(1888PressRelease)
April 19, 2008 - Los Angeles, CA – In a community where many of its residents struggle to put food on the table and avoid a life of drugs and gang violence, an inspirational group of eighth grade students at The Celerity Nascent Charter School in South Central Los Angeles are “thinking globally and acting locally” by participating in The Dream Project – an offshoot of The United Nation’s Millennium Development Goals.
Kelly Sullivan Walden, author, dream coach and vice president of the Los Angeles chapter of the Women’s National Book Association, participated in the 2006 United Nations Conference where the goals were unveiled. Her response to this meeting was profound, going far above and beyond her “duties” as an UN-affiliated non-governmental organization – and thus the Dream Project was born.
The Dream Project is designed to empower young people to recognize themselves as leaders that behold the potential to make a positive and real contribution to the world and to instill in them social responsibility, self-esteem, and creative problem solving. This pilot program gives students the opportunity to address and create solutions for the issues recognized in the United Nation’s Millennium Goals to combat hunger, poverty, disease, illiteracy, environmental degradation and discrimination in an attempt to fulfill these goals by the year 2015.
Vielka McFarlane, a veteran educator and founder of the Celerity Educational Group, knows all too well the responsibility and fortitude it takes to make a change in this world. She mortgaged her home and acquired a building on the corner of Jefferson and Crenshaw Boulevard in the notoriously underserved South Central Los Angeles community. This is where her vision of empowering children came to life - with The Celerity Nascent Charter School.
