Union League Boys & Girls Clubs will use $5 million to expand inroads made in Englewood schools

Tiara Gaines’ son Jamal loves gardening, a task he uses at Englewood STEM High School and in his part-time job with Grow Greater Englewood, a food and land sovereignty nonprofit. When he’s not doing that, the high school senior is partaking in sports activities after school through the Union League Boys & Girls Clubs, (Union League BGC), a charter of the national Boys & Girls Clubs of America.

Gaines, a mother of three, said she’d recommend the benefits of the club to any parent.

“Englewood is a hard area to grow up in, but it’s also how you raise your kids,” she said. “I definitely will recommend the program because it does keep young boys, especially, from going to the streets. When he got in that program, that’s when he started getting more opportunities … the Boys and Girls Club helped him with better opportunities.”

Jamal Gaines, 18, is one of hundreds at Englewood STEM High School participating in the club, according to Englewood STEM Union League Boys & Girls Clubs’ site coordinator Antwione Allen, a ninth grade English teacher. Students participate in five after-school programs under the Englewood STEM umbrella — Power Hour (a study session prior to activities), Technology, STEM, and Smart Girls or Passport to Manhood (separate groups for girls and boys that reinforce self-esteem and developmental needs that center on character, growth, relationships and community).

Gaines’ experience started when he was a junior. He said that spending time with teammates, getting to know people, and being able to have fun and be a kid is a big draw. As part of Englewood STEM’s first graduating class, Gaines said he’s still thinking about life plans for after graduation, which may entail business, marketing and acting, but for sure will include coaching youth sports in the community. He’s been coaching his 14-year-old brother in basketball for years on his own and he enjoys it. Working with youth within the Englewood community is on his agenda for the short and long term.

“I always wanted to work for Englewood, do something for Englewood,” he said. “My goal is to do more for the young, Black males. That’s why I want to do coaching with sixth, seventh or eighth graders, 12- to 13-year-olds.”

Union League BGC entered the Englewood community in 2015 with after-school programming at Stagg Elementary School. Within a year, there were talks of expanding to other school sites in the community. Union League BGC launched a five-year fundraising campaign in 2017 to raise $5 million to serve more youths in the neighborhood, a goal reached in December 2021.

The influx of money means club sites at Englewood schools — including Nicholson STEM Academy, DS Wentworth Elementary and Englewood STEM High School — will be sustained and potentially grow into other clubs in the area, said Marina Del Cid, director of marketing and special events for Union League Boys & Girls Clubs.

“Even though we’ve completed that campaign, we still need to continue to raise (funds),” Del Cid said. “When we first came into Englewood, Mary Ann Mahon-Huels, our president and CEO, was telling us the police chief and the fire chief were saying, ‘If you’re going to come into this neighborhood, you better make sure you do what you say you’re going to do,’ and that’s what we’ve been doing and we want to continue to be able to do it. We want to be in every community if we could.”

Over 2,000 youths are served in Englewood with after-school and summer programming.

“The Union League Boys and Girls Clubs has been our partner for five years,” said Englewood STEM Principal Conrad Timbers-Ausar. “We intimately worked together on the (programming) plan so it’s embedded in our curriculum … so we don’t see Union League Boys and Girls Clubs as a separate entity housed in Englewood STEM. Union League Boys and Girls Clubs is a part of Englewood STEM. To try to explain the impact that they have is really hard … because their impact touches all 800 of our students despite there being maybe 200 students that are technically on the (participant) roster. We have to put our lens on more students like Jamal because Jamal juts out over a lot of his peers, but he’s in a group of some amazing young people.”

Allen said programming such as robotics, anime, esports and tutoring has resulted in larger numbers of students wanting to participate. Jamara Hal, director of the Union League Boys & Girls Clubs in Englewood, said the money raised in the campaign will also help with food insecurity, transportation to events and experiences, and aid in dealing with youths’ social and emotional behavior.

“We implemented a social emotional corner in our schools, which I’m starting for each site,” Hal said. “If kids are having some disruption in the classroom and are asked to leave, they can come to our corner and unpack that emotion for an hour. We can help them with that and they can go back to their classroom. As mentors, we don’t tell them, we listen. Let them pour their emotions onto us and then do what we can to help fulfill whatever it is that they’re going through, by just being there for them.”

Gaines said his younger brother is his motivation; being around him, teaching him how to do things, and telling him right from wrong made Gaines want to do the same for the youth in his community — so much so that he doesn’t envision severing ties with Englewood.

“Until the work is done here, that’s when I’ll actually think about leaving,” he said. “Englewood needs some type of support, especially for young Black males and the Black community, so until the stuff is done here, I want to work for Englewood.”

Hal and the other adults in Gaines’ life commend him for his actions.

“As we always say in Englewood, ‘Don’t do something about us without us,’ ” Hal said.

drockett@chicagotribune.com