Improving the health and wellness of the people and communities of Spartanburg County, South Carolina.
"We all want Spartanburg County to be a successful and thriving community."
The Mary Black Foundation funds free Zumba and yoga classes at various locations of Spartanburg County Public Libraries. Watch this video to hear about the classes and see participants in action!
To learn more, visit: http://infodepot.org.
In 2011, the Mary Black Foundation gave a $900,000 grant to Spartanburg District 7 Schools to assist with the creation of the Park Hills Early Learning Center. The Early Learning Center program is designed to enhance children’s physical, social, emotional, and intellectual development by offering comprehensive services such as home visits. The Early Learning Center is on a full school day schedule and transportation is provided. To learn more about Park Hills, visit: http://parkhills.spartanburg7.org.
The Foundation staff worked with Hub City Farmers’ Market to plant two raised bed gardens in the Fall of 2011 for the children of Park Hills. The students maintain the gardens and eat the vegetables produced from them.
Karen H. Mitchell retired from the Mary Black Foundation Board of Trustees on December 31, 2011. Watch a video tribute to Karen’s years of service to the Foundation and to the people and communities of Spartanburg County.
This piece appeared in the Op-Ed section of the Spartanburg Herald Journal on Sunday, January 29th.
Changing the trajectory of a community problem can leave a community feeling overwhelmed — tired, resigned, looking for something easier to tackle. The incremental nature of community change is as frustrating as it is inevitable. We become so accustomed to the way things are that we lose hope that they can ever be different.
Occasionally, however, rapid and positive shifts occur.
On Tuesday, the South Carolina Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy reported a 13 percent decrease from 2009 to 2010 in teen births among 15- to 19-year-olds. Locally, the data are just as exciting. Since 2008, there has been a 25 percent decrease in Spartanburg County. That amounts to the prevention of more than 115 adolescent pregnancies in Spartanburg County.
Philip Belcher
Forrest Alton, CEO of the S.C. Campaign, suggested three potential trends leading to the improved outcomes:
First, teens are delaying sexual activity and, if they do have sex, are using contraceptives more consistently.
Second, the great majority of South Carolinians see teen pregnancy as a critical issue for our state.
And third, as a society, we’re discussing teen pregnancy more openly.
This is all good news, and many people and organizations in Spartanburg County should be pleased that their efforts appear to be moving this community toward success.
As a first step, in 2007, community leaders made a commitment to address teen pregnancy in Spartanburg County. Since that time, the Mary Black Foundation, Spartanburg County Foundation, Spartanburg Regional Healthcare System Foundation, United Way of the Piedmont and numerous concerned individuals contributed well over $100,000 to ensure that our youth have access to programs and services proven to reduce teen pregnancy.
These leaders have become vocal advocates in support of efforts to address the issue. The S.C. Campaign is working with local organizations such as REACH Upstate, Imagine That, Girl Scouts, ReGenesis Community Health, the Health Department and others that serve the community’s youth, to sharpen their focus on helping young people make healthy choices.
Projects like speakoutspartanburg.org have encouraged young people to get involved in teen pregnancy prevention efforts.
All seven school districts have become more aware of the Comprehensive Health Education Act and its requirement that schools teach teen pregnancy prevention. School leaders engaged local funders and other community leaders in difficult and passionate discussions about how to address this issue effectively while respecting community values.
And the faith community is engaged. Churches and other religious institutions are not immune from teen pregnancy, and it is heartening to know that they are eager to find ways within their own traditions to participate in broader community efforts.
Of course, there’s more work to do. Spartanburg County’s teen pregnancy rates remain higher than the South Carolina average, and the state average itself is nothing to brag about.
The good news is that teen pregnancy prevention is possible. This is not an issue with unknown solutions. We know the combination that works: focusing on abstinence as the first and best choice and, second, providing contraception for young people who choose to have sex. Both are essential.
But maybe the most important lesson from this recent success is what Mr. Alton mentioned in his press release: This progress is being made, in part, as a result of a more open climate for discussion. For better or worse, popular culture is forcing us to have conversations with young people about love, sex and relationships.
