Earlier this month, tragedy struck Citizen Schools' Henderson Campus in North Carolina. Abria Lewis, a charter participant in Citizen Schools' programs at Henderson, was killed along with her younger brother in a house fire. We are also collecting donations for the family. If you would like to contribute, we are accepting gifts as small as $1.We will notify you once we have the donation link set up.
Angelo Cross, Campus Director at Henderson:
They told us this job was going to be hard. They told us our days would be filled with challenges and frustrations. We knew what we were getting into. What they didn’t tell us is that our students would become our children, our co-workers would become our sisters and brothers, and our students’ families would become our cousins. Their successes would become ours; their tragedies would become ours, and we would have to step up and mobilize when we were called.
On Nov. 9, 2009, we got the call. One of our charter members at Henderson Middle School, Abria Lewis, was killed with her younger brother during a fire. Her mother, the bookkeeper at the school, was a supporter of Citizen Schools who referred other students after being satisfied with her own daughter’s involvement.
Abria was an exceptional young woman who had an infectious, positive personality. She embodied all the values Citizen Schools tries to relay to its students in and out of program: perseverance, teamwork, courage, leadership, to name a few. She would even deserve the star you can’t cut out: “remarkable.”
The relationships that Citizen Schools builds with its students go beyond academics. We want to reach out to the larger Citizen Schools family and help the Lewis’ begin the rebuilding process by showing the type of support that Citizen Schools can give to members of its community.
Our collective gifts of $1 or $2 can help this family through their roughest time with not only financial support but a concrete understanding of how Citizen Schools is much more than an after school program.
We would like to present the family with a check at the WOW! December 9th where Abria’s Citizen Schools colleagues will pay tribute to her.
