HIT THE BOOKS INC
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Mission Statement
Hit the Books (“HTB”) aims to bring additional educational resources to underserved communities through a sports-based development approach, with tutoring and mentorship at its core and mixed martial arts as the ‘hook’. HTB serves as an after-school community center to facilitate career development and help make any and every goal achievable for its Students.
About This Cause
Hit the Books (“HTB”) aims to provide educational resources to underserved communities through a sports-based development approach, with tutoring and mentorship at its core and mixed martial arts as the ‘hook.’ Based out of our 5,000 sq ft facility located in Harlem, New York, Hit the Books serves as an academic, fitness, and community center that helps make every goal achievable for its students. Currently, HTB provides free after-school educational programs, mixed martial arts classes, and peer mentorship to students in Harlem in grades 2-8. HTB exposes our students to educational opportunities that may otherwise pass them by, fostering an environment of educational equality. In addition to enhancing the educational resources available to children, HTB has developed into a community within a community where students view the facility as a safe space and second home. Hit the Books has been a haven for students and families during the COVID-19 pandemic. While inequality has always been a problem, programs like Hit the Books are now more important than ever and help students make up for lost time. Prior to the pandemic, students in Harlem were already behind. The graduation rate in Harlem was 69% in 2019 versus 83% in New York state. Just 22% of students in grades 3-8 were proficient in math in Harlem versus 45% statewide. In ELA, the gap was 29% vs. 45%. The pandemic has worsened these divides, with 80% of Hit the Books’ parents saying they were financially impacted by the pandemic and 70% saying their child’s education was impacted. Programs like Hit the Books also have a major impact on students beyond the classroom. 376 out of every 100,000 people in New York State become incarcerated at least once in their lifetime. That number is over 50% higher for residents of Harlem at roughly 575 out of every 100,000 people. However, research has shown that an improvement of 10% in a 5th grader’s ELA or math performance can reduce these odds by 25%. The fight to improve the lives of our students must be robust and begin early in our students’ academic careers. Every day at Hit the Books begins with a snack and homework help for roughly one hour. Afterward, half of our students receive tutoring in math and reading while the other half participate in a guided mixed martial arts class. The groups then switch places so that each student receives equal time in academic and fitness programming. Our days are concluded with a free communal dinner and student dismissal. During the summer months, we host a 5-week, full-day, 5-day per week summer camp for 30-50 of our school year students. Our expanded summer academic programming allows us to target students’ academic weaknesses and drastically improve performance ahead of the upcoming school year. Parents have also praised our summer programming for providing hours of MMA classes and outdoor recreational activities, giving students a fun and necessary outlet during their break from school. As a mission-driven organization, we look forward to supporting our students long-term. We have expanded our hours to include classes until 7PM on Mondays and Tuesdays and Saturday programming. This has helped us to meaningfully increase our student population and expand into middle school age groups. We have recently hired new staff to support our growth, including a Director of Education, Director of Operations, and additional program staff. HTB utilizes academic and fitness assessments to track and measure student progress in our program. Each day during our academic instructional time, students utilize the iReady online platform, which is monitored and supplemented by tutors and staff to support their growth in literacy and math. We implement a pre- and post-SEL assessment, Hello Insight, to further measure our impact. At the beginning and end of the program year, students are assessed in iReady, which evaluates their performance in key areas in math and reading. In 2023-2024, 73% of our students showed growth in literacy and 80% showed growth in math compared to drops in national test scores, particularly for low-income students of color. Additionally, we saw our rate for students on grade level improve from 13% to 22% in Reading and 7% to 14% in math. In our cohort of students that have been with us for multiple years, we have observed that 75% of students have grown on a percentile basis. In this cohort, the average growth has been from the 33rd percentile to the 54th percentile in reading (7 percentile points per year) and the 22nd percentile to the 42nd percentile in math (7 percentile points per year). Across four years of programming, we have consistently been able to double the number of our students that are on grade level in reading and triple the number of students on grade level in math. In our mixed martial arts class, students are tested each semester through physical fitness assessments (portrayed as fun competitions) to track students’ strength, agility, and physical capabilities. Each of these components informs individualized programming and helps design the next term’s fitness program. To date, we have seen immense growth in our students’ fitness, with 500%-3,500%+ average growth in push-ups, squats, sit ups, and laps (running). Nearly all of our students have shown improvement across our exercise areas. We leverage parent survey responses to further understand the impact we have on our students. In our 2023-2024 survey we had a 98% positive response rate, with 58% of our parents ‘strongly agreeing’ with our impact. These questions cover the academic impact we have on our students, the improvement in their physical health, and social emotional development.