Bright Side: The Epoch Dream Center

Helping kids mentally and physically, it's what Joann Blackmon does every day. Blackmon and her husband run the Epoch Dream Center, an after school program for under served school children in the Hebron area. Doing everything from swimming lessons to homework, Blackmon uses Nelsons Church as well as her own home to provide for these children. Some other activities include basketball, sewing, and mentoring.

Blackmon tells 47 ABC, "If I can love my kids, I can love some other kids."

Receiving funding from United Way as well as Perdue and other private donors, they serve kids at Westside Primary, Westside Intermediate as well as Mardela and Salisbury middle. Blackmon's been running this for 4 years.

Blackmon tells 47 ABC, "We're seeing tremendous strides with our students across the board their GPA's are up, there performance is up in school, their behavior and their attitudes seem to be on the rise and that's great, it's been better than expected."

Blackmon says they're always looking for kids who need that extra attention or extra help. With the help of the 4 schools, teachers recommend students they think would fit best in the program. As far as what inspired her to start this center?

Blackmon tells 47 ABC, "Why is it more appropriate or more acceptable for our own children to have all that they need, including love and nurturing and strong parenting and food and clean clothes and a place that's safe for them, when we can drive through our neighborhood and lots of other neighborhoods and see kids our kids age walking the streets at 10 at night. My thought was, why isn't anyone wondering where these kids are? Some people just don't have that extended group to help with and we thought we would kind of put our selves out there, an extra hand to fill in the gaps where people need help."

And the interaction doesn't end when the kids walk out the door. Blackmon tells 47 ABC, "We try to have a presence in the schools so our kids know when they go to sing their Christmas songs were going to be sitting in the audience watching them, we go to 5th grade graduations the whole thing, so there's a well rounded level of support. It's really an amazing opportunity to be able to work with the kids that we get to work with every single day."

Blackmon says they're working this year on developing their high school program for next year.