Coaching kids toward a better future

As Assistant Director of the Sixth Judicial District Department of Correctional Services, Jean Kuehl's mission is to promote law-abiding behavior and support positive change in adult offenders. So to her, it's only natural to look back up the chain to where those adults started out: as kids in need of guidance and support.

In 35 years of corrections, Kuehl has seen way too many kids who grew up without: Without opportunities to explore their interests and talents, without positive role models, without help with homework or getting that first job. Kids who “grew up the only way they knew how.”

"Why aren't we giving them a lifeline,” she asked herself.

That's why she' s so passionate about Children of Promise – the Community Correction Improvement Association's mentoring programs for at risk youth.

Children of Promise has been quietly working to support at-risk youth in our area for more than 15 years – through one-on-one and group mentoring programs helping hundreds of kids aged 5 through 18 in Linn, Johnson and Jones counties.

Most of the kids involved with Children of Promise programs are living in poverty, often in high-risk neighborhoods where they're surrounded by poverty and crime. They frequently come from families plagued by substance abuse, crime, mental illness and domestic violence and neglect. Many have parents involved with the corrections system and run a serious risk of following in that path.

The results have been measurable, according to the group's statistics: 91 percent of the elementary-aged kids served by the group's Foster Grandparents Program show improved reading skills. 97 percent of the older kids involved with the Youth Leadership Program have fewer behavior issues at school. Children of Promise participants show increased school participation, fewer unexcused absences, more plans to go to college and better social skills.

Keuhl credits that success to Children of Promise's commitment to building community: “Really trying to create what happened in the 'good old days' where there were extended support systems around you in the neighborhood.”

“If you don't have that, you're just kind of stuck,” she told me when we talked last week.

Till now, Children of Promise has relied almost exclusively on committed volunteers and grants from the United Way and other agencies (“little pots of money here and there,” as Keuhl puts it). They were Zach Johnson's Birdies That Care recipient in 2010 and 2011 – the first time most people had heard of the program. Now they're branching out and trying to establish a donor base.

They're holding a fundraiser this week emceed by Hawkeye Announcer Gary Dolphin. University of Iowa Football Coach Kirk Ferentz will give the keynote speech.

And I said I'd give them a plug because I'm with Kuehl and the others over at Children of Promise who think it's nonsensical not to step in and try to help a kid who looks like they're headed down the wrong path.

“If we really want safe communities, we're going to have to do things differently,” Kuehl says.

Hear, hear.