When I was in high school, the teacher of my Bible as Literature class was remarkably reticent to talk about sex. Of course, it’s difficult to read the Old Testament without broaching that subject somewhere. She disliked talking about it so much that, when forced to do so under relentless questioning by the teenage boys in the class, she both whispered and spelled it: S-E-X.
Fortunately, as a community, we understand better now that we must talk openly about the issues confronting us if we are to do anything about them.
Parents are talking more openly with their children about sex. More than 75 percent of South Carolina high school students report talking with their parents about expectations concerning sexual conduct. People are talking about condoms without whispering in embarrassment. If we cannot say the words, we cannot talk about appropriate distribution of contraceptives.
The work to reduce teen pregnancies will continue. The S.C. Campaign will invest more than $1.5 million in Spartanburg County over a five-year period to address prevention even more intensively. Success is unlikely to be uniform, and this work will require the long-term commitment of our entire community.
I am encouraged that Spartanburg County is seeing progress in this area and hopeful that other community issues also will be addressed from a perspective built on a willingness to tell the truth, say and hear the hard words, build trust and understanding with people who neither look nor act like us, and believe that change — even incremental change — is worth the effort.
The difficulties in our community are not insurmountable, and we need to celebrate success when it comes. It is a good day in Spartanburg County when we face, together, an issue that has long plagued us and see that, although the work is not yet done, it has surely begun.
-Philip Belcher
Last weekend, I was privileged to represent the Foundation at the grand opening celebration of Free 2 Play, the first Boundless Playground in Spartanburg County (and only the 2nd in SC). A Boundless Playground is designed to encourage outdoor physical activity for all children – regardless of their abilities – and provides ample opportunities for children with disabilities, who previously have had limited access to playground equipment. The Foundation provided a $50,000 matching grant to allow Carolina Miracle League to complete the park. Here is a summary of my comments from the opening ceremony:
“A healthy and well community should have opportunities for people of all abilities and public playgrounds are no exception. Free 2 Play will promote and encourage physical activity among children with disabilities and among children generally considered to be developing typically. It will also increase awareness about and acceptance of people with disabilities.”
A special thank you to Jennifer and Michael Orseck, Pam Dean, and the countless others who worked tirelessly to make Free 2 Play a reality. Their vision has made our community a better and more inclusive place to live. Their efforts have provided a place where people in our community – regardless of their ability – can come together to play. They have created a place where we can learn about people who are different from us and, more importantly, about what makes us similar.”
-Molly Talbot-Metz
At least I know I have all of the USC fans riled up, and I promise I will get back to the title, but I need to ramble a bit before I get there.
Alshon Jeffery fights with another player
I have been doing a lot of thinking about sports lately. Maybe it was my experience in South Africa seeing how sports can change the world. It might have been the multiple pickup games of football and lacrosse that I played with my boys and their cousins over the holidays. Better yet it could be all of the bowl games that I have watched. It also could be all of the Facebook updates from my friends that make me wonder when they were put on the roster for their perspective teams that inevitably come with this time of year.
Mostly I have been thinking about sports because I love them. I love to play them, although I am not very good at any. I love to watch some of them just to admire the athletic ability of those willing to play at various levels: from the 8-year-old basketball team on which my son plays, all the way up to the pros.
I love them for other reasons as well, especially for health reasons. Sports get us moving, teach us what it means to be on a team, teach us how to be part of something bigger than ourselves. They help us understand how our effort is inextricably bound to the success or failure of those around us.
I was reminded of this concept on two specific occasions recently. The first happened several days ago while visiting a community leader in the Northside of Spartanburg. As I sat at his kitchen table and listened to him talk about his neighborhood, his passion for its future, and how kids need places to play and play sports, I couldn’t help but smile. To myself I was thinking I am glad this dude is on my team.
The second time was at Jesse Boyd Elementary where I am mentoring four fifth grade boys as they work on their summative assessment project. They have chosen obesity as the issue they want to learn about and develop local solutions to. Each one of these boys plays sport, on a team, at recess, or in their back yard. As we were talking about ways to get kids moving they ask “I wonder if the price of youth sports stops some kids from playing?” It was a darn good question and one that we will google later for our research. They also talked about spaces to play – and how some neighborhoods don’t have many places to play. We will look into that one as well.
