As we kick off a school year like no other, we want to take a moment to share our gratitude for your support. Thanks to you, we’ve been able to maintain the high-quality enrichment programming you’ve come to expect from us, as well as create new ways to be of service to central Indiana families.

Your continued support matters, and you can click here to donate to our Annual Fund. Our Annual Fund helps us purchase the highest quality peer-reviewed curriculum for our programs, provide professional development that keeps our programs on the leading edge of out-of-school-time enrichment, and ensure we maintain affordable fees for service. In short, it lets us do what we do best. Keep in mind that the March 2020 CARES Act increased tax incentives for charitable giving, including an additional deduction for charitable gifts up to $300. Even if you are not itemizing your 2020 taxes, you can claim this new deduction.

Keeping kids safe and on-track is an essential need for Indiana families, and we want to keep filling it no matter what 2020 throws our way. So far, AYS has proven that we’re nimble enough to pivot when we need to and creative enough to innovate and meet new needs.

Here are some of the great milestones we’ve achieved since last spring:

• Opened three successful emergency full-day programs for children of essential workers.
• Launched three Liftoff e-learning support centers to offer full-day programming for youth in grades K-6, on Monday through Friday, with staff who are specially trained in e-learning.
• Opened twenty of our traditional before-and-after school programs in central Indiana.
• Equipped our locations and staff with the tools needed to go touchless and virtual.
• Trained all staff in CDC protocols for a safe and healthy environment and reconfigured our program procedures for no-contact pickup, drop-off, and daily activities.

We live a new reality, and because of you, and because of our resilient staff, we know that we’ll be able to keep going. Remote learning seems to be here to stay, and parents juggling full-time jobs or finding new ones need to know their kids are getting the support they need to succeed in school. We’re here for that, and we’ll keep being here in 2020 and beyond. Our kids go further!

Last March, no one expected that we’d still be responding to the COVID-19 crisis during the 2020-2021 academic year, but if this pandemic has taught us anything, it’s that we can never know what to expect. Thank you for all you do to keep us ready for anything.