The Familyhood Handbook gives an overview of what Familyhood is.

Below is a brief summary

“The Vision – #Familyhood and and its “Do Now” strategy defines Familyhood’s vision of building a community utilizing schools as the center of the communities development.

#Familyhood is a community development strategy that defines schools as the center for community development.

#Familyhood represents a collaboration at school sites that mainly consists of the schools Student Government Association, Parent Teacher Association, Alumni Association and community partners.

Together, they manage/operate the schools garden, farmers market and future grocery store.

#Familyhood is driven by two motto’s:
1) The Friends of School motto. Which states:” every school shall have a student government Association, Parent Teacher Association and Alumni Association.”

2) The Mo’ Better Food motto states, “every school shall have a garden, a farmers market and grocery store.”

#1stSaturdays is the “do now” strategy to advance any community towards #Familyhood.

How does a school get started? The school defines the 1st Saturday of the month to volunteer at the school with space to increase its Student leadership through a strong Student Government Association and its parent involvement by having a functioning Parent Teacher Association working closely with the school’s Alumni Association to connect the students to improve their community.

#1stSaturdays defines the first Saturday of every month as the official monthly volunteer/recruitment day at schools.

#1stSaturdays promotes every 1st Saturday of the month, as a day to volunteer at the schools in your neighborhood by working on their school garden. Also, 1stSaturdays promotes the schools three major organizations: Student Government Association, Parent Teacher Association and Alumni Association to share updates, while they volunteer on the schools garden.

If the school does not have any of the organizations above, 1stSaturdays promotes some dedicated time to create them.

1stSaturdays.com is the official site of the advancement towards #Familyood

Familyhood  is divided into four main strategies/brands/websites/twitter that work together to recruit volunteers (students/parents/alumni/community partners) to join these organizations and to eventually collaborate.

They are: #1stSaturdays/1stsaturdays.com, #friendsofschool/friendsofschool.org
#familyhood (#1 definition above)/ intergenerationalenterprise.com and #mobetterfood/mobetterfood.com.

To define each:
#1stSaturdays defines the 1st Saturday of each month at the school as the official monthly volunteer/recruitment day.

#Familyhood BEGINS with the SCHOOL’S ADMINISTRATION “SAVING ALL 1st SATURDAYS of the year” on the annual calendar as “Volunteer/Recruitment days”.

Each 1st Saturday’s of the month, volunteers visit the school to achieve the two main motto.

1) #Friendsofschool’s motto is, “every school shall have a functioning Student Government Association, Parent Teacher Association and Alumni Association.”

Since, many schools do not have these organizations functioning on campus, especially in lower income communities, the #friendsofschool program assists the school’s administration with creating/ engaging and collaborating these organizations with community partners to advance towards #Familyhood (definition 3).

During the 1stSaturday’s volunteer events, #Friendsofschool promotes a portion of time on the agenda to updates from representatives of the school’s SGA, PTA, ALUMNI.

2) #mobetterfood’s motto is “every school shall have a garden, a farmers market and a grocery store.”

Each month, The Intergenerational Enterprise meets at the schools garden or/and farmers market to improve it, with a vision of achieving both motto’s.

3) #Familyhood is the vision of a community or neighborhood becoming a healthy, sustainable, peaceful, community.

We believe we can advance communities towards #Familyhood by utilizing schools as centers for community development.

If you would like to organize a 1st Saturday’s at a school near you, click here.

We are currently seeking individuals to organize 1st Saturdays at schools in their community and community partners to join our efforts.

If interested in joining, donating to our efforts, please feel free to contact us.