Sport has lots of parallels to the Mary Black Foundation’s work in Northside, and to our work throughout the county and state. I believe sport can teach us all something.
So why am I picking on Alshon? When he got kicked out of the bowl game and then was awarded the MVP of the game we lost something. We lost a collective opportunity to celebrate all that is good about sport, about being on a team, and about being a role model. To be awarded for an amazing catch is one thing, but to lose your cool and get kicked out of the game isn’t MVP material in my mind.
For me, I want people on my team that have a collective passion and desire to make things better–who cares if we are the MVP or not? So let’s get to work, and play!
-Curt McPhail
The Mary Black Foundation announced on Thursday, January 5, in partnership with Spartanburg County First Steps, the pilot of a Quality Rating and Improvement System (QRIS) for Spartanburg County early childhood programs. The local QRIS will be called Quality Counts.
A QRIS is a voluntary system to assess, improve, and communicate the level of quality in early childhood programs. The system can increase program expectations and accountability, providing valuable information to families and communities on options for quality early education and care. Research shows a strong link between high quality child care and healthy children who are prepared for school.
We believe that early childhood development is the foundation of a healthy community. Early childhood programs are critical to our community – they help prepare children for success in school, careers, and life.
Quality Counts will provide support to child development programs interested in continuous quality improvement. Because Spartanburg is the first in SC to implement a QRIS for early childhood programs, we will start with an 18-month pilot to test the system and get feedback from programs and parents. After the pilot, we will look to expand county-wide and then throughout the Upstate.
The first statewide QRIS was created in 1998 in Oklahoma. Since then, there has been growing momentum at state and local levels to use the systematic approach of the QRIS model for benchmarking quality and for identifying and rewarding early childhood programs that provide high quality services. Over the last 10 years, twenty states and the District of Columbia have implemented a QRIS, while over twenty-five more states are in various stages of designing their systems.
A QRIS recognizes the efforts of programs that go above and beyond the regulatory standards of state licensing and registration. Licensing requirements set the minimum standards to ensure that basic health, safety, and developmental needs of children are being met.
Quality Counts will include quality improvement grants for providers who want to continuously improve. It supports program improvement through clear steps for setting and achieving future goals. Improvements in program practice are designed to support children’s learning and development, increase educational attainment among child care providers, and enhance professional skills and competencies.
For information about how to participate in Quality Counts, contact Barbara Manoski, Director of Quality Counts, at 864-327-4914 or bmanoski@1steps.org or visit www.spartanburgqualitycounts.com.
-Molly Talbot-Metz
For Christmas this year, my husband and I surprised our kids with a week-long trip to Walt Disney World. Having never been there myself, I was almost as excited as my kids. I’m not sure why I was so excited – I hate crowds and waiting in long lines and I don’t go on any rides where I will get wet, go upside down, twist, twirl, or go faster than I can run. In other words, I am a complete bore at an amusement park. Yet, there was something very appealing to me about going to Walt Disney World. It could be the years of marketing to which I was exposed that made the trip seem like the ultimate, American family, must-do vacation. All the things that would normally frustrate me and leave me in a bad mood – massive crowds of strangers, 30-minute waits for 2-minute rides, expensive food with no taste, and cheap crap disguised as must have souvenirs –seemed perfectly reasonable, enjoyable even. At the end of each day, exhausted and with our swollen feet elevated, we would plan out the next day’s itinerary with excitement. Now that I am home and far away from “the Most Magical Place on Earth,” I can safely say that it is not a vacation destination we will frequent often, if ever again, but I am glad to have done it.
On our long drive home, I had time to reflect on some of my favorite moments from our trip. As with any vacation, those memories are less about the place and more about the people. I got to spend 7 days with the people who mean the most to me. There was no work, school, after-school activities, or housework and, for those 7 days, it was magical.
Since it is almost New Year’s Eve, I resolve to bring home some of the magic of our vacation. Walt Disney World was full of things that would normally drive me insane; yet, I enjoyed every minute of it. I had made the decision to be positive and to experience it fully. Likewise, I can let the everyday realities of work and other responsibilities leave me feeling frustrated and negative, or I can end each day with the excitement of what will come tomorrow. That sounds much more enjoyable!
