By Tim Hohman, Midtown Fellowship East Church Coordinator

Midtown Fellowship East Nashville has been serving in Stratford High School for the past two years, focusing efforts towards supporting the teachers and providing materials and learning opportunities for students. Our goal is to be a consistent presence at Stratford and to find tangible ways to have a positive impact on the community.

We began last year by looking for small ways to build new relationships and serve the school. We provided coffee and donuts for teachers once a week around testing periods, and partnered with City Church to provide snacks for students on testing half-days when school lunches are not available. With the support of Alexa Skopek and Elijah Ammen from Stratford, we have distributed 1400 snack bags to Stratford students over the past two years.

We also began a teacher adoption program in which small community groups from Midtown East adopt one teacher from Stratford and build personal relationships to learn how to best support their adopted teacher. Currently, we have 6 active teacher adoptions, and through these relationships we have stepped into tangible opportunities to accelerate learning at Stratford. Our small groups have provided supplies and hygiene products to classrooms, provided books and furniture for a reading corner, facilitated career panels with experts to discuss various career paths, organized neuroscience lectures and activities through collaborations with Vanderbilt University (including a sheep brain dissection!), and helped organize a book fair.

We hope to continue to build the scope and the depth of these relationships. Through our partnership with United4Hope, we will continue to focus our effort on supporting the amazing teachers at Stratford High School as they invest in the future generation right in our community!

Email Janelle with questions and to share your events and stories so we can continue to share resources across our United4Hope network.