Rather than a student staying at home, with a relative or friend, or finding something to do on their own during a short-term suspension, SL Alternatives would like students to utilize their program.

“If a child is suspended, it doesn’t matter if it’s for one day, they can come and continue learning,” said Angela Jones, director of SL Alternatives.

The program provides tutoring, counseling, and service learning opportunities for students while they’re receiving disciplinary action from the school, specifically short-term suspensions which are between 1-10 days.

During the program’s first semester of operation, services were only provided to Pattillo A+, Martin Middle, Stocks Elementary and Princeville Montessori schools. Now all schools that educate students in grades 3-8 are open to referring students to the program.

The schools present parents and students with information on the program when a student is suspended.

“We don’t want to leave no child left behind, and we know suspensions were going on in these other schools as well so we reached out to those other schools,” Jones said.

There are two tutors, Alisha Battle and Marthiah Powell, who provide assistance to students from 7:30 a.m.-2:45 p.m. Monday through Friday. Jones also serves as the programs counselor.

Transportation is provided to students within the town limits to and from the site at 100 Neville St. in Princeville.

The program is funded by $71,508 from the North Carolina General Assembly’s Dropout Prevention Committee. Funding was allotted in enough time to allow the program to open its doors in January, and help students during the Spring semester of 2009.

During that time, the program served 56 students, and provided Jones with some insight on whether the program was working.

Not only does the program help students during their suspension, but it continues to track student progress after they have completed their suspension. In both circumstances, the counseling services give students visualization, anger management, peer pressure, and conflict resolution strategies to improve their behavior.

Jones recalled one student in the third grade that she worked with who was having a bad day at school, and wanted to avoid getting in trouble again. The student asked his teacher for someone from SL Alternatives to help him.

“It showed me how much he was listening, and respected the information he received,” Jones said.

“I reinforced to him that anger is a choice. A lot of times students need to hear encouraging words.”

The program was started under the direction of St. Luke’s Total Community Outreach Ministries (T-COM) to meet a need to help students with disciplinary problems.