A hometown newspaper with a local office, local owners & lots of local news
A hometown newspaper with a local office, local owners & lots of local news
Clockwise from left, Maggie Schulstrom, Dakota Koski, Dyne and Jeana Cahoon and Anne Parish worked to package Thanksgiving dinners for REACH students and anyone else in the community who asked for a meal. Cahoon cooks at Common Ground and worked with other staff members to cook and distribute the meals.
Every week that they can - pandemic permitting - the staff and students involved in the REACH program meet at the Common Ground coffee bar and deli. They do a little homework, various activities, enjoy some snacks and simply spend time together.
Over time, the staff at the Christian coffee shop have grown pretty fond of the kids, so they were looking forward to hosting them for a Thanksgiving dinner last week.
But Covid-19 got in the way.
"I couldn't let it go," said Common Ground cook Jeana Cahoon, mother to six kids of her own. So they decided to make meals for each REACH kid that would serve four to six people, and delivered them last Wednesday. The staff posted about their plans on Facebook, letting folks know they could donate to help defray the costs. They asked for $500; they got $1,600.
So they made more meals. Anyone who wanted a meal could call and ask for food to be delivered in advance of Thanksgiving. They also dropped off meals at a homeless shelter and told folks to stop by if they needed food.
"The only way to renew hope in your heart is to do something for someone else," Cahoon said. "Everyone has a desire to do something bigger than themselves, but they need to be empowered."
"It's been working," chimed in Maggie Schulstrom, who works as an AmeriCorps Promise Fellow with REACH. "I'm gonna start crying again, just thinking about this whole community that just loves these kids so much," she added.
Schulstrom had just been reading through the handwritten notes that the Common Ground staff had written for each REACH student, letting them know that someone was thinking of them during these strange times, when they have to learn from home and can't get together with their REACH buddies because of the shutdown orders to help slow the spread of Covid-19.
REACH executive director Dakota Koski said they've moved most of their programming online, so kids can still get help with homework or chat virtually with one another. They try to get together and do something outside as long as they can stay socially distanced, he said. "That way we can still see them," he said. REACH program coordinator Anne Parish will also drop off art projects to individual students.
The nonprofit organization's mission and vision is to provide supportive mentoring relationships in Carlton County.
"Distance learning is really hard in terms of motivation and the lack of structure," Koski said. "Some of the kids say it just feels like busywork. When you can be with them, they are great. But actually doing it alone, that's hard."
Cahoon said she misses the kids coming in as well, talking about a certain unnamed student that she's been trying to win over for a year, "with waffles."
"I finally got my first smile and a laugh," she said. "I love that I get to be here and love on people with food. I think that's my special ingredient - love."
