On May 14th, Georgia Afterschool Investment Council joined with Georgia providers to participate in the Afterschool for All Challenge in Washington, DC. Georgia's participants met with Senators Saxby Chambliss and Johnny Isakson, Congressman Nathan Deal, and key staff for Congressmen John Barrow and David Scott, to advocate for Congressional support of increased afterschool funding in the fiscal year 2009 federal budget.

Georgia's advocates joined with 400 advocates from across the country to urge Congress to increase funding for 21st Century Community Learning Centers. The President's proposed federal FY09 budget (Oct. 1, 2008 - Sept. 30, 2009) would cut 21st CCLC funding by almost $300 million. If Congress supports this proposal, Georgia would lose more than $8 million in 21st CCLC funds, equating to about 8,300 kids that would not have the opportunity to participate in these important programs.

Georgia's advocates also urged Georgia's Congressional delegation to increase funding for the Child Care Development Block Grant. CCDBG dollars provide subsidies for low-income parents to pay for child care, afterschool and summer care. CCDBG has been level funded since 2002. Given the waitlist for these subsidies in Georgia has been as high as 17,000 families over the past year, increased funding is desperately needed.

The 2008 Legislative session officially ended on May 14th with Governor Perdue signing numerous bills and using his veto pen more sparingly than last year. The deadline for Georgia's governor to act on bills passed by the General Assembly is 40 days from when the House and Senate gavel out. All bills signed, as well as any bills not acted upon at all by the Governor, become effective on July 1, 2008, unless otherwise stated in the bill.

Mental Health America of Georgia is introducing an exciting new program geared toward youth from 6th-12th grades to Georgia. Envision Your Future is a best-practice program which promotes positive youth development by successfully guiding at-risk kids toward making healthy choices in behavior and friends. Envision Your Future was successfully researched and developed in New Mexico and has helped youth achieve academic success, critical thinking skills, self-efficacy and confidence, and personal responsibility.

The Georgia Afterschool Institute is the first state model of an intensive, multi-day professional development institute to boost the skills and knowledge of afterschool staff to provide effective, high-quality afterschool education. GAIC is using the Afterschool Institute as a vehicle for building high- quality in afterschool programs across the state. Georgia stands to be a model for the country with this statewide pilot; there is tremendous momentum building behind this exciting initiative!

The first Georgia Afterschool Institute will take place July 29-31st at the Georgia Center in Athens, GA. As part of a larger systems-building effort to strengthen afterschool professional development throughout Georgia, this pilot will have two tracks to train:

1. 45 afterschool providers with skills, knowledge, and take-home-and-do techniques for effective afterschool education;
2. 15-20 local school-age afterschool trainers in the Institute training model. 8-12 trainers will be selected from this group after the July Institute to become the Georgia Afterschool Institute Faculty. This faculty will design and lead future Afterschool Institutes across the state.

The Center for American Progress recently released Additional Learning Opportunities in Rural Areas by author Roy Forbes. This report takes an in-depth look at rural afterschool programs and their resource needs, successes, and challenges.