Southwest Georgia Community Action Council concludes Youth Enrichment Summit with celebratory ceremony

MOULTRIE, Ga. – The Southwest Georgia Community Action Council (CAC) recently concluded its Youth Enrichment Summit with a celebratory ceremony.

This event honored the accomplishments of the participating bright young stars and provided an opportunity for the youth to demonstrate the skills and knowledge they acquired during the summit.

“So, we run about five different camps over our 14 counties span. And, so, what we do is combine different counties that are closer together and they run a camp there. And, we have a maximum of 25 children per camp in our counties and in Colquitt county we do a total of 50. The different activities that we do, we do college tours, we ask out camp facilitators to do a university and a technical school just to kind of give them an idea about a career path. They have a military presence coming in and talk to them about those options as well as entrepreneurs. And, then we do have a STEM curriculum that we do at our camps, and we target science, technology, engineering, arts, ag, and math skills,” said India Williams, Community Service Director, Southwest Georgia Community Action Council.

The ceremony began with the children completing a budgeting shopping trip, an exercise aimed at teaching money management skills. Given a set budget, the children purchased groceries, which were then donated to a local charity. Nursing majors from Southern Regional Technical College (SRTC) contributed by serving the students and guests at the banquet. The ceremony served as a platform to teach students communication and etiquette, reinforcing the summit’s goal of helping the youth realize their full potential as active citizens.

India Williams, Service Director for the Southwest Georgia Community Action Council, provided further insight into the Youth Enrichment Summit Banquet.

“Here in Colquitt county with the camp that we host here, our children have basically like a round up banquet. And, what that does, it just provides an opportunity for the children to one, be able to have a banquet seating, be able to sit in a banquet setting. They get to display their art that they did during the week. And, they also get to talk with community partners. So, we invite different community partners to come in and sit and talk with the kids. They learn table etiquette, and engage with the community partners, have eye contact, sit up straight in their chairs and be able to actually have a conversation, they learn table manners and everything that they’ve kind of learned during the week. They’re able to display it at their banquet and it’s just something different because a lot of them may have never experienced that type of setting,” said Williams.

Randy Weldon, CEO of the Southwest Georgia Community Action Council, shares his thoughts on the enrichment summit, highlighting its benefits for both the students and the community.

“We feel very strongly about the camp. We’ve provided a camping experience for youth and children dating all the way back to the mid seventies. And, what’s so great about this camp is we target rising seventh and eighth graders and we try to give them a lot of activities, fun activities, but educational activities at the same time that will help them grow as citizens to learn more about the importance of being active in the community and being good citizens and giving back to the community and at the same time preparing them as they enter high school to know what options are available to them when they enter high school and then beyond, once they graduate,” said Randy Weldon, CEO, Southwest Georgia Community Action Council.

De’Andra Jacobs reporting.

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