Grace Outreach

Getting Back to School

Back to school: three potent words that for most of us evoke the change of seasons and new clothes to go with it, of visits to stationery stores gripping vast lists of school supplies, of reunions with fellow students last seen in June and the return to old social rituals.

These three words also imply matriculation from one class grade to the next, a natural progression many of us tend to take for granted.

But for a large number of adult women – particularly those in our urban neighborhoods – back to school means something else entirely. It’s something they aspire to; a promise to themselves they hope to one day fulfill. It’s not about going back to school, it’s about getting back to school. Somewhere along the way the normal progression was disrupted, and now they must find the courage, the mental strength and determination within themselves to get the education they need but were denied.

They must find a way to either deal with or remove themselves from the distractions that surround – and are often imposed – upon them, and navigate the serial speed bumps that keep them from fulfilling their dreams. Doing that often requires tremendous sacrifice and a balancing of responsibilities that stretch well beyond the youthful self-interest inherent in a normal high school experience.

Few of us can fully appreciate the demands and obstacles they face.

Yet Grace Outreach began the 2010-2011 school year with 105 women having gotten themselves back to school in order to resume their education. In our short, six year history, we have seen our enrollment numbers rise, but this year is a record for September enrollments.

It is our wish for these students, as reward for having taken this difficult but necessary step, that their quality of life – financial, emotional, intellectual – will rise as well.