Parents create group to unite community for children

(Sentinel photo by Magdalene Landegent) Barb Messelhiser and Misty De Man, organizers of the Changing Lives Foundation, have created several programs including mentoring and Block Friends to encourage the community to work together for the benefit of children living in Le Mars. [Click to enlarge]

Misty De Man and Barb Messelhiser are creating The Changing Lives Foundation, combining mentoring, safety and support for Le Mars families.

"The community needs to bond together to be a better unit to help our children," said De Man, the foundation's director and mother of three.

The foundation already has three branches, a mentoring program, the Family Resource Center and the Child Safety Program, and more are yet to come.

The mentoring program will match up children with mentors who will spend time together, encouraging, guiding and supporting the child.

Anyone 16 and older can apply to be a mentor. Mentors must have a valid driver's license and pass a mandatory background check.

Those under 18 must also have parent's consent to be a mentor.

Parents and others can suggest children who might be a good fit to have a mentor. De Man said a few have already signed up.

"These are our future leaders," she said. "Why not give them the tools they so badly need now and teach them how to be the kind of leaders we want them to be?"

The foundation will match mentors with children.

Mentoring also helps parents, especially single parents or families where both parents have to work to pay bills, which is more and more common, said Messelhiser, the organization's assistant director.

"Every parent needs to have a little time to themselves," she added. "It goes a long way toward a healthy family."

It's a 'pay it forward' situation," Messelhiser added.

"Even if you help just one child, that one's going to help someone else," she said.

The second branch, the Family Resource Center, is a program that offers once-a-month meetings for parents and families designed to help bring families closer.

Meeting topics will range from creating low-cost family fun nights and family meals to make together to safety, Internet awareness and talking to children about difficult topics.

"It will also bring different age groups of parents together, and they can share advice and stories," Messelhiser said.

The first meeting will be 7 p.m. Thursday, Dec. 11. A location has yet to be decided and will be announced soon.

After the first meeting, Family Resource Center meetings will be the third Thursday of every month.

The third branch of the foundation is the Child Safety Program.

This program is designed to bring neighborhoods together to help children.

"Back in the '80s we had block parents," De Man said, explaining that these were people that children on the block could go to if they were lost or in trouble. "We want to bring that back."

That's where the idea for Block Friends came from, she said.

If children are walking to bus stops or home from school and they're lost, hurt, scared, or bullied along the way, Block Friends would be safe homes they could stop at, Messelhiser explained.

After going through an application process which includes a background check, a family could serve as Block Friends, posting a specific sign in their window letting children know their home is a safe one to stop.

"We don't want children to go into a house of a person who's made an assault or is on the predator list," Messelhiser said.

De Man and Messelhiser plan to host meetings in a home in each neighborhood to explain the program, beginning this week, and they'll speak at the schools to make sure children understand Block Friends.

Parents could find out who Block Friends are and take their children to visit them, De Man suggested.

"We want to bring the community back together, to know your neighbors," De Man said. "That makes for a safer community."

People selected to serve as Block Friends will be given some basic instructions, but will not need special training, like CPR classes.

Anyone willing to host a neighborhood meeting can contact the Changing Lives Foundation at its Le Mars office by calling 712-587-0922 or on the foundation's cell phone at 712-541-5184.

De Man and Messelhiser have been working on the Changing Lives foundation for about six months.

"We're meeting with the Le Mars Police this week, and we've talked to the Living Center, DHS (Department of Human Services) and Plains Area Mental Health, and they're all very supportive," De Man said.

The mentoring, Family Resource Center and Child Safety Program are only part of what De Man and Messelhiser envision.

Their big goal is a before- and after-school program.

It will be similar to Sioux City's Beyond the Bell program, which has been growing for the past eight years and now includes Sioux City and South Sioux City schools.

The program focuses on academics, youth development, fitness and recreation and nutrition.

"It gives kids a place to go," De Man said. "There would be tutoring, snacks, lessons, and it's putting older children with younger children and helping them help each other."

The big holdup to starting the after school is the money to get it started, she added.

They need about $40,000 for that.

Beyond this amount, she said, the organization needs about another $50,000 to cover basic costs, like flyers and printing, background checks, renting meeting spaces and more.

For example, the Family Resource Center offers incentives for parents to come. Every meeting the attend earns them points. If they are part of other Changing Lives Foundation activities, they also earn points.

When the points add up, they can "buy" something like bowling passes for their family or ice cream certificates.

De Man and Messelhiser are applying for grants to cover the foundation's costs.

They're also seeking community donations.

To donate, contact De Man at the numbers listed above.

"We have a lot of dreams and ideas of where to go with this," Messelhiser said.

De Man agreed.

"We are going to start out small and go from there," she said. "We want to bring the community back together, to know your neighbors."

Messelhiser nodded.

"This will help make us responsible for the community again," she said. "It's not just a police job."