Santa Maria Community Services, Inc. has received a $30,000 grant from the Scripps Howard Fund to support the creation of summer camps focused on preparing West Side children for kindergarten and beyond.
Funding will go toward Santa Maria’s Promoting Our Preschoolers Program, or POP, which serves the greater Price Hill area, one of the region’s most diverse and economically disadvantaged communities.
The initiative includes a five-week Kindergarten Readiness Event at Rapid Run Park, featuring interactive stories and crafts to enhance cognitive and fine motor skills. The camps will run on Thursdays from June 6 through July 11, except July 4, from 1 to 2 p.m.
The camps aim to improve children’s reading scores significantly as well as language abilities, motor skills and general social development, per Santa Maria. The program will use the Ready Rosie platform to offer participants with tailored learning solutions they can use at home.
Grant funding will also support additional seasonal reading camps in the spring and summer of 2025, focusing on literacy and language-based activities.
“Our goal is to bridge the early childhood education gap exacerbated by poverty and limited preschool availability in Price Hill,” said H.A. Musser, Jr., Santa Maria’s president and CEO. “Catching up once children start kindergarten behind is a challenge, making it crucial to address issues early, before children begin kindergarten.”
Supporting Cincinnati’s West Side communities
Founded in 1897, Santa Maria Community Services provides more than 2,500 individuals with educational tools and resources to build strong families, promote healthy residents and foster neighborhood revitalization throughout Cincinnati’ Price Hill community.
Musser expressed gratitude toward the Scripps Howard Fund, saying the gift will enable his organization to significantly expand its literacy programs.
Some of the funding to provide support services for parents and older siblings to create what Santa Maria described as an “inclusive and supportive family learning environment.” The organization plans to host monthly multicultural group meetings at the City Gospel Mission’s Little Village as well.
Camp programming is being created in partnership with Sisan Cuervo, a bilingual speech-language pathologist and assistant professor at Mount St. Joseph University.
Meredith Delaney, president and CEO of the Scripps Howard Fund, said investing in children’s education is one of the most impactful ways to support our communities.
Parents and caregivers interested in enrolling their children in the reading camps can do so by contacting Santa Maria.
“(Santa Maria’s) multicultural reading camps will not only focus on literacy, language and kindergarten readiness; they will empower children and their families with the tools and confidence they need to succeed in school and beyond,” Delaney said.
Santa Maria Community Services programs
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