CDF asked children, college students and caregivers to “freedom dream” with us. At every site, our partners from the Ink Factory situated a big whiteboard with colorful sticky notes to visually capture what we heard.
About the Site
We visited Battle Creek, Michigan, as part of a multi-state listening campaign. At the R.I.S.E. Corp. CDF Freedom Schools® site, parents, caregivers, and Servant Leader Interns (SLIs) voiced significant concerns about the local education system, including inadequate resources and a shortage of afterschool programs. They also highlighted financial struggles and the critical need for safe, nurturing environments.
Participants expressed that true freedom for their children encompasses access to quality education, peace of mind, and freedom from violence.
During the Battle Creek listening session, participants highlighted several key concerns and aspirations for their community:
Violence: The need for conflict resolution and crime reduction strategies.
Education: Desire for equitable opportunities, afterschool programs, and mental health resources for youth.
Community Engagement: Calls for stronger connections between children, adults, and more parental involvement.
Economic and Social Issues: Addressing financial struggles, providing job skills, and creating programs for those not thriving socially, academically, or financially.
National Concerns: Participants also cited the need for safe housing, access to meaningful jobs, and concerns about social media’s impact on youth.
The State of America’s Children® in
Michigan
Explore data for the children living in Michigan, including indicators related to child poverty, health, education, welfare, and more.
“[We need] community programs, special ability programs, something like where if you can draw, sing, or just the special types of things.”
Donna Collier Rickman Fmr. Teacher, Friend of R.I.S.E.
“The inclusion, the diversity, those areas, they’re lacking. They totally are for everybody to really feel or be at peace or to take a piece of the pie.”
LaJoy Agnew Parent of two Scholars
“We put our kids in different districts, trying to get them new opportunities, but we forfeit them being with people who are like them, who can relate to them. So, that’s the struggle. Do I get them these tangible opportunities and forgo them staying connected to their culture and community or do I keep them over here knowing that it may be a handicap for them as they’re trying to get to higher education.”
Jazmine Arms Parent of two scholars
“My tradeoff is putting them into community activities like this so they are with people of their culture, learning, so it’s not just being one way because of the school district that they go to.”
Damon Brown R.I.S.E. Founder
(On social media) “You know, some of the kids, their friends, they’re being bullied because they’re not on it. You know I think the most important thing is just to talk to our kids. We have to talk to them, at an earlier age now, about more serious topics because it’s being exposed to them. As you said, they can just click on something and you will have something inappropriate pop up and you’re nowhere around. You know, how do they process that? I try to sit down and talk to my kids at an earlier age now. It can be uncomfortable conversations, but we have to have those at an earlier age with our kids.”
Jazmine Arms Parent of two scholars
“Make this freedom school program longer in the summer because some of our kids, probably in the summer time, this is the only activities they are experiencing. If it’s just tis short amount of time, when this is over, what are they doing. So, right before school starts, they start losing all of the education, as I said, they lose some of it during the summer time and what freedom school is doing is keeping them on track for that next year. So, when this is over with at the end of July, our kids still have 20-plus days before schools start. What are they doing?”
Damon Brown R.I.S.E. Founder
“I was reading something about how the telephone has advanced, the first car, the first automobile, has advanced to where they are now and it showed the classroom and it showed how it looks now and it was all the same like nothing’s changed. Some of the books that we’re seeing at Northwestern are some of the books that was the same when I was at Northwestern. And I’m like, ‘how is this possible?’ We’ve been talking with Kalamazoo and we’re going to be going to a couple of schools over there, going to schools and helping those kids, and it was a world of difference. One of their middle schools over there looked like a college. And I felt so bad for our kids, looking at the schools, they’re broke down. They just need a lot of work. A lot of physical work. Not only technology. So, I think the way we’re teaching our kids, old fashioned, and knowing how much technology is out here, why aren’t we using these different tools to educate our kids.”
Jacqueline Patrick-James – R.I.S.E.’s Student Empowerment Program Director and Board Treasurer
“They could change an election if they were bale to vote, but because they’re not, they’re the only group of people who don’t have that voice and they don’t have a revenue source behind them. What I’ve always liked to see is, we need to write children into local state policy where there’s designated funding, like we do for our seniors, to take care of our kids where everybody can contribute. But we need to invest in our kids financially where there’s support for them and resources where we can fix schools, where we can do all this other stuff, but that’s a piece that’s missing that I haven’t seen anywhere. Write them in to the state budgets. There should be a ‘kid fund.’”
LaJoy Agnew Parent of two scholars
(on money issues) “It’s not always the guarantee. I have a lot of colleagues that do have degrees and I make way more than them or they don’t have that dream job, so it’s not the case. If you have a good job, you can afford child care, the best child care costs a lot of money and it’s not the free ones. So, you’ve got to have that money, that’ll take care of that. It’s a safeguard when it comes to health. Health – you’ll have the benefits. You’ll be able to pay those premiums. Insurance – that’s not a problem for you. Police reforming – you’re less likely to live in areas where your child will be exposed to that type of situation. Most people that live in those types of situations, their children are not going to be exposed to high crime rates. They don’t see it in schools like that. They’re policed totally different. They just don’t see those types of things. The culture is totally different. You’re afforded that lifestyle when you have your finances. It kind of takes care of those problems.”
Highlights from our Visit
Learn more about CDF’s site visits in these cities:
