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Who We Serve

What We Do

Our Programs

The Need

Testimonials

Renzi's Students

The Renzi Education and Art Center serves 100-120 Shreveport-Bossier youth in grades K-12 every school year.  Because we know that having a diverse student body benefits children’s educational, artistic, and personal development, we welcome kids from all income, racial, ethnic, and religious backgrounds as well as of all sexual orientations.  However, we target and recruit K-12 youth from low-income, high-crime neighborhoods in Shreveport.   Approximately 80% of our students are from these areas.

   

Most of our students:

• Go to underperforming schools 
• Struggle to keep up in school
• Live in substandard housing 
• Live with relatives – adults and children – who suffer from mental illness, drug addiction, and often both
• Live with relatives or family friends who have been in and out of prison
• Live in transient families, who move multiple times within a year, without warning, and under the radar
  

• Live in households headed by a single female parent or guardian

The racial/ethnic breakdown of our current student body is:

• 66%    African American
• 25%    White/Caucasian
•   9%    Latino and mixed
  

Why Renzi Kids are Amazing

What amazes us is how positive and resilient our at-risk students are, despite their tough circumstances.  They don’t always start out that way at Renzi, but we see time and time again that after being here for only a week -- sometimes for just a day, they are more upbeat, energetic, and confident.  If there is anything we’ve learned from working with and serving the kids of Highland and Stoner Hill, it’s that they are special, amazing people. 

They can do so much -- and will do so much -- if they can just have some of the same opportunities their peers from higher income families have: one-on-one assistance with their homework, the space, materials, and freedom to express and discover themselves, and lots of encouragement and positive attention from caring adults.

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