Hickman Mills Family Summit shines online (and it's still live!)

Mad Science was one of the virtual events at the Hickman Mills Family Summit on March 6. Many of the family resources can still be reached at the district’s Family Summit webpage.

To say the least, pulling off the Hickman Mills School District’s annual Family Summit was “tricky.”

“To be in this virtual world,” said district spokesperson Marissa Cleaver-Wamble, “I’d say it was a success.”

And the best part: It’s still there, online, ready to serve any family looking for help or ideas from dozens of community resources, and job opportunities, and school pages.

LINC’s Janet Miles-Bartee announces a prize winner at the Hickman Mills Family Summit on March 6 as LINC site coordinators Rashad Wahab and Bryan Geddes look on.

“It stays open,” she said.

More than 100 toured the summit’s resources page, and the district will be promoting it so more families can take advantage of the community’s offerings.

The summit also featured an in-person wellness fair at Smith-Hale Middle School to provide families dental service, free screenings, vision and hearing tests and blood pressure checks. Forty adults and children stopped by.

“I’m glad we were able to do the wellness fair,” Cleaver-Wamble said. “Those services aren’t always available close to them.”

The summit also featured kids’ events that are part of LINC’s regular after-school programming, including Mad Science and Kansas City Young Audiences.

A virtual fitness program was introduced by Fitness 4 Ever, and that is a program LINC would like to set up going forward for families. Contact Bryan Geddes at 816-665-5883 or bgeddes@kclinc.org to set up sessions.

The summit shows the variety of help LINC and the district are trying to bring to the community, said Geddes, LINC’s Caring Communities site coordinator at Smith-Hale and Ruskin High School.

“We’re trying to make sure we’re meeting families where they are,” he said.

LINC also carried on its tradition of supporting the event with a drawing for dozens of prizes. Winners’ names were drawn in a live Facebook event, LINC staff contacted them in order by phone and they picked their prizes.

Next year, the Family Summit can expect to return with a crowd all together, but also with new skills to share resources widely in a virtual world.

“We learned a lot (going virtual),” Geddes said. “We’ll continue to use what we learned moving forward to support families.”

To access the online community resources, go to the district’s Family Summit webpage.

The online offerings of the 2021 Hickman Mills Family Summit, like these interactive family resource links, remain active on the summit webpage.