Grade School Program
Sophia Program
Inn Dwelling provides a rigorous middle school program in an urban elementary school. Qualifying students, ages 11-13, are provided an opportunity to prepare for selective high schools. In an all-day (8 AM to 5 PM) academically challenging environment, students develop their potential and learn behaviors that will prepare them for our partner high schools. This is a replicable program that we will reproduce in more urban schools.
Inn Dwelling II
Inn Dwelling provides after school homework help to grade school students at our location in Northeast Philadelphia.
High School Program
Inn Dwelling I & II
Taking place in two locations (Germantown and Northeast Philadelphia), Inn Dwelling's high school program provides:
- Homework assistance
- SAT/ACT preparation
- Leadership opportunities
- Community service opportunities
- Summer enrichment
- Bridge scholarships
- Exposure to the arts
Since many of our students are first-generation college attendees, we promote experiences to identify a best-fit school for each student. College visits, assistance with the admissions process, advocacy, and a host of other services enable students to have confidence in their college choice.
Enrichment Opportunities
Inn Dwelling is committed to educating the whole student and exposing our students to a variety of experiences including:
- Attending summer programs at colleges including Lehigh University, Xavier University, American University, Carlton College, Cornell University, University of Pittsburgh, Johns Hopkins University, Villanova University.
- Saturday enrichment at Merion Mercy Academy and St. Joseph's Preparatory School for middle school students
- Community service projects serving senior citizens, children, and local nonprofits
- Leadership opportunities through our Student Advisory Council, student-led retreats, and organizing community service projects
Letter from one of Inn Dwelling's first college graduates, Charles Arroyave:
I attended West Catholic High School on a full tuition scholarship, having put aside my partial tuition scholarship from St. Joseph's Prep. I graduated from Chestnut Hill College with a degree in Education and with the Phi Kappa Epsilon Award.
I taught at Inn Dwelling throughout my college career, and I know firsthand that our students would not be able to accomplish what they accomplished without the financial and emotional support of those who shared with us their resources and a vision that transcends the inner-city. Our youth, for the most part, are bright and deserving. Their problems are multiple, but their spirit is willing and strong; their intelligence is documented and realized in a thousand different ways because of you and the many foundations that have supported them.
Often times a child comes to Inn Dwelling hungry; more times than not, the child knows what it means to have their electricity turned off leaving him or her with no access to a computer, or their gas turned off leaving him with no access to a warm shower. The students, however, come positive, desirous of participating fully in our society, and wanting to succeed in school. It is unimaginable that a student would want to come to an after school program every day, when he or she only had to come two days. It is unthinkable that a child would be asked to pay the parent's electric bill out of his $60 per week salary. It is tragic when a child cannot go to school because her brother had to use her gym uniform on the same day as she. These are the facts. Yet all of our eighth graders have received substantial amounts of money to attend competitive high schools such as LaSalle College High School, Merion Mercy Academy, Holy Ghost Preparatory School, Germantown Friends, Mt. St. Joseph Academy, St. Basil's Academy, and Abington Friends Upper School. All of our seniors have been accepted to colleges that include universities such as Villanova, Penn State, De Paul and St. John's to name a few. One of our seniors is awaiting word from Harvard University.
I know first-hand that children who bear afflictions are not always overcome by them, but rise above them with a little hope and a little support. I know that anything is possible with the proper mixture of love and self-discipline. The future can only offer the promise of change if the present provides the opportunity to rise high, very high. Inn Dwelling is that kind of program. It offers challenge and the promise of a new dawn. Most of all it insists that every child achieve his or her potential and return to his or her community with shirt-sleeves rolled up and a willingness to engage in social change. Inn Dwelling is the only nonprofit organization that held my feet to the fire because I had the human capital to become independent of systems-private and government. It has lit a fire under me and I will be eternally grateful.
