From North Kansas City to Grandview, from Kansas City’s West Side to Buckner, Mo., LINC’s Caring Communities school programs pounced on the new school year.

“I’m going to have an almighty day!” sang out LINC’s program leader at Kansas City’s African-Centered College Prep Academy.

“And I’m gonna do it in a mighty way!” answered LINC children in the before-school program, dressed in red or green shirts and neat slacks and skirts for opening day Aug. 21.

“Character counts . . .” sang the leader.

“All the time!” the children sang back.

“And all the time . . .”

“Character counts!”

It’s not just the before- and after-school care programs that mean so much to families and neighborhoods that LINC serves in its partnerships with the Kansas City Public Schools, the Hickman Mills, Grandview, Center, North Kansas City and Fort Osage school districts and the Lee A. Tolbert Community Academy and Genesis School charter schools.

“We are always appreciative of our partnership with LINC,” said Kansas City Public Schools Superintendent Dr. Jennifer Collier at the first-day celebration at ACC Prep.

“(LINC) partners in so many ways,” she said. “Not just for before- and after-care but all the ways that LINC supports our families through rental assistance and other things, and helping refer them to resources.”

LINC’s year-round aid and support working with its communities feels a boost with the start of the new school year.

In all, LINC operates before- and after-school programs at 45 Caring Communities sites, plus community programming and eight more sites.

First-grader Kobe, checking out the back-to-school night event at Dobbs Elementary School in Hickman Mills with his mother, Marlisha Wright, is now a veteran student, heading into his second year with LINC.

“LINC is fun,” he said, “because you get to stuff like you do in class and you get to draw a lot and you can do a lot of work and you can go to the gym to have fun.”

For his mother, LINC’s support provides comfort.

“It gives parents the opportunity to go to work and have a safe place for their children to go,” Wright said.

This year, LINC is adding a site inside Red Bridge Elementary School in the Center School District. LINC added the Red Bridge program last year, collaborating with the district to bus the children to LINC’s established program at nearby Indian Creek Elementary.

It’s great to have LINC at its own site in Red Bridge, said Red Bridge Principal Rachelle Hamrick.

“I’m looking forward to having our students able to have a quality before- and after-school care program,” she said. “I just feel this is so much more beneficial for our students and parents to have it at our building.”

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