KNOWLEDGE QUEST INC
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Mission Statement
Serving the community since 1998, Knowledge Quest responds to the needs of the community through helping to stabilize homes, providing access to health, and by making the clear path to opportunities for families. Engaging the whole family is a priority at Knowledge Quest and we have developed a variety of programs offering targeted assistance to Memphians including our Extended Learning Academies, Green Leaf Learning Farm, Family Stability Initiative, and our Universal Parenting Place. In partnership with Best Buy, we will be opening a Teen Tech Center Spring 2021. This center will be a free, interactive learning space where teens can explore technology and learn how to use it.
About This Cause
More than twenty years post of its founding, Knowledge Quest has grown from a passionate thought of its founder to a youth and community development organization that has engaged thousands of lives and continues to invest in children, their families and the neighborhoods in which they reside. Families primarily reside in the 38126 and 38106 zip codes of Memphis, TN. The programs operate from three sites within a 2-mile corridor along Walker Avenue known as the “Knowledge Quest Kids Zone.” KQ’s mission is to vigorously equip youth and their families to maximize their potential through education, wellness and economic stability and its vision is to transform lives by expanding minds. Knowledge Quest operates through four strategic programs: the KQ Extended Learning Academies; Family Stability Initiative, Family Stability Centers, and Green Leaf Learning Farm (featuring the Jay Uiberall Culinary Academy). Knowledge Quest’s programs are designed to incorporate a Two-Generational strategy toward promoting family and community development. Each of our four programs ‘wrap around’ families, prioritizing matters of stable homes, parent and child physical and mental health as well as school success and career attainment. The respective strategies of each program are under gird by collective impact teams whereby we come alongside local community partners committed to singular outcomes in the respective program areas. The chart below offers a visualization of our two-generation model. Knowledge Quest’s Extended Learning Academies are open enrollment, non-fee based programs that work to promote academic excellence, social emotional competency, and healthy lifestyles in an after-school setting. The KQ Extended Learning Academies serves students, Pre-K through 12th grade, across three campuses. The program models for the ELAs are based on four core activities: homework tutorials, “Adventure Education” (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) and Reading Language Arts), good health and nutrition, and recreation. The Family Stability Initiative program assists families experiencing crisis, particularly financial crisis that may lead to the loss of their current place of residence. Housing instability is related to increased school mobility, decreased school attendance, and diminished academic performance. The goal of the program is to enhance the academic success of youth by addressing crises related to housing, employment and other ‘stability’ matters within households. The types of services offered include: assistance accessing other available supportive services; presentation of life skills sessions and hard skill development and advanced education/training designed to promote greater household stability through increased wages among parents. The Family Stability Centers support parents as they face the challenges involved in raising children. The sites apply a relationship-based model that works in tandem with existing community resources to mitigate the effects of toxic stress and trauma on childhood development. The center provides parents with access to professional resources for addressing behavioral challenges at the earliest point in their children’s development. The three primary parent engagement strategies include: parent-centered and family activities; therapeutic groups; and individual counseling sessions with a licensed therapist. Knowledge Quest has transformed thirty formerly vacant, blighted lots including the repurposing of three formerly vacant, abandoned buildings into a 3-acre urban, micro-farm positioned on our Main Campus. Formally initiated to support the nutritional needs of the South Memphis community, Green Leaf now operates as a USDA Certified Organic farm that focuses its efforts on three strategic pillars: good health and nutrition education, community/economic development, and healthy food access/security. On the farm, students and family members learn how to grow food in ways that build community and increase neighborhood access to healthy foods. Our students and their families become healthy eaters, entrepreneurs, and advocates for social and environmental justice. Lastly and with much anticipation, Knowledge Quest will open a Best Buy Teen Tech Center, Summer 2021!! It is the first and only center in the Tennessee tristate area.