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Building Community in Chapman Town

Photos of smiling children helping each other on art projects, running, and showing off their TEAM Chapman t-shirts greet visitors to Health and Community Services professor Mary Portis's office. "Together Everyone Achieves More," or TEAM Chapman, is the name of this three-year collaborative effort among Butte County Schools, CSU, Chico, and Big Brothers and Big Sisters to reach youth and build community. Portis is the director of the academic support component of the program.

California Wellness Foundation granted $1.3 million for a three-year period to TEAM Chapman. Health and Community Services receives $50,000 each year to provide school-based programs, staff training, senior services, health screenings, and community education programs.

The project works with two elementary schools, Chapman and Four Winds, and the Big Brother and Big Sister program. The goal of the project is to support the development of healthy youth and communities through determining what the community defines as its needs and then working with community members to assess available strengths and resources. The program's focus on youth includes a youthful staff of volunteers from CSU, Chico, Butte College, and local high school students, and a paid director, Darcia Johnson.

A recent addition to TEAM Chapman is the Girl's Club. For the past month, 31 girls, ages seven to eleven, have met each Wednesday to craft, cook, and dance. "We'll be a club forever," said one of the girls. When mothers come to pick up their daughters, they often join in. Portis said, "Then the mothers are helping. They've been suggesting activities, and this is exactly what we want." Last week the club made homemade tortillas and quesadillas. "To a lot of our mothers, that's no big deal because they do it every day," Portis said, but it's a skill that can be shared with the children and that TEAM Chapman can support.

The program actively recognizes children's cultures, talents, and skills. When TEAM Chapman sponsored a family health fair on October 6, they needed translators for many families. This fall TEAM Chapman hired Chapman Elementary School students, ages 9 to 12, who spoke Spanish, Laotian, and Hmong to translate. They earned a t-shirt and $5 for each session. Portis said, "We want them to be proud of their origins, and we want them to realize that they have skills and people will pay them money for it."

"One of the values of Health and Community Services involvement is that we have a lot of people power," says Portis. CSU, Chico students provided enough volunteers to run several full-day Health Academies at both elementary schools. In October, the two-day health academy involved 94 student volunteers, two or three to a classroom. The college students worked with the children on health topics ranging from dental hygiene to accident prevention to environmental health.

In looking at what worked well in the first year and a half of the project, Portis found a couple of surprises. Art and physical fitness have emerged as primary community building activities. The running clubs developed at the elementary schools became very popular. Of the 700 runners in this year's Honey Run Run, 147 were members of the running clubs. For many of the kids, this was their first experience with a large-scale community event.

Physical fitness builds community by providing ongoing activity with people who get to know each other well. Not all programs are focused on youth. One of the most successful projects is Sit and Be Fit, a senior fitness program that has attracted 28 white seniors. Portis noted, "We're finding that there is a lot more isolation among the white elders in Chapman town than among the Asian or Hispanic elders." They are now a friendship group that celebrates together.

Currently, children are creating tiles for the backyard of a house used by TEAM Chapman to border the Peace Garden. This garden contains plantings representing the diverse ethnic groups in Chapman Town. Growing plants to grow community is a good symbol for TEAM Chapman. And their harvest is just beginning.

-- Barbara Alderson