Teen resource centers open at 3 Ogden high schools

OGDEN — Ogden School District’s three high schools hit the ground running this year with new teen resource centers as the new school year began.

Jer Bates, director of communications for the Ogden School District, told the Standard-Examiner in an email Friday the newly opened centers at Ogden, Ben Lomond and Ogden Technical high school offer several services for students in need.

“The Teen Centers at BLHS, OHS and OTECH HS cater primarily to any student facing challenges associated with homelessness and housing instability,” he said. “The centers are equipped to provide a safe and welcoming space for students to shower, wash clothes and prepare food. At the centers our students can receive donated school supplies as well as food, clothing and hygiene supplies. In addition to meeting immediate, short-term needs, our Teen Centers are also designed to connect students with community resources to help identify more permanent solutions. The Teen Centers can also be utilized by students who occasionally have need of a quiet, secure and stress-free space. This can be particularly helpful for individuals dealing with sever anxiety. Our goal is to give students a place that feels more like home than a classroom or an office.”

This comes on the heels of the district opening a similar facility at Odyssey Elementary School last fall.

“The Family Center at Odyssey Elementary School provides access to the same items and services as our Teen Centers in a space that is large enough to accommodate an entire family,” Bates added. “Similar to the Teen Centers, the Family Center works to connect parents with community partners for long-term support and resources. All of these centers are made possible through the partnership between Ogden School District and Ogden School Foundation with the support and donations from generous community members.”

In addition to these centers, the district’s Child Nutrition Center, which opened last winter, includes the MarketStar Student Resource Center, which collects and distributes many of the same items the family and teen centers administer to the other schools in the district.

Bates said, for the moment, the center at OHS is fully operational, but services at the other two new centers will be fully realized in the coming weeks.

“The BLHS center is providing support on a limited basis,” he said. “The school will soon have a full-time supervisor in place to allow the center to fully serve students. The OTECH HS center is similarly supporting students on a limited basis and will continue to ramp up its operation.”

He did not give an exact time frame for full operational status.

Shauna Haney, Ogden High School principal, said the new teen centers can be very powerful.

“Teen centers will remove barriers for students and allow them to focus on their academics,” she said. “They will change the lives of many of our students and provide them with the resources to leave high school with the skills they need to be successful members of society.”

Anthony Martinez, Ogden High School student body president, agreed that the new center will be a huge boost for students.

“I think this is really important for students, especially for students that don’t have needs met at home, because it’s hard to focus on school when you are worried about other things,” he said. “So this is a place where they can feel safe, where someone cares about them.”

Amanda Hadley, Ben Lomond’s head secretary, said the school’s center is already making a difference.

“The teen center has been a great addition to Ben Lomond High School,” she said. “Even operating in a limited capacity, administrative assistants have been able to assist students with their needs by utilizing the teen center. Having this opportunity has allowed us to create relationships with students which is very important.”

Bates said that while there aren’t currently plans to add similar centers to other schools in the district, it will be kept in mind for any new construction down the road.

“Each of our schools has a limited on-hand supply of donated items. Individual requests to meet specific student and family needs are communicated from the schools to the MarketStar Student Resource Center on the district campus, which serves as the central hub for receiving and distributing donations,” he said.

Ribbon cuttings and opening celebrations involving parents, community members and students are planned for at least two of the centers. A ribbon cutting has been set for BLHS at 3 p.m. Sept. 18 and for OHS at 3 p.m. Sept. 19.

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