes, however, have decided that our state's homeless adolescents deserve a decent place to live, a place where they can formulate and live out plans for a better future," she said. Nelson said the effort is working, as less than one percent of the youths who go through Covenant House return. Covenant House is the state's largest provider of services to homeless and at-risk people between the ages of 16 and 21. It served more than 2,000 young people last year. TV40 News |
||
