About Us
While working as teachers in the Bronx and Brooklyn, Jonah Canner and Becky Raik began to notice that despite all of their schools’ efforts there were a significant number of students who were not able to find consistent success in the classroom. They believed that if their students were ever going to get a fair shot they were going to need more than what the schools were able to offer. In January of 2006, after more than a year of coffee shops and cottage cheese pancakes, they founded The Fertile Grounds Project. Its mission: to provide young people with the space, tools and support they need to take ownership over their own educations and build an identity in a world where they can belong.
Jonah Canner – Co-Founder/Educational Director
Jonah brings seven years of public school experience, six years of camp administration and 5 years as a camp counselor to his work directing the educational programming of the Fertile Grounds Project. Jonah was a founding Teacher at the Community School for Social Justice in the Bronx, where he designed and implemented curricula; developed performance based assessment measurements; served on the school's strategic planning committee; and mentored many students through their journeys toward graduation. He has provided professional development for, and mentored countless teachers and camp counselors. Jonah received his Masters in Education from the New School University in New York.
Becky Raik – Co-Founder/Executive Director
Becky Raik was born and raised in New York City. She received a Bachelors degree in Theatre and Drama from the University of Wisconsin. After graduation, she taught Special Education in Chicago for two years and then as a Teaching Fellow in Brooklyn for another three. During her years in the NYC public school system she earned a Master's degree from Brooklyn College in Special and Elementary Education. She was inspired to teach by the years she spent as a camp counselor at a camp for young people with emotional, behavioral, and learning challenges. She loved summer camp. For her, camp was a space where she (as a camper) had felt safe enough to take risks and empowered enough to grow and change. As a camp counselor, as a teacher, and now, as the Executive Director of The Fertile Grounds Project, her greatest goal is to create this space for others.
Cary Feliciano – Director of Youth Programming
Born in Puerto Rico, raised and currently living in The Bronx, Cary Feliciano is a long time youth advocate and is known as the heart and soul of Camp Kadia. She worked for five years in The New York City Department of Education but found her niche working with youth in the non-profit world at Citizen's Advice Bureau, as a summer camp counselor, after school program group leader, Case Manager for High School students and eventually an after school program coordinator. Currently Cary works at The Educational Alliance as a director of an after school program for Middle School and High School students. She has been part of The Fertile Grounds Project since Camp Kadia's first summer in 2006. She has an extensive background in youth development and education and continues to volunteer her time in other grass roots activisit organizations. In whatever capacity she works, Cary empowers her young people to see their own potential.
Molly Raik – Youth Activities Co-Director
Molly is excited to be involved year round with Camp Kadia. She has spent every summer in camp since she was three and is thrilled at the opportunity to participate in activities throughout the year. Molly is a student at Hunter College and has worked in camps, schools, and after-schools.
Claudia Hindo - Board Member
Claudia Hindo currently holds an Early College Liaison position for Lehman College supporting the development of a new New York City Department of Education 6th-12th grade Early College school located in the Bronx. At Lehman College, Claudia is also an adjunct instructor in the Middle and High School Education department and serves as the Teacher Academy liaison for a joint City University of New York and New York City Department of Education teacher preparation program. Prior to this work, Claudia worked on a Steinhardt School of Education and Applied Psychology behavior intervention research project for New York University and spent four years as a small school liaison/research associate for Northwestern University's Center for Learning Technologies in Urban Schools developing small schools within large high schools in the Chicago Public schools system. Claudia holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Psychology from Loyola University Chicago and a Masters of Arts degree in the Learning Sciences from Northwestern University.
The Need
There are far too many young people dropping out of school, who are failing to be stimulated by the educational programming they have been offered. The U.S. Department of Education published statistics putting the official dropout rate at just below 10 percent (2005). However, in 2006, the Editorial Projects in Education Research Center reported that nearly 1 in 3 high school students would not graduate.
Young people growing up in communities where the school system is at its weakest are the most at risk of giving up on their education and are the most in need of alternative structures and programs. In the central school districts of the 50 largest cities, only about one-half (52%) of students graduate high school (America's Promise Alliance 2008).
As they develop, today's youth need more than school. They need programs where they can explore their identity, value system and work ethic with the support and guidance of peers and adults in a non-competitive environment.
The Vision
In order to meet the growing needs of young people who are not being reached in our public education system today, we must rethink our educational methods and create new structures and more innovative programs within and outside of our schools.
Our Mission
The mission of the Fertile Ground Project is to provide innovative programming in and outside of schools. Our programs offer young people the chance to challenge themselves physically, emotionally, artistically, and intellectually, to take control over their own education and build an identity in a world where they can belong.
Our Goals
To create innovative, replicable educational programs within struggling schools
To provide educational opportunities outside of school
To create a sustainable, interdependent, community of young people who support each other as they effect change in their own lives
Learning, Empowerment & Support
People are born wanting to learn. We want to explore, to see the world around us and make sense of it. We want to make connections, to recognize patterns, to write stories, to build an identity, and to create language so that we can best communicate our ideas. We want to know how and we want to know why. We want to build, we want to create, and we want to engage the world.
When young people have choice and determination over their pursuits, they build the self-confidence needed to accomplish anything. Young people struggling through our urban education systems graduate high school when they have people supporting them. People who care, whom they don't want to disappoint and who help them believe and bring out the best in themselves.
In three years the Fertile Grounds Project has launched three successful programs for New York City public school students. The organization has relationships with more than a dozen schools and our programs have reached more than 300 young people. All of this has been accomplished with zero full time employees and minimal funds, raised through events and individual donations.
The Hallway Project
This innovative curriculum has provided participating students with the opportunity to earn back credits towards graduation and has increased their passing rates by 20%. The Hallway Project is being replicated in five schools around New York City.
It has inspired over 200 stories of individual accomplishment. One student was arrested and spent the first four months of his senior year in Jail. During that time he would mail in work and his teacher would conference during visiting hours. He graduated on time and is now in college studying law enforcement.
Camp Kadia
In the summer of 2008, our third year, several of our former campers came back to work as counselors, the first step towards our goal of having a self-sustaining, continuous community.
During the closing activity this summer one of the campers said she was already looking forward to next year when it would be her fourth summer as a camper. For her, and many others, the experiences she has had and the lessons she has learned at Camp Kadia are now a part of her life and will stay with her forever.
The Survival Project
In the first year of close to 100 public school students completed the three-day challenge course. Students learned basic survival skills, their small group communication flourished, individual leadership emerged, and students earned credits towards graduation.
Mailing Address
The Fertile Grounds Project
39 Eldridge Street, 4th Floor
New York, NY 10002
Phone
646-338-2696