Happy New Year to You and Your Family!
-Molly Talbot-Metz
Any of my family members will tell you that I have an abundance of reasons to be humble. Beyond the personal jab they might intend by the comment, of course, they are absolutely correct.
I’ve thought some recently about humility, but it’s slippery. Consider that it may disappear as soon as one acknowledges it. We all know people who take enormous pride in their humility. Sort of ruins the effect, doesn’t it?
My own definition of this particular virtue has to do with understanding how much we have to learn from others—from those who agree with us, from those who disagree, from those within our own traditions, and from those who hold world views that could not be farther from ours. In this sense, humility might be considered the opposite of provincialism or parochialism. Maybe its twin is respect. Maybe its cousin is honesty.
A couple of years ago, the Foundation distributed its holiday greeting card electronically to our rather extensive mailing list. The message was simple: Happy Holidays. The photograph showed the Foundation’s staff hanging from various handholds on the climbing wall at the Glendale Outdoor Leadership School. Festive and cheerful. Among the many return greetings was one email replying that the sender would have preferred the Foundation to have wished him a Merry Christmas. I have thought about that ever since (not that I ever brood). The implication of the email reply was that the Foundation was diluting the significance of the greeting by not using language that specified the offended citizen’s religious preference, that we were in some fashion attempting to be po
litically correct. But I make a distinction between political correctness — using or avoiding language solely out of deference to another’s preferences (my definition) — and respecting other peoples’ traditions. Surely there is nothing inherently wrong in caring how our words affect others or in asking what our Jewish, Muslim, Buddhist, atheist and other non-Christian neighbors might think of being greeted with a Christian salutation by a non-sectarian institution like the Mary Black Foundation? The issue, however, is deeper than a concern for whether religious minorities in our community might take umbrage. Respect is more than tolerance; it entails acknowledging our own ignorance, making public what is obvious: that we do not know everything, that our understanding does not encompass all wisdom and truth. If we are willing, all of us can learn from those whose beliefs and traditions differ from ours. To do otherwise is to wave the tattered banner of arrogance.
A more recent event also encouraged me to consider the great diversity of wisdom: the death of Christopher
Hitchens. Hitchens, whose New York Times obituary provides a useful introduction to his work, was a writer, a literary and cultural critic, one of the nation’s leading public intellectuals, a curmudgeon, and an “anti-theist.” His brilliance was undeniable, regardless of one’s opinion of his take on culture and politics. Hitchens was particularly famous for his lucid and tightly-argued essays and for his prodigious appetites for literature and alcohol. In one of his more controversial articles, he went after Mother Teresa and the Vatican’s effort to accelerate her beatification (Daily Beast, October 20, 2003). So here are two public figures, Mother Teresa—founder of the Missionaries of Charity and winner of the Nobel Peace Prize—and Christopher Hitchens. And I find myself wanting to learn from each: from one a marvelous clarity of thought and courage to write and say what one believes, from the other a boundless energy on behalf of the poor and oppressed. One of them was an atheist, one a Catholic on her way to sainthood. What’s wrong with learning from each?
As the Foundation continues its work to improve health and wellness in Spartanburg County in the New Year, we commit ourselves to listening to, and learning from, the diverse voices that comprise this community. May their number grow.
Happy Holidays!
-Philip Belcher
This time last week I was waking up in Cape Town, South Africa, planning to climb Table Mountain with some new friends, and full of energy from my short stay and experiences at the Beyond Sport Summit. As many of you may have read, I was there representing globalbike, learning about how bikes can transform lives and communities – much like they have in Spartanburg. I was also privileged to join the Beyond Sport Summit for 4 days as a speaker and participant. This conference led me to several observations that are, I think, very applicable to Spartanburg.
play far more often than I do. What was phenomenal about the game is that as soon as we started to play the 4 others on my team were one, despite the fact that we all came from different corners of the world. I left sore, but smiling ear to ear (as referenced by the picture).If you have 2 minutes check out this video about how soccer is transforming on part of Khayelistsha.
-Curt McPhail
