Safe To Be Smart Program

Youth Services Assistant- George Carter

The Rochester Public Library plays a crucial role in delivering library services to neighborhoods throughout the City and providing safe havens for children and youth. The libraries are often the only educational and cultural resource available beyond the schools.

There is a great disparity among the neighborhoods in  Rochester; the Friends & Foundation of the Rochester Public Library is working to raise funds for those branches in areas with the greatest needs. Many of the branch libraries are stretched beyond the limits of their financial and staffing resources. Children who fill these libraries after school, on the weekends and during vacations need more supervision, assistance and creative programs than the libraries are currently able to provide.

The Safe to be Smart program provides programming opportunities for children and adolescents at the Wheatley, Lincoln, Sully, Maplewood and Arnett Branch Libraries as well as the Central Library of Rochester and Monroe County on South Avenue.

Friends & Foundation of the RPL is seeking support for the Safe to be Smart program that utilizes community services to offer after-school programs at the branches and Central Library.  Activities above and beyond operational funding including cultural and literacy-related field trips, life skills programming, community service activities and guest speakers.

An endowed fund named in memory of George R. Parsons Jr. was established by the Halcyon Hill Foundation, making funding available on a continuing basis to support branch library services for children and youth, including programs such as Safe to be Smart. Additional gifts to the fund help provide consistent support and new gifts are gratefully accepted.

To give a gift today, please visit the Friends & Foundation of the RPL donations page here.