Program
Overview | Building
Life Skills | Academic
Enrichment
|
JSF
Featured Program
|
Because
of the growing need for bilingual child care
in the West Berkeley community, Project VIDA
was established in 1975 in a small residential
duplex with an initial enrollment of 20 children.
VIDA’s quality care for children ages
3 to 5 years quickly outgrew its first home.
Funding at the time was primarily from federal
sources that were administered through the
City of Berkeley, Community Action Program.
In 1978, the BAHIA was awarded a contract
from the State Department of Education, Child
Development
Division, to provide child care services
to lower-income families, enabling us to
expand
services to care for up to 49 children. In
this same year, Project VIDA moved into the
James Kenney child care facility, a city-owned
site, which was shared with a school-age
program. Although program distinctions were
continuously
negotiated and patiently endured, inevitable
confusion with regards to different age groups
being served (5 to 12 year olds), hours of
operation and differences in philosophy arose.
Over the years,
BAHIA has become recognized on a local, state
and national level as an organization that
promotes children’s learning and the
idea that it takes a community to raise children.Today,
BAHIA is the only full-time, private, non-profit,
bilingual (Spanish-English) program in Berkeley,
addressing the city’s needs by providing
a bilingual, culturally diverse child care
center for lower-income, working families
and student parents. Our programs continue
to nurture
the growth of family-parent involvement and
collaboration. Centro VIDA now serves 64
preschool children ages 2 to 5 years; Bahia
School Age
Program serves 65 school age children ages
5 to 10 years. |
Joy
of Sports Foundation is proud of our partnership
with BAHIA, impacting the lives of children
in the Berkeley area. |
Program Overview
Joy of Sports Foundation (JSF) programs
aim to serve at-risk children and are designed to
appeal to different age groups. We use tennis, basketball,
soccer, and a multi-sports combination in our programs.
For younger kids, we offer the STAR Power program
for pre-schoolers. For school-age children, our various
sports-based programs, Healthy Kids and
our Healthy
Kids Club, are available.
We provide all needed equipment and our coaches
are thoroughly trained by our staff. Our programs
are
offered in partnership with local organizations including
schools, recreation centers, Boys & Girls Clubs,
and day care centers and are located at their facilities.
JSF programs are available on a year-round basis
for children ages 3-13.
JSF believes in the power of positive programs for
children — programming that supports and nurtures
the development of the whole child. Most physical
education (PE) and youth sports programs are enjoyable
for the youngsters who are naturally athletic. However,
we recognize that many kids have negative first experiences
with sports and get discouraged by being picked last
for a team, or told to sit on the bench, and are criticized
for not having skills equal to other kids. Their self-esteem
is badly damaged and they often form a life-long habit
of physical inactivity. We particularly try to reach
out to these kids to make sports a fun, integral,
healthy part of their lives.
Regular physical activity is a habit that is easy
to form as a child, but much more difficult later
in life. By starting early, children in our programs
learn healthy choices as well as life skills that
will serve them in any endeavor. Our philosophy, "Seeing
the Star in Every Child", enables coaches
to focus on helping kids develop at a level appropriate
to their skills. Praise and encouragement are given
based on children’s attitudes and needs rather
than the physical aptitude for sports. At Joy of
Sports Foundation,
we truly want to bring the “joy” into
the learning process and onto the sports field!
Building Life Skills
We focus on teaching children key life success skills
that have been proven to positively enhance children’s
school performance and ability to attain goals. All
program participants are tracked before and after
to ensure program quality and success. Our unique
measured success provides a solid benchmark and guarantee
that our goals are being met and that the children
in our programs are deriving significant benefits
from their participation.
Our programs strengthen
the following life success skills:
Academic Enrichment
In addition to teaching children life success skills
through sports, our programs also focus on academic
enrichment, including:
These additional areas of focus provide a complement
to the physical activity component of our programs
and allow children to apply the skills they practiced
on the field in the classroom.
“I
meet each student where they are at. Sometimes they
can be a challenge to get moving on the court, but
then walking back to the classroom, they tell me about
a personal problem happening in their lives. I see
they are opening up to me and I’m there to help
them any way that I can. It’s my job to give
them positive alternatives and hope. Anyone can learn
a forehand. We’re here to do much more than
that.”
-Jumanne Jahi, Joy of Sports coach for five years
Students:
To complete a Program Survey please click
here
