Who is Zone 126?
We are a youth development organization committed to students living in Astoria/Long Island City zip codes 11101, 11102, and 11106. While this area of Queens enjoys an economic boom, our students are living in concentrated pockets of poverty, anchored by three public housing developments—including the largest public housing development in the United States.
95% of our students are students of color, 82% qualify for free/reduced lunch (a federal poverty indicator), and 12% have special needs. Their average household income is $25,605, drastically below that of non-public housing residents in Astoria ($71,792) and Long Island City ($98,920). We utilize a Collective Impact approach to ensure that our students can overcome these challenges, access support from cradle to career, and achieve educational success.
The Challenge
Chronic absenteeism is a pervasive issue. According to the U.S. Department of Education, as many as 1 in 6 students miss enough school to be considered chronically absent. When students miss school, they experience learning loss. This has a long-lasting, negative effect on their test scores, social-emotional development, ability to graduate high school, and future earning potential. The harmful impact of absenteeism disproportionately affects students of color, who are more likely to face other barriers to educational success such as living in poverty and having chronic health conditions or disabilities.
The Solution
Our Collective Impact approach activates our community, schools, and service providers in a cross-sector effort to support local students in need. Through integrated programming that centers the whole child, we directly promote students’ academic success and wellness in addition to the needs of their families and community networks. This encourages school attendance and builds strong educational pipelines that close educational achievement gaps for low-income students of color. It is a proven-effective approach by both the U.S. Department of Education and Zone 126’s own outcomes.
